I mean, really: have these people never heard of Zoom? Remote working?

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“Paging Mr. Khamenei, please pick up the walkie-talkie waiting for you at Terminal X”

Israel strikes Iranian leadership meeting about Khamenei succession plan

(Update: I’m not sure whether this fellow was at this meeting or someplace else, but either way, we won’t miss him; nor did the Israelis)

Americans say they're willing to pay "no more than $10 month" to fight global warming*, yet they're already paying thousands because of regulatory costs; here’s another $4,000

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Brace for THOUSANDS more in energy costs — unless Albany fixes NY’s insane climate law

NY Post Editorial:

Critics, including us, have been warning that New Yorkers’ energy costs are about to soar even higher, thanks to the state’s insane 2019 climate law.

Now, a state agency itself is confirming those warnings — and has even put a price tag on the pain: a whopping $4,100 a year extra per household by 2031.

That’s just for electricity, reports the New York State Energy Research and Development Agency; the bill for gas for home heating, as well as gasoline costs, are also set to shoot up. At the pump a gallon of gas is expected to go up an eye-watering $2.23.

Plus, businesses’ utility costs could rise 46%, and truck-delivery expenses over 60% — sending consumer prices through the roof.

Gov. Kathy Hochul seems to have recognized at least the political danger: As she runs for reelection on a promise of affordability, voters won’t find the extra hit particularly “affordable.”

So she appears set to push for changes or delays to the law — at least until after she’s safely reelected.

>>>>

Sometimes rule changes are needed to “fit the times,” argues Hochul Budget Director Blake Washington, as if “the times” have dramatically changed unpredictably since the law was passed. 

Truth is, opponents have been flagging its astronomical (and pointless) costs for years. 

Last year, even the left-leaning Progressive Policy Institute called it an “undeniable” failure that’s only succeeded in “driving up costs for families, constraining reliable supply” and imperiling “the political viability of the state’s climate agenda.”

The Climate Act was first championed by ex-Gov. Andrew Cuomo before Hochul doubled down on slashing gas emissions by 40% by 2030 with the goal of achieving 100% zero-carbon-emission electricity by 2040.

Yet fantasizing about an alternate reality didn’t bring it about: “There is a lack of market capacity to deliver the volume of renewable energy” for EVs, heat pumps, etc., to meet the requirements called for under the climate law, notes NYSERDA’s bombshell memo.

Hochul has already quietly pushed her new energy tax — the “cap and invest” program for reducing greenhouse gas emissions — past this fall’s election.

She’s also paused the state’s all-electric building mandate. And she’s sought new modular nuclear-power plants upstate.

Yet she’ll need the Legislature’s backing even just to delay the law’s mandates, and Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart Cousins, for one, is already on record opposing any effort to mess with them.

Unless Albany lawmakers get on board and head off the additional costs, voters would be justified in showing them the door come November.

They’d be justified, but they won’t; just like much of the rest of the country, they reelect the very people who are doing this, and then complain about inflation.

* From ten years ago, but still valid, as other, more recent polls show:

Americans willing to pay to fight climate change (but only a little)

CBS News September 15, 2016 / 4:29 PM EDT / AP

WASHINGTON Most Americans are willing to pay a little more each month to fight global warming - but only a tiny bit, according to a new poll. Still, environmental policy experts hail that as a hopeful sign.

Seventy-one percent want the federal government to do something about global warming, including 6 percent who think the government should act even though they are not sure that climate change is happening, according to a poll conducted by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research and the Energy Policy Institute at the University of Chicago.

And those polled said they’d be willing to foot a little of that cost in higher electric bills.

If the cost of fighting climate change is only an additional $1 a month, 57 percent of Americans said they would support that. But as that fee goes up, support for it plummets. At $10 a month, 39 percent were in favor and 61 percent opposed. At $20 a month, the public is more than 2-to-1 against it. And only 1-in-5 would support $50 a month.

“I feel we need to make small sacrifices - and money is a small sacrifice - to make life better for future generations, “ said Sarah Griffin, a 63-year-old retired teacher in central Pennsylvania. “Surely I have enough money to spend on something that’s worthwhile.”

Greg Davis, a 27-year-old post-graduate student in Columbus, Ohio, agreed: “It’s far more important to protect the environment than to save money. I think that’s true for businesses as well as individuals.”

That a majority is willing to pay more is a new phenomenon, said Tom Dietz, professor of sociology and environmental science and policy at Michigan State University.

Dana Fisher, director of the Program for Society and the Environment at the University of Maryland, said it’s noteworthy that a majority was “willing to pay at all,” and added that the levels of support for $10 a month and $20 a month are significant.

But so was the opposition to higher costs.

James Osadzinski, 52 of Rockford, Illinois, said simply: “I have a set budget. I don’t have the money,” while for 26-year-old nurse Marina Shertzer of Pensacola, Florida, it doesn’t make sense because she doesn’t see climate change as a threat, but something cyclical and normal.

Of those polled, 77 percent said climate change is happening, 13 percent weren’t sure, and only 10 percent said it wasn’t happening.

New listing in (what I'd call) central Greenwich

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7 Dearfield Lane, $2.950 million. Last time out in 2013-2014, it sold, eventually, for $1.940 million on an original ask of $2.495*, but these owners have removed all frightening objects from the household, and that in itself should ensure a better market reception.

original 2014 hazard zone

after exorcism

*An effort that was undoubtedly cursed by this unfortunate article in Greenwich Time:

While the iron is hot: Greenwich couple try to sell their home in a hurry

Story and photos by Anne W. Semmes Updated Oct 31, 2013 4:44 p.m.

What, at this point, does it matter?

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Reuters Poll:

1 in 4 Americans back Trump’s Iran strikes, most say he’s too quick to use force: poll

Republicans mostly supports strikes, Democrats overwhelmingly oppose military action

Trump doesn’t seem to be impressed by how the media’s shaped public opinion, nor should he be.

"I think that the polling is very good, but I don’t care about polling. I have to do the right thing. I have to do the right thing. This should have been done a long time ago," Trump said in an interview Monday with the New York Post when asked about the new survey.

I thought PJMedia’s Scott Pinsker, who writes from a public relations perspective, offered a good take on this yesterday:

PRedictions, PRojections, PRaise, and PRedators: The PR Fallout of the War in Iran

“How this will play in Iran is unknown. (Either way, we’ll soon find out.)

But within the United States, the PR fallout of the Iran War is far easier to predict (or PRedict): If we win, the American people will approve; if it’s ANYTHING other than a win, there’ll be various degrees of blowback.

This is a purely outcome-based military mission: If Iran is flipped from an enemy into an ally — and American casualties are minimal — then this was a masterstroke in realpolitik. 

If so, Trump will be hailed as a visionary…

…which will eke him a few days of positive press, and then be mostly forgotten about by the midterms.

It’s a shame: Despite representing a seismic shift in geopolitics, the U.S. political benefit will be minimal. It’s highly unlikely that Maduro, the Ayatollah, or the collapse of Cuba will matter more in the November midterms than inflation, affordability, domestic issues, and the strength of the economy.

This was one of those gambles where the political downside was FAR greater than the political upside.

Of course, success in Iran will win Trump the love and support of Iranian Americans. We’re already seeing them march in the streets, weeping tears of joy — and thanking President Trump. Right now, they vote heavily Democratic: 52% are Democrats and only 8% Republicans (with 40% independent).

But there just aren’t a lot of ‘em. The Iranian American population is estimated at a little above half a million to maybe 2-ish million. (And about half live in California, which mutes their national reach.) Unless this flips the larger population of Arab Americans (3.7 million), that’s not enough voters to budge the needle.

Even if this war is a smashing success, by Nov. 2026, it’ll probably matter as much as President George H. W. Bush’s Gulf War victory did in 1992.

The Dems would have to retire their “TACO” taunt (for a few weeks, at least), but that’s about it. They’re on record opposing the Iran War, but they’ll pay a minimal PR price for their stance. It’s Maduro redux: Since this isn’t a huge deal to the American people, the Dems will side with their base.

From Joe Six Pack’s perspective, solving the Iranian problem is very nice, but that wasn’t his #1 priority. It’s not what animated him to vote in 2024, and it’s not what’ll drive him to the polls in 2026.

The midterms will still be about the economy. Period.

Now, if Iran’s new government does something that rewards the American taxpayers — cheap oil, military contracts, whatever — the Iran story and the economic story could fuse together. That’s the best-case PR scenario for the GOP: The victory in Iran becomes part of the overall “winning” narrative.

It’s the evidence that proves the theory.

Okay, but what if the Iran War is less than a smashing success? For example, what if we bash and batter Iran for a few weeks, but the mullahs manage to hold on and the regime survives?

Trump would still be able to claim victory: By definition, this was already regime change, because the “supreme leader” — who’d been in power since 1989 — was blown into bits.

Plus, Iran’s military will certainly be weakened. Too many craters over too many military bases already — and we’re just getting started. That alone fulfills the America First precept of advancing our national interests by weakening our enemies.

But that’s not how it’ll be spun.

See, it’s kind of like the Avengers, but for dumbass Republicans: Have you noticed that MAGA’s stupidest members are the ones most opposed to bombing Iran? Those super-geniuses, like Marjorie Taylor Greene, Nick Fuentes, Tucker Carlson, Candace Owens, Andrew Tate, and Thomas Massie, have all united against the president.

They have a microphone, too — and the mainstream media will gleefully amplify all their criticisms.

And we already know what their criticisms will be: AIPAC controls congress, Israel controls America, disloyal Jewish “neocons” control the White House, and this whole damn war was yet another example of the American government putting Israel First.

(Or maybe it was a distraction from the Epstein files, which something-something Israel-Mossad-Jews, too. Those nitwits love a conspiracy.)

If this happens, the PR fallout will be a fractured MAGA movement, with the 20% isolationist wing separating from the rest. And, with depressed GOP turnout, the 2026 midterms will produce a big Blue Wave that gives the Dems full control of the House by 30+ seats — and probably the Senate.

Losing 1 in 5 of our base in the midterms would be impossible to overcome, and there just aren’t enough Iranian Americans to offset the depressed numbers.

Third possibility: What if the war is a horrible mistake and ends in complete and total disaster?

Well, the supreme leader (who’s a lot like a regular leader, only with sour cream) is already dead, so that won’t happen. Plus, our Armed Forces are too frickin’ good to roll snake eyes. The part of this war we control directly — the number of bombs and missiles, and where they go — means we’ll 100% fulfill our objective of regime change at the top, plus degrading of Iranian’s military industrial complex.

So we’ve already passed that threshold. 

But what if Iran captures a downed U.S. pilot and parades him on TV?

What if, during the Biden years, Iran ordered sleeper cells to cross into our border, and they’re waiting for the green light to unleash a wave of terrorist attacks on U.S. cities?

That’s when things get dicey. And the ultimate PR fallout, I’m afraid, will depend on the gruesome specifics.

Sadly, we can’t predict what’s unpredictable — which is still the greatest danger of all.”

Friday closings reported Monday

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The Flying Nun’s house at 35 Sterling Road sold for $7.150 million — full price.

As did, kinda, sorta, 17 Will Merry Lane. It started at $4.795 last year and had dropped to $4.495 by July, when it was pulled from the market, “refreshed” and put back on for $4.695 million, and that’s what it sold for.

Further east, 18 Sound Beach Avenue, new construction, sold for $1.849 million on an original asking price of $2.199.