Nick Brumfield

"[In Ayutthaya era Siam] waterways functioned as roads with a naturalness that comes to expression the older meaning of the word 'khlong' which now means 'canal' or 'waterway,' but formerly stood for 'road' and did not differentiate between land roads and waterways."

Wittfogel eat your heart out

Trump says only 'unconditional surrender' will end war on Iran US president says 'no deal' with Tehran unless the country capitulates

Whoa boy. This guy doesn't get that Venezuela wasn't actually a total victory.

Map of Israeli airstrikes in the Beirut suburbs over the last few hours (6 MaRCH 2026). Image from https://israelpalestine.liveuamap.com/en/2026/6-march-13-the-israeli-raid-that-targeted-the-southern-suburbs

Israel is extensively bombing the suburban area of Dahiya, south of Beirut. This is the namesake of the 'Dahiya Doctrine', a strategy whereby the IDF targets civilians and civilian infrastructure to put political pressure on governments they don't like. It's literally the definition of a war crime.

High gas prices, war in the middle east, unpopular president, soaring unemployment. Welcome back second term Bush administration.

Killing people should not be something we do quicker than the speed of thought

King of the Waters: Homan van der Heide and the Origin of Modern Irrigation in Siam

Combining my Thailand and water kicks, starting King of the Waters!

A much more interesting book than its title suggests! Less about a Dutch engineer in its title and more about culturally clashing notions of bureaucracy and the shifting political ecology of early 20th century Siamese agriculture

The influencer-fication of celebrity

Dax Shepherd and Kristen Bell are an example of how being a little messy as a celebrity makes you relatable, but making it your brand with a 3-hour podcast just makes you messy

Also worth noting he wrote that in '65, *before* the Six Day War discredited pan-Arabism in favor of Palestinian direct militancy and the 1970s oil crises

Don't get distracted by Noem's ouster. Just cuz Reinhard Heydrich was out in '43 didn't mean the SS didn't keep doing horrific things.

Frank Herbert may have been a crank, but the whole "the spice must flow" theme really did capture the essence of global capitalism

And *that*, regardless of legality (I'm pretty sure it's illegal, as is the US attack on Iran), is why Iran has attacked what it has

Somehow this is already being shrugged off while the BBC has a nice little feature about Trump meeting Inter Miami’s players

I do not believe this will happen. This will not sit well with Dubai, even if Abu Dhabi is mildly keen.

The UAE officially maintains that these assets belong to individuals, not the IRGC/state. A freeze of assets would contradict the official narrative.

Last time the Saudis launched a special military operation, I spent a decade following Yemen

I'm around if you're in town!

Pro-Israel/UAE lobby has been teeing up hating Turkey and Saudi the last year or so.

Will be interesting to see where all this goes after the dust settles.

Deep Dive: The CIA's Kurdish gambit and the war game with Iran When intelligence agencies leak information, it is rarely accidental. The CIA's recent disclosure of US involvement with Iranian Kurdish factions as a potential tool to pressure Iran, therefore, deman...

"So how does Washington move partners it cannot honestly reassure? By manufacturing public pressure. A leak that frames Kurdish engagement as already underway creates expectations among regional audiences, among Iranian intelligence, and critically, within Kurdish political communities themselves."

Kristi Noem has done a stunning amount of damage and it’s good she’s gone.

But this doesn’t change the fact that we need a complete overhaul of DHS, impartial investigations into the killings of two American citizens, and information on children that were taken from Minnesota.

The things different societies decide to automate is very interesting. Thailand has pretty cheap labor that allows it to not automate a lot of things automated in the US, but one of the biggest things here are automated barista machines.

This is actually a separate incident. I love this country.

Israeli tourist accused of assaulting elderly man in Phuket

This one i can vouch for. Will share more

If AI were actually sentient, it'd be diagnosed as a sociopath

Yup. That mountainous borderland up between Laos, China, Burma, and Thailand (what Scott called Zomia) is very similar

Threads thread: thriller_instinct 3d Is it okay to bully 40 and 50 year olds who are on social media just for being on it, cuz like why are you here - 254 Q 3.1K G 28 746 corporateash 18h ••• My ICQ UIN is 7231680. That number is burned into my consciousness. I inadvertently learned that you could see private conversations in public chat rooms when using Telnet instead of a browser on GeoCities. I can tell you the difference in audible dial-up handshakes between 1200, 2400, 14.4 kbps modems. I needed a edu email address to join Facebook after my university was admitted. We were here at the beginning. We made social media. You wouldn't be in my Top 8. I have usernames older than you. 852 Q62 G6 72

“I have usernames older than you.”.
Holy shit

The @nytimes.com will use every possible euphemism to avoid saying “Israeli invasion”

Today the Israelis ordered the evacuation of the southern suburbs of Beirut. This included a couple Palestinian refugee camps. People who were displaced during the Nakba or in 67, settled in Beirut and now their grand/great grandchildren are once again displaced.