At the moment, it’s hard to envision an offramp for the tinderbox that is the situation in the Middle East. It’s obviously what Hamas wanted. Provoke Israel into launching a military campaign so the Palestinians can claim victimhood and provoke outrage across the world. It worked. Mass protests in Europe and the US in support of Palestine. The US is now reportedly pressuring Israel to postpone any ground invasion of Gaza. Hezbollah is ramping up attacks in the north and Egypt has moved a hundred thousand troops towards the border. Iran is happily stoking the unrest. Israel is fucked no matter what they do.

If they do nothing, it emboldens the muslim world to continue using terror to extract concessions. If they strike, it also emboldens the muslim world to continue using terror tactics. This won’t end. It wasn’t that long ago, in this scenario the proper solution would be to remove your enemy from the playing field with extreme prejudice. That is no longer an option. Israel has to balance every single action against the court of public opinion, which was already slanted against them. So basically Israel has to just sit there and take it.

Here’s the problem. I don’t think Israel is going to worry as much about a “proportional response” this time. And that is what Hamas wanted all along. And the US is going to get dragged into this in support of our ally. And that scares me.

We do not have a competent administration in charge. Based upon how badly we misjudged (by accident or design) the ongoing Ukraine situation, I have zero confidence that we have any reasonable analysis happening regarding the potential fall-out from a large regional conflict in the Middle East. Especially one in which we’re up to our elbows in.

If large scale missiles start flying, what then? What do you think is going to happen to the price of oil if the Suez Canal and the Strait of Hormuz is shut down? Saudi Arabia and Iraq are still in the top 5 for US oil imports. Our strategic oil reserve is empty. We’re not ramping up domestic oil production anytime soon. Think inflation is bad now? Wait until the price of diesel doubles. Scarcity of goods will become a very real thing here. Remember the empty shelves during the blip that was covid? It’ll be a lot worse than that… assuming you can still afford to buy anything.

Think this will remain a regional conflict over there? When we start lobbing missiles at Syria, Lebanon, and Iran… picture the millions of people who’ve streamed across our border in the last few years. We have zero idea who’s in our country. You’re very naive if you think we won’t start seeing terror attacks across the homeland.

We are closer to a large scale global conflict than I ever thought I’d see in my lifetime. Sadly, there doesn’t seem to be anyone capable of walking us back from the ledge. It’s truly frightening.

So now what? My gut says the die is cast. I hope not. I sincerely hope cooler heads prevail and this calms back down to a low simmer. But as the old saying goes, hope is not a plan.

It’s time to be prepared to look after your family and friends. Can you withstand frequent, sustained rolling power outages? Do you have food and basic supplies to bridge the gap if the supply chain breaks down? Are you prepared to defend against the civil unrest that follows food and goods scarcity? For gods sake, people were nearly coming to blows over the toilet paper shortage during covid. This would be much worse.

Better to have and not need, than need and not have. But you never know. I’ve been known to get a bit negative after spending too much time reading social media. There’s a chance I’m simply a weird tinfoil hat guy sitting in my basement. Biden might cancel his beach vacation and negotiate a lasting world peace. Obama may step in and wave his Nobel prize around. The ayatollah might get scared of Lindsey Graham’s chest thumping and back down.

Maybe.