Economic Isolation

Ratcheting up? “U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has promised to reveal severe measures on Iran, which has endured near-continuous economic sanctions ​since the Islamic Revolution of 1979, when he gives a press conference at 1 p.m. EDT (1700 GMT) on Monday,” reports Reuters.

This comes in response to Iran’s recent escalation, blacklisting 45 oil tankers who had allegedly broken its rules crossing the Strait of Hormuz without permission. These ships might be fined and detained; they might have their cargo confiscated; and “any vessels involved in ship-to-ship transfers ​with the named vessels could be added to the blacklist” as well, per Reuters.

Bessent and the rest of the Trump administration say they’re ready to ratchet up the pressure:

President Trump has dismantled Iran’s military capabilities, destroyed nearly 100 percent of its military factories, and buried its nuclear program.

We are now entering the endgame. At dawn begins an economic D-Day — the single greatest financial offensive ever marshaled against…

— Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent (@SecScottBessent) August 23, 2026

“Our objective is to sever every economic lifeline that sustains the tyrannical regime until Tehran stands alone,” writes Bessent on X. “We’re going to [other countries] and saying: You’re either with us or against us,” said the Treasury secretary last week. “If you insist on doing business with them—either transferring money, buying oil, doing seaborne ship transport—then the US Treasury and the US government, they will put its full might and force towards enforcing against you.”

He vowed that this would be the “greatest coordinated economic isolation in the history of the world.”

But what exactly will this look like in terms of the U.S. relationship with China, Iran’s biggest oil customer?

“The Treasury Department has imposed sanctions on independent Chinese refineries that buy Iranian oil,” reports the Times, “but it has refrained from imposing large-scale sanctions on Chinese financial institutions that facilitate such transactions.” So how robust is the Trump administration’s commitment, really?

Scenes from New York: Where exactly does Gustavo Gordillo, a leader of the Democratic Socialists of America, live? One address leads to an apartment in Crown Heights, another leads to a nearly $2 million townhome in Bedford-Stuyvesant, purchased by his father. “Questions about Mr. Gordillo’s housing surfaced as other aspects of his biography have become murkier,” reports The New York Times. “He moved to the city in 2013, after studying sculpture and video at Yale and worked in a high-end art gallery in Chelsea. He quit, he told The Times, because selling art to wealthy people conflicted with his values, and he decided to become an electrician.” It’s not clear he ever actually did become an electrician: “In interviews, he has described himself as a union electrician. The Times confirmed earlier this month that he was a member of the local IBEW chapter, which represents electricians in the city, though the union said he was more than $300 behind in dues. But the union also said that Mr. Gordillo’s enrollment in an apprenticeship program was terminated in March of this year after he failed to complete the required work.”

QUICK HITS

• This article by 19th News tries to fearmonger about how conservatives who want to restrict commercial surrogacy are also trying to outlaw IVF. I don’t think that’s an accurate representation of what most of these conservatives want.
• “A lot of time has gone into speeding up human communication, from the telegram to the Pony Express to shouting loudly from a rooftop. Lately, at least two apps have asked: Was a carrier pigeon the pinnacle?” asks The New York Times. “One of the apps exploring this idea is Carrier Pidge, an app that allows users to send messages at the speed of pigeon. Users track their bird on a map as it whips toward its destination. Like real birds, the digital pigeons have a chance of getting lost or dying—0.2 percent. Buying a new one within the app will run you 99 cents.”
• Academics studying the death of Friday night: “In the early 2000s, social life followed a clear weekly rhythm: Modest weekday interaction built toward pronounced peaks on Friday and Saturday nights. Since the mid-2010s, that rhythm has collapsed. Friday night, once a central site of social activity, now looks like a typical weeknight. Saturday remains elevated but less so than before. Overall, time with friends has fallen by more than half. The mix of social activities, however, has remained stable. Americans have not replaced one form of interaction with another; they have reduced social interaction across the board. These findings point to a temporal reorganization of social life marked by the disappearance of the ‘night out.'”
• A.I. forecasting:

If Cowen gets credit as being singularly correct/early to this point, I’m going to blow a gasket. I’ve been saying this since at least 2024 as have many others. https://t.co/fFrk6Pw62G pic.twitter.com/nEZTlRCliz

— Jon Stokes (@jon_stokes) August 23, 2026

• Unintended consequences: Unintentional child drowning deaths dropped 38 percent from 2000 to 2019. “But then the trend reversed,” PBS reports, “with the number of child drowning deaths rising from 756 in 2019 to 865 in 2024, the most recent year for which complete data is available.” What happened? Well, for one thing, “The COVID-19 pandemic interrupted swimming lessons and lifeguard training programs.”