Before my blog on earthquakes, two newsworthy items: The lull in the Iran War is over.  Iran lobbed missiles at American bases in the Middle East. Here is the backdrop: Way back in February, Netanyahu and Trump felt that, if they could surprise Iran with a serious series of bombardments, they could assassinate the Supreme Leader, plus many dozens of top government leaders, stimulating the people to rebel and overcome.  Israel and the USA could then swoop in, establish a new government, and totally demolish any nuclear ambitions. The USA/Israel did succeed in killing Ali Khamenei and 53 leaders.   Here is the complete list . However, Iran knew someday this would happen, and they organized a plan to take control of the Strait of Hormuz, and if necessary, also the Bab el-Mandeb Strait. Here is the current situation. The people did not rebel, a new government formed and Iran has been able to maintain control over the two oil flow choke points. They also are not idiots....

We know today that smoking tobacco leads to serious health effects. It is the the greatest cause of preventable death globally, and killed at least a hundred million deaths in the 20th century. Current smokers are estimated to die an average of 10 years earlier than non-smokers. Tobacco contains 70 known carcinogens, plus nicotine, which is a highly addictive psychoactive drug. As early as the 1700, it was generally known that tobacco caused cancer. But tobacco companies succeeded in selling their product to the public. I heard that China still smokes a lot, so I asked Google AI: Despite a slight decline in the percentage of individual smokers, overall cigarette consumption in China has surged by 39% over the past two decades . The country now accounts for nearly half of the world's total cigarette consumption , selling approximately 2.4 trillion cigarettes annually. [ 1 , 2 ] The rising trend in cigarette sales and consumption is driven by a combination of institutional, economi...