Good morning.
Monday in Whitewater will be sunny with a high of 69. Sunrise is 7:17 and sunset is 6:54 for 11 hours 37 minutes of daytime. The moon is a waning gibbous with 67 percent of its visible disk illuminated.
Whitewater’s Planning Commission meets at 6 PM.
On this day in 1044, the people of Constantinople riot against emperor Constantine IX Monomachos, whose preference of his mistress Maria Skleraina over empress Zoe Porphyrogenita is seen as an insult.
Iran is far from America, but global markets reach even the supermarket aisle:
What’s happening in the Middle East can seem very far away — at least until you stop for gas. Prices at the pump have jumped since Iran effectively closed the Strait of Hormuz at the start of the conflict, creating a gap in the energy supply chain that spans the world.
It’s a reminder that war has profound effects on all those who are connected to it. And we are all connected to it, somehow.
Take agriculture. “The longer the conflict in the Middle East continues,” writes my colleague Peter Goodman, who covers global economics, “the greater the likelihood that people around the globe will pay more for food. And those in the most vulnerable countries could face hunger.”
Why is that? Because the Persian Gulf is a dominant source of the world’s fertilizers, especially those that deliver nitrogen to soils — a source of nourishment for crops that amount to half the world’s food. Fertilizer is produced in the region and shipped … everywhere. If the Strait of Hormuz remains strangled, prices for fertilizer will rise. And as a result, farmers may use less on their crops, if they can get any at all. The world will get less food, and it will cost more.
[…]Which is terrible timing for farmers in the Northern Hemisphere, who will soon need fertilizer to boost their spring crops. Where might they get it? China’s the most obvious alternative, Peter writes. But last year the Chinese government imposed restrictions on the export of fertilizer, in part to shield its farmers from just the sort of geopolitical chaos this war brought on.
Prices are already climbing. Over the past week, the price of urea sold in Egypt, a market that economists track closely, climbed more than 35 percent. If the trend continues, governments across the Global South could need to subsidize the cost of growing crops. And that could add to their debt burdens.
Missiles fly over Iran: People get poorer in Africa. The cost of groceries in Dallas mounts.
See Sam Sifton, The New York Times, The Morning Newsletter (Mar. 9, 2026).
The man who builds hotels around the world selectively forgets that it’s a global economy for more than a few billionaire hoteliers.
Not long ago, the local landlord faction (well-read, thoughtful as always) was putting up signs on their rental properties warning about higher prices:
They should have spent less time putting up signs and more time studying at the university that sustains them. Even before this war with Iran, Mr. Trump’s long commitment to tariffs was sure to increase prices.
‘Not many off-ramps’ available to get oil back under $100: