The Continuum

The Island That Runs the World: How Taiwan Came to Control 90% of the World's Advanced Chips

Oil has dozens of producers. Advanced semiconductor chips — the components powering every smartphone, every AI system, every modern weapons platform on the planet — have one. Taiwan. One island. 23 million people. 90% of the world’s most advanced chips. And right now, as the Iran war disrupts the energy supply lines that keep Taiwan’s fabs running, the fragility of the entire global technology supply chain has never been more visible. This episode tells the full story — from Taiwan’s deliberate government bet in the 1960s to turn itself from a textile exporter into a semiconductor superpower, to the founding vision of Morris Chang and the pure-play foundry model that nobody else had tried, to the extraordinary ascent of TSMC into the most critical manufacturing company in the history of human technology, to the geopolitical question now dominating the minds of every defense planner and tech executive in the world: what happens to the global economy if Taiwan’s chip production stops? This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit rejil.substack.com [https://rejil.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1]

The Petrodollar: The Cracks In The System | PT 3

The petrodollar system has survived oil embargoes, financial crises, and the rise of China. It survived 2008 — when a crisis born in American banks sent investors running toward the dollar, not away from it. But the dollar just posted its worst performance in over fifty years. And this time, the threat didn’t come from Beijing or Moscow. It came from Washington. In Episode 3 of our Petrodollar series, we cover the two events that are changing the architecture of global finance in real time: the Trump administration’s chaotic tariff policy — which shattered the dollar’s safe-haven status for the first time in modern history — and the war with Iran, which closed the Strait of Hormuz and turned the world’s most critical oil chokepoint into a yuan-denominated toll booth. The petroyuan isn’t theoretical anymore. It’s being enforced at gunpoint in the waters where the petrodollar was born. In this episode: — How the dollar’s safe-haven status broke down under its own government’s policy — Why the Strait of Hormuz closure is the most direct challenge to the petrodollar since 1974 — Iran’s condition for reopening the strait — and what it means that ships paid in yuan — Saudi Arabia’s quiet departure from the 1974 petrodollar arrangement — What the de-dollarization numbers actually show — without the hype or the denial — The British pound parallel — and what it tells us about how reserve currencies actually die This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit rejil.substack.com [https://rejil.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1]

The Petrodollar: The Privilege of Power | Part 2

In Episode 1, we traced how America replaced the gold standard with oil — and built the petrodollar system in a secret deal between Henry Kissinger and the Saudi royal family. In Episode 2, we look at what that system actually did. For fifty years, the United States has run deficits that would have collapsed any other economy. Borrowed endlessly. Printed money. Fought wars it couldn’t pay for. And the global financial system absorbed all of it — because the world needed dollars, and it needed them to buy oil. That is the exorbitant privilege. And it didn’t come for free. The same strong dollar that let Washington borrow cheaply made American manufacturing uncompetitive and sent factories overseas. The same recycling loop that kept interest rates low pumped money into financial assets owned overwhelmingly by the wealthy. And the same dollar dominance that gave the US financial flexibility eventually became something else entirely: a weapon. When the US froze $300 billion in Russian central bank reserves in 2022, every country in the world got the same message: the dollars you hold are subject to American political decisions. Your reserves aren’t savings. They’re hostages. That decision — more than any other single event — is what is now driving the de-dollarization we’re seeing accelerate in 2025 and 2026. In this episode: — Why the US can run trade deficits that would destroy any other currency — How petrodollar recycling keeps American borrowing costs artificially low — The strong dollar’s hidden cost: deindustrialization and the hollowing out of the American working class — How the dollar became a geopolitical weapon through sanctions — Why the 2022 Russia asset freeze was the moment the world started building exits — What 2008 tells us about the dollar’s self-reinforcing power — and its limits This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit rejil.substack.com [https://rejil.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1]

The Petrodollar: The Deal That Changed The World | Part 1

Discover the secret arrangement that saved the US dollar and reshaped the global economy for 50 years. In 1971, the world’s financial anchor snapped when Richard Nixon ended the gold standard. Facing economic chaos and a skyrocketing oil crisis, a secret 1974 deal between Henry Kissinger and the Saudi royal family created a new world order: the Petrodollar system. We trace the history of modern money from the 1944 Bretton Woods conference to the “Nixon Shock,” revealing how America replaced gold with oil to maintain its status as the world’s reserve currency. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit rejil.substack.com [https://rejil.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1]

Augustus Caesar: The First Emperor of Rome

In 44 BCE, an 18-year-old received a letter in Greece telling him that Julius Caesar — assassinated the day before — had named him his heir. His advisors told him to walk away. He walked straight in. What followed was one of the most ruthless and brilliant political ascents in human history. The boy everyone planned to sideline outmaneuvered Mark Antony, outlasted Cleopatra, put his own champion Cicero on a death list, and then — after winning a civil war that left him the last man standing — did something no one expected. He gave the power back. Or appeared to. This is the full story of Augustus Caesar — the man who watched Julius Caesar get stabbed twenty-three times for looking like a king, and spent the next fifty years ruling as one while making sure nobody could point to the throne. In this episode we cover: — How an 18-year-old with no army turned a famous name into absolute power — The Second Triumvirate and the proscription list that killed Cicero — The Battle of Philippi and the death of the Republic’s last defenders — Mark Antony, Cleopatra, and how Augustus turned a love affair into a propaganda weapon — The Battle of Actium and the last war Rome would fight itself — The Principate — the fake republic that actually worked — The Pax Romana, the marble city, and the 200-year peace he built on blood This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit rejil.substack.com [https://rejil.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1]