DYSPEPSIA GENERATION

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The absence of shame as a constraint. This is the component hardest for the credentialed class to model, because the credentialed class is constituted by shame. The credentialed class is the class of people who have internalized the institutional consequences of saying the wrong thing, and who have organized their public speech to avoid those consequences. Trump did not come up through any of those institutions. He came up in New York real estate and tabloid culture, both of which are environments where shame is a vulnerability rather than a discipline, and where the operators who succeed are the ones who have learned to act without it. He says things the credentialed class would be unable to say, not because the things are necessarily wrong, but because the credentialed class has been trained to feel an autonomic flinch before the words leave the mouth. Trump does not have the flinch.

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Mehek Cooke, senior national security and legal analyst for the Daily Signal, said that recent anti-Immigration and Customs Enforcement protests in New Jersey are part of a broader pattern of organized agitation aimed at undermining law enforcement and President Donald Trump’s immigration agenda.

Appearing Thursday on NewsNation’s “Katie Pavlich Tonight,” Cooke responded to video of protesters outside an immigrant detention facility who blocked a trucker’s exit route. She said the confrontation revealed the growing divide between political activists and hardworking Americans.

“I think it’s frightening and it’s a pattern,” Cooke said, pointing first to the Black Lives Matter riots where cities completely shut down because of rioters before mentioning sanctuary city policies. She said current anti-ICE protests are “a direct violation of our law.”

Cooke argued there is a clear distinction between peaceful protest and conduct that obstructs law enforcement and prevents ordinary Americans from doing their jobs.

“There’s one thing about peaceful protest, but these individuals are obstructing justice,” Cooke said of the viral video of the truck driver admonishing protesters. “Look at that man. He’s a working man. Aren’t Democrats supposed to stand for working people?”

Cooke argued the truck driver in the video became a symbol of broader public frustration.

The American Mind.

Writing in 1833, Justice Joseph Story, one of the greatest jurists of the early republic, warned against a dangerously exaggerated conception of the freedom of the press. “There is,” Story observed in his Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States, “a good deal of loose reasoning on the subject of the liberty of the press, as if its inviolability were constitutionally such, that, like the king of England, it could do no wrong, and was free from every inquiry, and afforded a sanctuary for every abuse; that, in short, it implied a despotic sovereignty to do every sort of wrong, without the slightest accountability to private or public justice.” This idea, Story held, “is too extravagant to be held by any sound constitutional lawyer.”

Story’s warning is as relevant today as it was when it was written almost 200 years ago. Much too often, the contemporary press is not content with the equal constitutional rights shared by all Americans. Instead, its members frequently assert special privileges that are not based on the Constitution. In some cases, they even claim a prerogative to do things that would land any ordinary American in serious legal trouble. This problem is illustrated by the recent remarks of A.G. Sulzberger, the publisher of the New York Times, at an event sponsored by Yale Law School.

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Looks like another “Summer of Love” is setting up for the progressively virtuous city of Seattle. The weather’s improving and the bullets are flying. It’s not exactly what Irving Berlin had in mind when he wrote, Nothing but blue skies from now on. On the other hand, if you inhabit Bluesky, the leftist social media platform, your attitude about Seattle’s current crime wave is likely, nothing to see here.

Residents of Seattle’s Aurora Avenue corridor are particularly upset after a recent gun battle between, presumably, rival gang members. They fired as many as forty rounds at each other from opposite sides of Aurora Avenue so it must have been a pretty serious beef. And this is how beefs are commonly settled in lightly policed, modern progressive cities where they just don’t want to have to put any more black and brown people in prison. So the bullets fly and innocent bystanders best get out of the way.

Remember the last “Summer of Love?” Why, it seems like only yesterday. 2020 it was, in those heady days and weeks following the demise of George Floyd when, despite draconian COVID restrictions, people were nonetheless given carte blanche access to the streets to gather in vast numbers to “protest,” as well as to vandalize, topple statues, burn, loot and assault, all in the name of a useless thug who wasn’t white. And it was then that Seattle’s famed autonomous zone was established, first known as CHAZ, then shortly after as CHOP.

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Criminals get caught when they brag. They seemingly cannot help it.

All these “hidden camera” interviews where government workers or politicians let the cat out of the bag to a perfect stranger over a drink (with perhaps some sexual attraction thrown in for good measure) are pretty much the same thing. Look at all the leaks to journalists by people whose job it is to keep a secret, yet are somehow incapable of doing it.

Or even consider Hunter Biden, who blabbed endlessly to prostitutes. Wow. Using beautiful women to get powerful men to talk is a technique as old as time. What is astonishing is that it works.

Why?

My wife is fond of a program that uses bodycam footage of traffic stops to document people talking themselves into jail.

John C. Wright explains it all to you.

And now, a word from the Patriarchy:

In all of life, men go out into the wilderness, fight and built, and found a new settlement. This can be either literal wilderness or figurative. Starting a business, starting a political movement, springs from a similar male conquering impulse.

Then women and old men come into the frontier, after it is conquered and safe, and they make it nice and civilized and set up lace curtains in the windows, doilies on the chairs, flower gardens.

The woman and old men move into the settlement, built a church, start a school, elect a sheriff, close the opium dens and gambling dives, drive away the saloon girls, streetwalkers, and the roughnecks, and make the streets safe for women and children to walk at night.

In business, unfortunately, this means women flock to the HR department and try to make the competitive dog-eat-dog atmosphere of capitalism into something socialist, childproof, and sterile, and safe.

And in entertainment, the female impulse is to prevent entertainment, sex and violence, at all costs, but instead to use stories teach and lecture, as every mother must to do to every small child.

And when this happens, the men, sick of being stifled, move onto a new wilderness, a new business, a new venture. There is no female Elon Must in all of history, no female Einstein, no female Thomas Edison, or Thomas Aquinas, nor Christopher Columbus, Alexander the Great, Richard the Lionheart or Sir Edmund Hillary.

I see no hope for the future of our people if they are dependent on frivolous youth of today, for certainly all youth are reckless beyond words… When I was young, we were taught to be discreet and respectful of elders, but the present youth are exceedingly wise [disrespectful] and impatient of restraint.
~Hesiod, 8th century BC

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While wave upon wave of smartglasses and face-based wearables crash on the shores of CES, traditional glasses really haven’t changed much over the hundreds of years we’ve been using them. The last innovation, arguably, was progressive multifocals that blended near and farsighted lenses — and that was back in the 1950s. It makes sense that autofocusing glasses maker IXI thinks it’s time to modernize glasses.

After recently announcing a 22-gram (0.7-ounce) prototype frame, the startup is here in Las Vegas to show off working prototypes of its lenses, a key component of its autofocus glasses, which could be a game-changer.

IXI’s glasses are designed for age-related farsightedness, a condition that affects many, if not most people over 45. They combine cameraless eye tracking with liquid crystal lenses that automatically activate when the glasses detect the user’s focus shifting. This means that, instead of having two separate prescriptions, as in multifocal or bifocal lenses, IXI’s lenses automatically switch between each prescription. Crucially — like most modern smartglasses — the frames themselves are lightweight and look like just another pair of normal glasses.

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Apparently Wilhelm II was the Joe Biden of early modern Germany.

Like Hitler without the talent.

Believe me, you don’t want to be in a berthing compartment when there’s farting going on….

Example.

dickover?n.?:?a modal panel, popover, or curtain presented by a website or app, deliberately obscuring its own content to frustrate the user with an unwanted, unnecessary, mandatory interaction; e.g. asking the user to accept “cookies”, subscribe to a newsletter, install the website’s mobile app, agree to terms of service, or anything else that the user couldn’t give two shits about.

Thanks to Daring Fireball for this PSA.

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Automobiles have been around for well over a century. During that time, we’ve gotten pretty good at designing and building their basic components and controls: seats, doors, pedals, steering wheels, mirrors, etc. But when today’s automakers decide to make an electric vehicle (EV), they seemingly forget much of what they once knew, creating new versions of features that are objectively, obviously worse than the time-tested designs they replace.

When Tesla ushered in the modern EV era in the early 2000s, some of these changes made sense, at least from a marketing perspective. To convince a cautious public to consider an EV, the vehicles had to appear “futuristic.” Flush door handles that automatically extend when you approach the car are definitely cool and fancy! But electronic door mechanisms like these have also proven to be unreliable, and possibly dangerous.

On the interior, Tesla settled on a minimal design dominated by a large touch screen. Touch screens provide a lot of flexibility. This is why our phones no longer have physical keyboards on them. Touch screens are also, perhaps surprisingly, less expensive than the array of physical buttons and switches that they replace in car interiors. This savings is especially important on EVs, where the cost of the vehicle is dominated by the battery (yes, to an even larger degree than an internal-combustion car’s cost is dominated by its engine). But despite their cost savings, the over-use of touch screens in cars has proven unpopular. They’re also not great for safety.

In 2026, we’re well past the time when EVs need to compromise safety and functionality in order to appear futuristic. As for the cost savings, well, that’ll be harder to shake. Once automakers got a taste for cheap touchscreens, they spread to all cars, not just EVs.

To help the industry get back on the right track, I’ve created a checklist for car designers. Make sure your new car—EV or otherwise—checks all these boxes to avoid making the same stupid mistakes that have plagued modern cars for years.

CNBC, a Voice of the Crust.

A federal judge on Friday barred President Donald Trump from adding his name to that of the Kennedy Center, as he did in late December, ruling that “Congress gave the Kennedy Center its name, and only Congress can change it.”

Judge Christopher Cooper ordered that Trump’s name be removed from the facade of the center and other sinage within two weeks.

Cooper also temporarily blocked the Washington, D.C., performing arts landmark, which in December had been renamed the “Trump Kennedy Center,” from being closed for two years for renovations at the behest of the president, who is chair of its Board of Trustees.

Cooper’s order came in response to a lawsuit by Rep. Joyce Beatty, an Ohio Democrat and ex officio Kennedy Center trustee, whose civil complaint challenged the renaming, the closure of the center for renovations, and being stripped of her voting rights by board in May 2025.

The Telegraph (UK).

Boarding schools are “increasingly not British at all” after a surge in the number of foreign students, the UK’s top educational philanthropist has said.

Sir Peter Lampl, the founder of the Sutton Trust, said British children were being “priced out” of boarding schools, with their places taken by international students.

Sir Peter, a former adviser to Sir Tony Blair, claimed this was partly a result of Labour’s “narrow-minded and mean-spirited” VAT raid on private schools, which had handed an advantage “to our foreign competitors”.

The War Zone.

Members of Congress are moving to push the U.S. Navy to develop a containerized version of its High-Energy Laser with Integrated Optical Dazzler and Surveillance (HELIOS) system. Containerized designs could help accelerate the service’s fielding of laser directed energy weapons on a wider array of ships, providing added layers of close-in defense. The Navy has already been experimenting with palletized designs as part of its larger laser development efforts, which have faced continued hurdles in recent years.

An early draft of the annual defense policy bill, or National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), for the 2027 Fiscal Year, would authorize the addition of $5 million to the Navy’s budget for work on a containerized HELIOS. It would also add $2.5 million for a “Containerized Maritime High Energy Laser Weapon System,” which does not otherwise appear to be mentioned, at least by that name, in the service’s proposed budget for the 2027 Fiscal Year. The House Armed Services Committee released this draft NDAA earlier this week.

The Navy’s proposed budget for the next fiscal cycle does already include a request for $75.6 million for a separate Joint Laser Weapon System (JLWS) effort. The development of a containerized 150-kilowatt-class laser directed energy weapon, along with work toward 300 and 500-kilowatt-class designs, are part of the stated plans for JLWS. It’s unclear whether the Maritime High Energy Laser Weapon System mentioned in the draft NDAA is related to JLWS.

HELIOS, which the Navy has also designated Mk 5 Mod 0, is a 60-kilowatt-class laser directed energy weapon. At that power level, it is able to destroy or at least damage certain targets, such as drones or small boats, a capability that has now been demonstrated in multiple tests. There has been talk in the past about scaling HELIOS’s power rating up to 150 kilowatts.

The War Zone.

President Donald Trump on Friday announced he was lifting the U.S. blockade on Iranian ports enacted last month. The move comes amid media reports and administration messaging that Washington and Tehran appear to be drawing closer to a deal that could lead to ending the conflict. Iranian officials have rejected that notion. TWZ cannot confirm either side’s assertions.

“Ships caught in the Strait due to our amazing and unprecedented Naval Blockade, which will now be lifted, may start the process of ‘heading home!’” Trump proclaimed on Truth Social, referring to the Strait of Hormuz. The strategic chokepoint has been largely closed to most traffic by Iran since not long after the launch of Epic Fury on Feb. 28.

Trump’s comments may reflect a still unsigned Memorandum of Agreement with Iran that paves the way for reopening the Strait and is designed to create negotiating space to deal with the larger issues of Iran’s nuclear ambitions.

Watch it.

The YouTube channel MAXIMONICS has the data.

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For the past several days, ICE agents and Antifa affiliated protesters have clashed outside the Delaney Hall detention center in Newark, New Jersey. The rioting protesters have blocked the entrance, stopping vehicles from entering the facility. Multiple trucks can be seen in this video at a standstill.

I’m going to ask the question again: Why Doesn’t the FBI Stop this violent, organized, national activity?

…

How can a group within America openly threaten police, use violence against police, throw Molotov cocktails, bricks and explosive fireworks at police. Use batons, shields, bats and physical violence against police and federal law enforcement; destroy vehicles, set cars on fire, destroy property, trash and block the streets and create chaos, completely without consequence?

Construction Physics.

Over the last few months we’ve examined the extent of the construction industry’s productivity problem. We’ve looked at a variety of construction productivity metrics, both for the US and for countries around the world, and found that construction productivity almost always rises much less in construction than it does in industries like manufacturing; often, it doesn’t improve at all. We’ve analyzed trends in construction costs in the US and around the world, and noted that construction almost never gets any cheaper: construction costs almost always rise at or above the level of overall inflation. And we’ve considered the most obvious strategy for solving this problem — moving the construction process into a factory — and we saw that the cost savings from prefabricated construction are frequently much less than hoped, often never materializing at all.

Now that we’ve mapped the contours of the problem, we can begin to explore its deeper nature to understand why, specifically, construction productivity is so resistant to being improved, and why construction costs stubbornly refuse to fall.

Oil Tumbles On Deal ‘Breakthrough’ As US-Iran Reportedly Reach MOU, Pending Trump’s Final Approval

Trump has no way out on Iran — This edition of PN is made possible by paid subscribers. (Noah Berlatsky/Public Notice)

No Way to Make a Deal ??? The agreement that Trump wants to strike with Iran keeps eluding him. (The Atlantic)

Scoop: U.S. and Iran reach deal but need Trump’s final approval, officials say (Barak Ravid/Axios)

U.S. and Iran reach temporary deal ??? but Trump hasn’t signed off yet (Kevin Breuninger/CNBC

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The Fairfax County Police Department in Northern Virginia is investigating a swatting call at the residence of Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett Wednesday night.

“Yesterday evening at approximately 9:02 p.m., officers responded to a swatting call at the residence of U.S. Supreme Court Justice in Fairfax County,” the department’s public information officer told the Daily Signal in a Thursday phone call.

“The call was received through the department’s non-emergency line,” the officer explained. “Officers immediately coordinated with Supreme Court police personnel assigned to the residence and quickly determined that the report was fictitious. No additional police resources were utilized.”

“Swatting” refers to the practice of calling police with a false report concerning a threat or violence, aiming to convince law enforcement to send a SWAT team to the targeted location. Since SWAT teams often enter houses with little notice and can cause confusion, these calls may result in unnecessary police violence.

When asked if the police department is investigating the call, the officer said, “That’s definitely part of it; every one of those calls is investigated.”

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Exxon Mobil shareholders on Wednesday approved the company’s plan to redomicile in Texas, marking a win for the top U.S. oil producer after two leading proxy advisory firms advised investors to strike down the proposal.

The oil producer is incorporated in New Jersey, but the company has been headquartered in Texas since 1989. It said moving its legal home to the state was logical and made more sense for the business.

Other companies, including SpaceX, Tesla, and Coinbase, have recently shifted operations to the Lone Star State. A Texas law passed last year enhanced legal protections for businesses in several ways, including reducing the threat of shareholder litigation by allowing companies to set stock ownership thresholds for lawsuits.

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Swiss city of Winterthur on Thursday morning, with witnesses reporting that the attacker shouted “Allahu Akbar” during the assault.

The attack took place shortly before 8.30 a.m. local time outside Winterthur station, around 20 kilometres northeast of Zurich, during the morning rush hour. At least four people were injured. Three victims were taken to hospital, including one person who suffered serious injuries.

Roger Bonetti, a Zurich cantonal police spokesman, confirmed that the suspect had been detained. “The perpetrator was arrested by the police,” he told local media, adding that the motive for the attack was “still under investigation.”

Video footage circulating online appeared to show a man running outside the station entrance while holding a knife and repeatedly shouting “Allahu Akbar.” Witnesses described scenes of panic as commuters fled the area.

Imagine how peaceful the world would be if the Religion of Peace didn’t exist.

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You may think you need water and hoses to fight fires.

But in California, they do things (D)ifferently.

CNBC. a Voice of the Crust.

New York City’s new tax on second homes will more than double property taxes owed by many wealthy luxury apartment owners, according to tax experts.

State lawmakers on Wednesday passed the tax on nonprimary residences in order to help close the city’s budget gap. The so-called pied-a-terre tax will be imposed on second homes valued at $1 million or more. It’s expected to raise $500 million in revenue.

Details on the tax obtained by CNBC show that the property tax would take effect in two different phases. In the first two years – the tax years 2026-2027 and 2027-2028 – condos and co-ops valued at more than $1 million by the city’s Department of Finance will be subject to the tax. Properties worth between $1 million and $3 million will face a 4% annual tax; properties valued at $3 million to $5 million will face a 5.25% tax; and those above $5 million will face a 6.5% tax.

Time to leave.

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Two more “Minnesotans” (Somali pirates) were arrested and charged by the DOJ for stealing $21 million.

Read that again, dear reader who has to live paycheck to paycheck and barely scrapes by with inflation, taxes, and rising gas prices. These two Somali women were dropped into America and promptly stole $21 million from you.

 

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I guess it shouldn’t be a surprise at this point, but the “theology expert” running for the U.S. Senate in Texas may be a huge weirdo.

Sure, you knew he called God non-binary, he daydreams about trans kids, and he’s David French’s ideal of a Christian in the public square, but that’s not all of James Talarico’s problems.

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ow’s that “Diversity is our Strength” thing going, Europe?

You will not be surprised that the world’s international “objective” news agency failed to mention a key detail in the motive for the attack.

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Many years ago, I was watching a nature show. It was about some hunter-gatherers on some Pacific island. The film crew went right up and talked to one of the hunter-gatherers about his life — hunting, gathering, finding and killing witches among his fellow tribesmen, and so on. But as they talked, I realized that there must be a giant video camera right in the face of this tribesman. And he wasn’t even reacting to it. What was this strange, unnaturally shaped object, made of strange unknown materials, and potentially possessing magical powers? Didn’t he wonder? And didn’t he ask himself if he could get something like it, and use it for whatever these strange foreigners were using it to do?

I often think about the example of the tribesman and the video camera. It’s a small version of a story that happens again and again, on a far grander scale, determining the fate of entire nations and geopolitical systems of power: absorption of foreign technology. Most of the things you use on a day-to-day basis were not invented in the country in which you live (even if you live in America). They were invented all over the world, and one crucial reason you have access to them is that your society deemed it fitting to allow those technologies into the country.

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The most effective way to destroy an organization is to make it more bureaucratic. In 1944, the Office of Strategic Services, the precursor to the CIA, was aware of this. What they didn’t know was that their blueprint for sabotaging Nazi operations would become the operating manual for modern corporations.

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College degrees don’t offer the job security they once did. Is blue-collar work the answer?

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What is unfolding across parts of Europe, particularly in the UK under Prime Minister Keir Starmer, should serve as a warning to every Western democracy wrestling with questions of immigration, national identity, social cohesion, and the limits of political tolerance.

A nation can be compassionate without becoming careless. It can welcome newcomers while still expecting assimilation, civic responsibility, and respect for the laws and traditions that hold a society together. But when governments become so consumed with appearing morally virtuous that they neglect order, border enforcement, public safety, and cultural confidence, the social fabric eventually begins to fray.

Across Europe, many citizens increasingly feel that they are watching this happen in real time.

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Are you aware? Really aware? Or are you like me, struggling to keep up with the blizzard of social and political awareness events that bring a rich texture to our lives?

Do you worry that you can’t recall if Black History Month – that time when I approach my BAME colleagues with even more reverence than usual – is in June or July? Are you confused as to whether Pride Month and LGBT History Month are the same or distinct entities? Have you kept pace with the latest incarnation of their life-affirming, multicoloured flag? Does your wife frown at you because Menstrual Hygiene Day has passed you by? Have you forgotten World Alzheimer’s Day again?

Then worry no more – help is finally at hand, in the shape of the Awareness Calendar, your one-stop source of those important dates that can be handily pinned to your fridge door.

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Gov. Gavin Newsom signed legislation Wednesday that aims to shield California elections from federal interference, saying he expected President Donald Trump’s administration to try to meddle in the midterms this year.

“They can steal this election! Only we can steal this election!”

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Israel’s military has just taken out a high-value target, with the confirmed death of the commander of Hamas’s military wing, Mohammed Odeh.

He was targeted in a a strike on the Gaza Strip Tuesday, in an operation which injured dozens more bystanders, given a residential building in a very busy market area of Gaza City was obliterated.

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Over this past week, we’ve been subjected to a flurry of pandemic warnings. It’s like the disease of the day: Bird flu, novavirus, m-pox, hantavirus, slap rash (did you miss that one?), and Ebola. A former director of the CDC just warned that this Ebola outbreak could become a pandemic.

It sounds scary but that is literally impossible for reasons I will explain. My hope is that this article will allow you to know this too. My point is to rescue basic knowledge of infectious disease that every person knew in my grandmother’s generation. The postwar period put huge emphasis on this in schooling. It was called public health in those days.

They knew much more than certified experts today.

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Germany’s Left Party is calling for a major expansion of voting rights that would allow long-term foreign residents to participate in elections. The change would apply after five years of legal residence, regardless of nationality.

The proposal, submitted to the Bundestag, also urges cooperation between federal and state authorities to extend similar rights to regional and local elections.

The party argues that Germany faces a ‘democratic deficit,’ as millions of people who live, work, and pay taxes in the country remain excluded from political participation. According to figures cited in the proposal, around 14 million foreign nationals currently live in Germany, including roughly five million European Union citizens. Many have resided in the country for years, with the average length of stay estimated at around 15 years, yet still lack voting rights in most elections.

Easily fixed: Become citizens. If you’ve lived in a country for five years or more and you have made no effort to become a citizen, then you’re not committed enough to that country to be trusted with the vote. It’s just that simple.

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What does not make sense is the relentless campaign to portray every health challenge as another symptom of the ‘carbon dioxide crisis’, even as the IPCC retreats from its most apocalyptic scenarios and real-world data show humanity becoming far more resilient to environmental extremes.

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I’m not a Texan. This week’s Republican senatorial primary wasn’t my rodeo, circus, or fashion show… Ken Paxton, John Cornyn, James Talarico are not my ponies, monkeys, or models, respectively.

But if you follow the news, you’ve been forced to consider the ramifications of the race. Even the math of the race.

I heard time and time again (often from Jim Geraghty on The Three Martini Lunch) that if Paxton was the nominee, the RNC would have to spend tons of money for Paxton to defeat Talarico. Many conservative commentators are very concerned about money that will need to go to Texas rather than for other tight senate races. But I also heard that $100 million was spent on Cornyn’s unsuccessful campaign to be the nominee. What if that money had been saved for the November race?

Another math problem comes courtesy of John Cornyn. In the recent race, he asked voters to look at what he’d done in the previous six months. He’s been in the Senate for 24 years. So what percentage of 24 years is six months? I believe it’s a small percentage.

There’s another math problem we can’t work out because we don’t have the figures. What percentage of senators actually support the SAVE Act? We don’t know, because it hasn’t been brought to a vote. Senator Cornyn assures us he supports it. Paxton was willing to drop out of the race if it was passed. But even if John Thune “doesn’t have the votes”, why can’t he do a vote anyway so we’ll know what percentage of senators oppose the will of 80% of the American people?

There is one math problem I can do. Jimmy Talarico says there are six genders. What percentage of those genders are imaginary? The answer is two thirds of Talarico’s genders aren’t real.

So a math problem for y’all. What are the odds of James Talarico being the next senator from Texas?

I am a Texan, so I’ll give you a hint: Zero.

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California Assembly Bill 2624, dubbed by critics the “Stop Nick Shirley Act,” passed the California Assembly on Tuesday, raising concerns among opponents that undercover journalism and fraud investigations could be restricted—including investigations conducted by independent journalist Nick Shirley.

Shirley, who uncovered hundreds of millions of dollars of day care fraud in Minnesota and hospice fraud in California, took to X to share his thoughts on the vote.

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In September 2025, then-US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Commissioner Dr Marty Makary publicly acknowledged that the agency was investigating reports of child deaths following Covid-19 vaccination.

“We do know at the FDA…that there had been children who have died from the COVID vaccine,” Makary said during a CNN interview.

By that stage, however, a fierce internal dispute had already emerged inside the FDA over what investigators believed the evidence showed – and whether the public should ever see the full findings.

“It really did feel like there was some sort of cover-up going on about the Covid-19 vaccines,” said one individual familiar with the discussions.

MD Reports spoke with several current/former agency officials, advisers, and individuals briefed on the discussions, all of whom requested anonymity because they were not authorised to publicly discuss internal FDA deliberations.

Don’t call them ‘conspiracy theories’—call them ‘spoiler alerts’.

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Fed up with years of gun violence and repeated shootings near Aurora Avenue, some residents in North Seattle have started installing their own street barricades in an effort to protect their neighborhoods, KOMO News writes.

Neighbors living near North 97th, 98th, and 102nd streets recently placed large planter boxes, piles of dirt, and gravel across parts of residential roads that connect to Aurora Avenue North. The goal, residents say, is to make it harder for shooters to speed through side streets during violent incidents linked to ongoing prostitution and human trafficking activity in the area.

Tensions escalated again over the weekend after another shooting near Aurora Avenue N and N 98th Street. Seattle police said officers found around 40 shell casings at the scene after multiple people exchanged gunfire. Security footage reportedly captured several seconds of rapid shooting, with bullets hitting nearby apartments, homes, and parked cars. In one recent case, a stray bullet entered a family’s home and came to rest near the bassinet of a 6-week-old baby.

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Australian company Hyperion Systems has revealed a compact uncrewed surface drone dubbed the Astra 460, featuring a 3D-printed hull at this week’s Indian Ocean Defence and Security Conference (IODS) 2026 in Perth, Western Australia. Hyperion specialises in additive manufacturing, also called 3D printing, in conjunction with portable robotics for civilian and military applications.

In this context the WA-based company also displayed its “Titan Cell” containerised 3D printing solution which Hyperion dubs “factory-in-a-box” due to its small infrastructure footprint and transportability.

For those worried about AI taking their jobs, the improvements in additive manufacturing will, I think, rapidly bring the capital requirements needed to set up one’s own shop to blue-collar-affordable levels. We may be on the verge of an explosion in custom-job entrepreneurship.

The New Neo.

I’ve written this previous post about Somaliland. Since then, I’ve been wondering what makes Somaliland so different from its neighbor, Somalia, and so many other states in the region. I think the answer is probably complicated and probably contains many elements of which I’m unaware. But one is probably its different colonial history; Somaliland was a British colony and Somalia was an Italian colony. This can make a world of difference.

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The stereotype here is so on the nose that The Babylon Bee couldn’t have written it better.

This week is the Islamic slaughter day of Eid al-Adha, where a goat is killed to cover their sins. They connect this to the biblical story in Genesis 22 where Abraham is asked by God to offer his son as a sacrifice.

Muslims, however, believe God offered up a ram to replace Ishmael, ignoring the fact that God’s provision and promises were made through Isaac. The ram – just like the lamb’s blood the Israelites would later paint on their doorposts in Egypt – signified that God would Himself pay the price for humanity’s evil deeds.

Sarah Hoyt:

Socialism is Communism on the installment plan, having surrendered the idea that they’ll eventually get to that magical state withering away and instead believing it’s possible to stay suspended in that place where everyone gets what he needs and everyone contributes what she can. Like communism, in its most functional form, it is an oligarchy, nepotistic and brittle in the face of any new technology. For its failure mode, see the sh*tshow of Europe these days. Or the way we were headed two years ago. Eventually the nepo oligarchy becomes an open kakistocracy that can stay in power only by brutal repression. Next verse, same as the first, welcome to the end stage of various dictatorships as the velvet glove comes off and the steel clad boot comes down.

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Years ago, I wrote a column denouncing the decision of the University of California system to drop standardized testing in the cause of greater racial diversity. Now, hundreds of UC mathematics faculty have called for a return to such testing after reports showing a thirtyfold increase in students with math skills below high school level.

As written earlier, the University of California system was an early supporter of this disastrous move.

It was heralded as a way to preserve diversity after voters in California repeatedly rejected race-based admissions and the Supreme Court appeared ready to bar such practices (commonly proven with reference to standardized test differentials among applicants).

Now, many professors in the California system have come to the same conclusion as some of us who denounced the move years ago. They have witnessed the drop in academic skills and abilities among incoming students.

These tests not only have the most significant predictive value for performance but also play an important role in the advancement of minority students. Former University of California President Janet Napolitano, however, overrode those conclusions.