OPEN THREAD: Ring in the weekend.
July 25, 2025
THE NEW SPACE RACE: Senegal signs the Artemis Accords. “Senegal became the 56th signatory of the Artemis Accords at NASA HQ today. . . . The United States and seven other countries established the Artemis Accords in 2020 to serve as a set of practical principles to guide responsible space exploration. Senegal joins the United States and 54 other nations – Angola, Argentina, Armenia, Australia, Austria, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Belgium, Brazil, Bulgaria, Canada, Chile, Colombia, the Republic of Cyprus, Czechia, Denmark, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Iceland, India, Israel, Italy, Japan, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand, Nigeria, Norway, Panama, Peru, Poland, the Republic of Korea, Romania, Rwanda, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Thailand, Ukraine, the United Arab Emirates, the United Kingdom, and Uruguay – in affirming the Accords’ principles for sustainable civil space activity.”
The Artemis Accords are very important because they underscore the legality of exploitation of space resources.
MADE IN THE USA: ForestLeaf Colostrum Powder 50% IgG Highest Pure Concentration, Grass Fed. #CommissionEarned
SCIENCE, UNSETTLED: Sweat Doesn’t Actually Form The Way We Thought, Study Finds.
THEY CAN’T HANDLE THE TRUTH:
UNREAL.
Britain is now CENSORING videos of the protests against open borders.
This is what a dictatorship looks like. https://t.co/T87vPCcANS
— PeterSweden (@PeterSweden7) July 25, 2025
And they don’t want you to know it. But this is mostly a tell that they’re afraid now.
UPDATE: Afraid with reason:
Once people know protests work, they spread. The government doesn't have enough police officers to crack down everywhere, which is why it practices two tier policing to crush gatherings before they catch on. https://t.co/VCccugrtW5
— Sam Ashworth-Hayes (@SAshworthHayes) July 25, 2025
THE NEW SPACE RACE: NASA seeks moon and Mars communications, navigation proposals.
SCHADENFREUDELICIOUS: ‘Crisis’ at Media Matters, as It Cuts Staff, Struggles to Pay Legal Bills.
A RARE DISAPPOINTMENT FROM THESE GUYS ON THIS ISSUE: Trump Admin’s Defense of Interstate Handgun Sales Ban is Rooted in Bureaucracy, Not Freedom.
IT’S TIME FOR VICTORIA TAFT’S West Coast, Messed Coast™: Holy Environy! Newsom Desperately Tries to Sell Refinery He Helped Close. “Welcome to the West Coast, Messed Coast™ report, where this week the luxury-believing leftists ruling these states are beginning to realize they may have gone too far.”
MAYBE NOT SO IMMUNE? Actually, Obama Can Be Indicted. Here’s Why.
GET RID OF BUGS: Buzbug LED Bug Zapper Indoor Outdoor, 10 Years Lifespan. #CommissionEarned
UNDOING BIDEN’S CRISIS BY DESIGN: DHS started flying illegal immigrants out of Florida’s ‘Alligator Alcatraz.’
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) said Friday that the Department of Homeland Security has started flying illegal immigrants out of his state’s “Alligator Alcatraz” detention facility.
“I’m pleased to report that those flights out of Alligator Alcatraz by DHS have begun,” DeSantis said, Fox News reported. “The cadence is increasing. We’ve already had a number of flights, in the last few days, we’ve had hundreds of illegals [that] have been removed from here.”
“This provides an ability to enhance the mission, to increase the number and frequency of deportations. And so what’s been done here has really been remarkable,” he added.
I’d add, “More like this, please,” but it looks like there will already be plenty more like this.
FLORIDA MAN FRIDAY [VIP]: Since When Is Drunk-Mowing the Toll Road a Crime? It’s time for your much-needed break from the serious news, and this week, we’ll learn where not to take your lawnmower out for a drug-fueled spin, why Planet Fitness isn’t the place to do… any of that, really, and how Alabama Man became the new master of disguise.”
READER FAVORITE: Liquid Probiotics for Dogs of All Ages – Probiotics for Cats to Support Digestion Well-Being. #CommissionEarned
THOSE RUSSIANS SURE LOVED REAGAN:
The Obama-directed & Clapper-Brennan-Comey-created Intel Community Assessment on Russian meddling in the 2016 election claimed “the Kremlin has historically preferred Republican over Democratic candidates.”
Here is the *actual* historical record, which is 180 degrees different. https://t.co/zSRnMDF1Rw pic.twitter.com/mLaVe1fAd5
— Jerry Dunleavy IV 🇺🇸 (@JerryDunleavy) July 25, 2025
Obama lies, scorpion stings frog, dog bites man…
THE CURRENT STATE OF JOURNALISM:
Scandal: WSJ Reports Trump’s Name Appears In Their Article About The Epstein Files https://t.co/33oHOulSOq pic.twitter.com/aqsR34Bjbg
— The Babylon Bee (@TheBabylonBee) July 25, 2025
THEY COULD DISH IT OUT, BUT . . . Under Siege From Trump and Musk, a Top Liberal Group Falls Into Crisis: Scrambling to pay legal fees, Media Matters has dialed back its criticism, trimmed its staff and contemplated closing entirely.
Weird how all these lefty outfits started shutting down as soon as the USAID money spigot was turned off.
RUY TEIXEIRA: Today’s Non-Progressive Progressives. They’re not on the right side of history anymore:
Here are some of the ways that “progressives” have bid farewell to progress.
Colorblindness, anti-discrimination and equal opportunity. The quintessential moral commitment of midcentury progressives was to make American society truly colorblind. It was unfair and egregious that racial discrimination could truncate the life chances of black people and visit misery upon them. Therefore, progressives advocated and marched for ending discrimination and unequal opportunity. They won the argument. Not only was legislation passed to make such discrimination illegal but anti-discrimination and equal opportunity became as close to consensual beliefs as you can get in America.
Americans today believe, with Martin Luther King Jr., that people should “not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.” In a 2022 University of Southern California Dornsife survey, this classic statement of colorblind equality was posed to respondents: “Our goal as a society should be to treat all people the same without regard to the color of their skin.” That view elicited sky-high (92 percent) agreement from the public.
Similarly, a 2023 Public Agenda Hidden Common Ground survey found 91 percent agreement with the statement: “All people deserve an equal opportunity to succeed, no matter their race or ethnicity.” This is what Americans deeply believe in: equal opportunity not, it should be noted, equal outcomes.
And it is what progressives used to believe in—indeed, mounted the barricades for. But a funny thing happened on the way to the 21st century.
Read the whole thing.
But this isn’t “today’s” self-described Progressives. The original Progressives of the first-half of the 20th century were thoroughly racist, from H.G. Wells to Margaret Sanger to Woodrow Wilson. Calvin Coolidge noted they weren’t on the right side of history a century ago:
About the Declaration there is a finality that is exceedingly restful. It is often asserted that the world has made a great deal of progress since 1776, that we have had new thoughts and new experiences which have given us a great advance over the people of that day, and that we may therefore very well discard their conclusions for something more modern. But that reasoning can not be applied to this great charter. If all men are created equal, that is final. If they are endowed with inalienable rights, that is final. If governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed, that is final. No advance, no progress can be made beyond these propositions. If anyone wishes to deny their truth or their soundness, the only direction in which he can proceed historically is not forward, but backward toward the time when there was no equality, no rights of the individual, no rule of the people. Those who wish to proceed in that direction can not lay claim to progress. They are reactionary. Their ideas are not more modern, but more ancient, than those of the Revolutionary fathers.
As the late Fred Siegel wrote in The Revolt Against the Masses, American progressives rebranded as liberals in the 1920s after the disastrous Wilson administration. The American left went back to calling themselves progressives after liberalism became an increasingly tainted word during the last decades of the 20th century. What will be the next rebranding effort?
20 MINUTES INTO THE FUTURE: Democrats Are Going to Run Hunter Biden, Aren’t They?
Part of me thinks that surely, SURELY, they’ll look at their abysmal approval ratings and learn a thing or two about how unpopular their agenda really is with the majority of Americans and maybe even run a more blue-dog Democrat this next time around. You know, more of a typical, traditional Democrat although if I’m being honest, I’m not sure what the heck that even looks like anymore.
The other part of me sees crap like this from The Atlantic and thinks Democrats are actively trying to destroy their own party and would consider running another Biden. You know, the degenerate crack-head version.
He’s William S. Burroughs meets MAHA:
Hunter Biden on the benefits of crack cocaine.
Definitely Joe's son.
An arrogant, ignorant, hostile clown.
— john jackson (@pvtjokerus) July 21, 2025
CHEESE-EATING SURRENDER MONKEY: Macron Recognizes ‘Palestine’ as a State.
I KNOW SOMEONE WHO’S BEEN “MICRODOSING” TO LOSE A COUPLE OF POUNDS A MONTH WITH NO SIDE EFFECTS: If GLP-1 Drugs Are Good For Everything, Should We All Be on Them? “Studies show that the obesity and diabetes medication also reduces heart attacks, cancer risk, migraines, and memory loss. How is that even possible? And at what point should we all be on it? . . . When I initially read this study in January, it seemed too good to be true. Miracle drugs don’t exist. Perhaps, I thought, there were nuances that I’d missed. So I called up a co-author of the study, the Washington University physician-scientist Ziyad Al-Aly. On my podcast Plain English, Al-Aly told me that GLP-1 drug use really was associated with improvements across every biological system they studied.”
That said, the steady flood of good news leaves me a bit suspicious that it’s a PR push where we aren’t getting the downside.
THIS ALWAYS HAPPENS: Israel’s 12-Day War Revealed Alarming Gap in America’s Missile Stockpile.
The U.S. has seven high-end Thaad missile-defense systems. During the 12-day war with Iran in June, two were deployed to Israel—and it wasn’t enough.
Operating alongside Israeli systems, Thaad operators burned through munitions at a furious clip, firing more than 150 missiles to shoot down the waves of Iranian ballistic missiles, according to U.S. officials. That is nearly a quarter of the interceptors ever purchased by the Pentagon.
The demand was so staggering that at one point, the Pentagon considered a plan to divert interceptors purchased by Saudi Arabia to the systems in Israel, one official said. The discussions were sensitive, because the kingdom’s cities and oil installations were also considered at risk during the conflict.
It wasn’t just the Thaad. The U.S. ran through large numbers of shipborne interceptors as well, and Israel quickly drained stockpiles for its own systems. Dozens of Iranian missiles got through anyway.
While Israeli officials credited the American systems for saving thousands of lives, the war revealed an alarming gap in U.S. supplies. The U.S. also discovered inefficiencies in the way it fired its antimissile systems and is scrutinizing the performance of some interceptors.
It’s a peacetime conceit that we never stockpile enough of what we need for war.