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Ted Cruz(!) Just Said FCC Pressure On ABC… Is Like A “Goodfellas’ Movie”. Tangerine Whines At Cruz. Y A W N.

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John spoke this evening of “asymmetry“ — as the performative GOP morons in the US House decided to honor the avowed racist Charlie Kirk. AOC rose to rightly point out that this was performative, and insulting to people who had survived Jim Crow and worse.

John claimed that all the GOP members voted to condemn the assassination of the Democratic Speaker of the Minn. House. [I forget: did Charlie Kirk ever win an election — even as a dog catcher?!] Talk about your… asymmetry, there, now Hinderaker.

But… back to the main narrative: Cruz is the only one with the balls to tell Trump and the FCC Chair to knock it off. Cruz doesn’t want to be labeled as a pro-Putin autocrat [any longer, I gather]. Here’s that bit:

…”I got to say that’s right out of ‘Goodfellas’,” Cruz said, evoking the Martin Scorsese gangster movie. “That’s right out of a mafioso coming into a bar going, ‘Nice bar you have here. It would be a shame if something happened to it’….”

Delicious. The boys are… fighting. For his part, the Manchurian Cantaloupe shot back (at Cruz), saying that he disagrees — but that Cruz is “a patriot”.

Check. Trump is against the US Constitution — and in favor of mediocre white men, with big balls.

Got it.

You paying attention, here Johnnie?!

BTW, where’s Hinderaker’s piece criticizing Trump’s / FCC use / abuse… to stifle legitimate debate?!?

Out.

Waiting To Be… Found: 6,000 Worlds — And Rising, Daily.

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Do… just watch.

The official number of exoplanets — planets outside our solar system — tracked by NASA has reached 6,000. Confirmed planets are added to the count on a rolling basis by scientists from around the world, so no single planet is considered the 6,000th entry….

The number is monitored by the agency’s Exoplanet Science Institute, based at Caltech’s Infrared Processing and Analysis Center in Pasadena, California. There are more than 8,000 additional candidate planets awaiting confirmation, with NASA leading the world in searching for life in the universe….

The below is under two minutes in length — and will (almost certainly) put a smile on your face, this Friday:

Closing Friday — on a hopeful note. We should expect this census figure to explode geometrically, in the coming decades, with JWST and the Nancy Grace Roman space ‘scopes.

Yup, we may soon find… that we are not alone. And… what a moment that will be. Onward.

नमस्ते

“This Is What Democracy Looks Like — We Will Not Back Down!” We Will Not Be Rebuffed, By A Lawless Few That Don’t Understand The Contours Of Peaceful Protests, Against ICE Cruelty.

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This is local — this is is real time. And this is my Mayor.

Good on him! Kristi Noem can kick rocks — until her next derma-peel and spackling compound make-up/cover-up arrives. We will not be moved:

…EVANSTON, IL — Federal immigration officers got physical with protesters outside the Immigration and Customs Enforcement processing center in north suburban Chicago Friday morning, physically dragging people as well as using tear gas and pepper balls, according to videos from the scene and social media posts from local officials.

Numerous politicians were present at the protests Friday morning, including Lieutenant Governor Juliana Stratton and Evanston Mayor Daniel Biss. In a video posted to X, Biss and other protesters are shown standing in front of a moving vehicle as agents deploy tear gas….

“Federal forces just tear gassed myself and the other peaceful protesters here at the Broadview ICE facility. This is a terrifying escalation, but we will not back down,” Biss said….

Onward, resolutely — no matter what.

As the reporting indicates, a local state politician was thrown to the ground, and sustained scrapes and cuts — all for saying “this is WRONG!” — and loudly so.

नमस्ते

[U] In Just Three Elapsed Days — Yep, Tangerine 2.0’s Suit Is… Tossed: His Lawyers Can’t Read Rules, For Comprehension. Hilarious.

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Yep. Just as we said. And it was a Bush 41 appointed USDC Judge that tossed it.

Stick a fork in this one (per Bloomberg Law) — no future amendment of it will survive any summary motion to dismiss, no matter what these jamokes do… or say:

…A federal judge in Florida has tossed out President Donald Trump’s $15 billion defamation lawsuit against the New York Times days after it was filed, finding the president’s lawyers failed to follow court rules requiring “short, plain, direct” claims.

US District Judge Steven Merryday found that Trump’s lawsuit “unmistakably and inexcusably” violated the court’s rules by featuring “repetitive,” “superfluous” and “florid” allegations and details….

Here is the order in full, and a bit: “…A complaint is not a megaphone for public relations or a podium for a passionate oration at a political rally or the functional equivalent of the Hyde Park Speakers’ Corner….”

It is indeed… a glorious Friday, now! Onward.

नमस्ते

Four Decades On — Still Getting Great Discoveries — From Hubble!

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This is the “solution” — to the above masthead mystery.

Here is what the bottom masthead pic (and derivative image, at right) depict: a Pluto-like icy world, being shredded by its host white dwarf star — and, an event much like what may obtain over 3 billion years from now — in our system, after our Sun inflates, and burns Earth and the inner planets to ash — it will collapse to be about the size of old Earth — an exceedingly dense white dwarf. Here’s the latest, from NASA (with a video explainer at bottom):

…Billions of years from now, when our Sun burns out and collapses to a white dwarf, Kuiper Belt objects will be pulled in by the stellar remnant’s immense gravity. “These planetesimals will then be disrupted and accreted,” said Sahu. “If an alien observer looks into our solar system in the far future, they might see the same kind of remains we see today around this white dwarf.”

The team hopes to use NASA’s JWST to detect molecular features of volatiles such as water vapor and carbonates by observing this white dwarf in infrared light. By further studying white dwarfs, scientists can better understand the frequency and composition of these volatile-rich accretion events.

Sahu is also following the recent discovery of the interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS. She is eager to learn its chemical composition, especially its fraction of water. “These types of studies will help us learn more about planet formation. They can also help us understand how water is delivered to rocky planets,” said Sahu….

Now you know. Mystery (above)… solved. Out.

नमस्ते

[U: Paul Belches… Too!] Sure, John. Whatever… You Hypocritical Flip Flopping Liar.

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Donald Trump = Vlad Putin.

He said it pretty plainly today, that FCC should review (with a threat toward revoking) the broadcast licenses of networks that criticize him.

And updated: all the coward Paul Mirengoff can say is “he went too far”?! What a chickensh!t. How about this violates about a century of Supreme Court precedents? How about this is exactly what Paul annd his MAGA-handlers claimed (falsely!) was wrong with Obama and Biden and Harris?! No… Paul is an Tangerine-licking b!tch. End update.

And as the original piece — so it is, that Hinderaker claims he is a free speech absolutist. And he claims that Pam Bondi is in the wrong here.

But you can bet your very last dollar Hinderaker will not even mildly chastise Donald Trump for saying that broadcast TV networks that criticize Trump should have their licenses revoked from the FCC.

Charming. We will — as ever — peacefully — resist. Resist the trampling of our First Amendment rights.

Nearly 250 years of freedom now hang in the balance. Forget this loser, folks:

…President Trump said federal regulators should revoke broadcast licenses over late-night hosts who speak negatively about him, a day after ABC pulled Jimmy Kimmel’s show “indefinitely” after pressure from the Federal Communications Commission chairman….

“They’re giving me all this bad press, and they’re getting a license,” Mr. Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One, after ABC suspended the late-night Jimmy Kimmel Live show. “I would think maybe their license should be taken away….”

Not on my watch you Manchurian Cantaloupe.

Nope.

नमस्ते

USDC Judge Timothy Kelly [A Trump 1.0 Appointee!] Agrees: Noem’s Acts Are “Patently Unlawful”. Guatemalan Kids Cannot Be Kidnapped Back To Abuse — Or Worse. Full Stop.

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His opinion is a searing indictment… of how utterly Un-American these goon squads are. Miller and Noem (and Tangerine, in allowing them to run wild!) are more brown shirts, than MAGA. None of this makes any America we might want to live in… “great“.

And so, as we posited, even Trump appointed federal judges (like Judge Kelly) have ruled this… beyond the pale. Here’s the fine 43 page order / opinion, and a bit — just published at lunchtime today:

…Just before midnight on the Saturday of Labor Day weekend, several Executive Branch agencies began to implement a plan to expel from the United States certain unaccompanied alien children in the custody of the Department of Health and Human Services and send them back to their home country of Guatemala. Those agencies told the children’s caretakers, who were hearing about the plan for the first time, to have them ready for pickup in as little as two hours. The children were roused from their beds in the middle of the night and driven to an airport, where some were loaded onto planes.

Lawyers got wind of this hasty operation while it was unfolding and filed this lawsuit seeking emergency relief that Sunday at 1:00 a.m. The judge on emergency duty entered a temporary restraining order barring the agencies and their officials from removing or otherwise transporting the children from the United States. At a hearing later that day, counsel for Defendants explained why it was “fairly outrageous” for Plaintiffs to have sued: all Defendants wanted to do was reunify children with parents who had requested their return.

But that explanation crumbled like a house of cards about a week later. There is no evidence before the Court that the parents of these children sought their return. To the contrary, the Guatemalan Attorney General reports that officials could not even track down parents for most of the children whom Defendants found eligible for their “reunification” plan. And none of those that were located had asked for their children to come back to Guatemala….

[Thus,] the Court will provisionally certify the class described above and grant Plaintiffs’ motion for a preliminary injunction…

Given the lack of representation that [Tangerine/Noemite] Defendants will sustain any monetary injury from an injunction, the self-evidently limited financial resources of Plaintiffs, and the important rights they seek to vindicate, the Court will impose a nominal bond of $1.00. See N. Am.’s Building Trades Unions v. Dep’t of Def., 783 F.
Supp. 3d 290, 315 (D.D.C. 2025) (defendants had “not sufficiently demonstrated any likelihood of suffering costs or damages if they are later found to have been wrongfully enjoined”)….

Onward. This regular, whole-sale and notorious open court lying — by agencies of what was once a mostly-honorable federal government… must end.

Use the ballot box in 2026 — and rid us (via a new House and Senate — ready for some real Congressional oversight!) of these… brownshirts. Out.

नमस्ते

Mirengoff: Just As With Comments Critical Of Israel After Oct. 7 [Mirengoff Stupidly Posits], America Needs… “Speech Codes”?! Hilarious!

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File this under… irony quotient: 1000!

Paul was all for “absolute” free speech… until he didn’t like the speech — or speaker. That was in the wake of October 7, 2023.

Over the ensuing months, he moderated his views a bit, allowing that some Palestinians have “a point” — but they (even completely peaceful Muslims) are not entitled to “any homeland” in the very land they’ve occupied for nearly 2,000 years. To be fair, for almost 900 years prior to that time — Jews lived on most of that land — like before 2,000 BC… if the Bible is to be believed.

Now — with howls from inside his own camp, for a “crackdown” on all liberal groups — Paul again chooses the coward’s path.

He suggests that people working in machine shops can be fired for decrying the hate that Kirk spewed — and saying “good riddance!”… but they shouldn’t be CRIMINALLY prosecuted (without an actual violent act). Gee — that’s magnanimous, Paulie!

Kirk is dead. That was a crime. It is being prosecuted, appropriately so. It was actual violence.

Even so, I say: “may his wrong headed rhetoric too soon pass from this Earth, despite his widow’s need for clicks and likes.”

No employer will have a say… in what I write. Or say. Or think. I am my own keeper — and in need of no funds — forever.

Get used to people… telling you (in very public places!) “you are full of crap Paul and John.” Because both of you… are.

Out.

UPDATE On Mr. Khalil’s Matter: Will Challenge Admin. Law / Immigration Judge’s Specious Ruling That Noem Had “Separate Grounds” To Remove Him…

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Much of my theme over the past two weeks has revolved around the current mal-administration’s lawless attempts to silence dissent — and/or speech they do not favor. That is at the core of this Khalil development.

He peacefully mediated and advocated, on Columbia University’s campus last year. [Whether one agrees or disagrees with him, he had the right to do so — just as Charlie Kirk had the right to spew his bile, in a free America.] But for that, by Mr. Khalil, Noem / Miller / Tangerine 2.0 threw him into a hell-hole in Jena, LA for four months. [He missed the birth of his first child, in the process, in NYC.]

He is free now — living with his young family and US Citizen wife. But the immigration admin. judges have ruled that Noem may label him “deportable” — based on incomplete information in a packet of papers, about his whereabouts, more than a decade ago. Here’s the ACLU explaining what the order of filings will be, as they await word from the Appeals Court, on the overall matter [Mr. Khalil did win out, at trial, against Trump]:

…Following the Trump administration’s latest effort to weaponize the immigration system to silence Mahmoud Khalil for his advocacy in support of Palestinian human rights, Mr. Khalil’s legal team today submitted a letter to the federal court in New Jersey overseeing his civil rights case. The letter to Judge Michael Farbiarz explains that Mr. Khalil will challenge a Sept. 12 decision made by the immigration judge in Louisiana that denied Mr. Khalil a waiver of removability, bringing him one step closer to a final order of removal, because of baseless, pretextual “misrepresentation” charges the government added after his detention.

As the letter notes, the immigration judge rushed to a decision without providing a hearing on the evidence as due process requires, engaging in multiple procedural irregularities, and choosing to believe the false charges made after the fact by the government. The letter also states how rare it is for an immigration judge to deny a waiver against a lawful permanent resident with a U.S. spouse and child, and no criminal record….

Kimmel and Colbert are not aberrations — they are the playbook. Dammit people — wake up! Onward, resolutely just the same.

नमस्ते

NASA Wins [Another] Webby Award, For Compelling Content — And Advancement Of The “Free Marketplace” Of… Ideas.

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Since at least the early 1990s, NASA has been well ahead of all other US federal agencies, in serving up free and compelling content, on the web, as a “dividend” for the world, from our tax dollars.

As of April 2025, NASA had won a total of 116 Webby Awards since 1998. [It was, in fact, the NASA animations of the Shoemaker-Levy comet impacts on Jupiter that first hooked me on this web-address.] I think, based solely on a quick “GTS” search (urban dictionary for “google that sh!t”), no other single organization has ever won more than 40, life to date (since 1996). Here’s to the fine science-teams — and creative teams — at the National Aeronautics and Space Agency (and here’s the news, from NASA on the latest Webby 30)!

…NASA has earned a spot on The Webby 30, a curated list celebrating 30 companies and organizations that have shaped the digital landscape.

“This honor reflects the talent of NASA’s communications professionals who bring our story to life,” said Will Boyington, associate administrator for the Office of Communications at NASA Headquarters in Washington. “Being recognized shows that America’s leadership in space and NASA’s innovative messaging resonate with the public as we share our missions that inspire the world.”

The Webby awards recognize companies across technology, media, entertainment, and social media that have consistently demonstrated creativity and innovation on their digital platforms. NASA’s inclusion in the list underscores the agency’s long-standing commitment to sharing its awe-inspiring missions, discoveries, and educational resources with audiences around the globe.

“Singling out NASA as one of the most iconic and innovative brands shows a government agency can compete on the global digital stage,” said Brittany Brown, head of digital communications at NASA Headquarters in Washington….

Onward — with a wide grin: the whole of the Universe lies ahead — if we are curious enough to go learn about it. Yep!

नमस्ते