Today's News (and A Lil' Announcement)

I'm pretty sure I'm gonna publish a book soon :)

I finished digitizing the archive yesterday, and I’m actively editing as you read this.

SpaceX CEO Elon Musk visits N&NC and AFSPC

I guess it would be called a book, right? I’ll definitely publish it… the question is, where does one stop? How do you end a thing like this, when you know it’s just a volume? We’re less than 3 months in and it’s already WELL over 100 pages. This presidency will continue for years, so my best bet is to produce some type of ongoing series. The original text has its own type of charm, but I’ve decided instead to create a version for publication so it includes afterthoughts and multimedia. If even one person finds it worth keeping/insightful/useful to the world, I think my heart would actually just explode.

I am incredulous and unabashedly proud. I started writing because it felt like somebody should (a lot of somebodies, honestly)… so I did; if it hadn’t been for the folks on Substack encouraging me the whole way, there’s no saying whether I’d have had the courage.

For every comment, compliment, and (gentle) criticism… THANK YOU. I’ll let you know as soon as I have a date!

PS - Believe it or not, something else is coming too :) This weekend, I had possibly the best idea of my life… more on that later.

Because of the digitizing, and because today was the end of the month at work, I haven’t looked at the news in what feels like a record amount of time since this inauguration… a whole two days! Let’s see what sorta mayhem the world has cooked up for us. It’s Monday at 2:41pm.

• Reuters: In a change of course, US Justice Dept drops challenge to Georgia voting law

  • AG Bondi: “Georgians deserve secure elections, not fabricated claims of false voter suppression meant to divide us.”

    • Considering this is the same woman who resorted to talking about Hillary Clinton emails to deflect from her utterly unserious reaction to leaked military secrets, I’m not surprised.

• Reuters: Trump plans executive order targeting ticket scalping, according to document

  • Hmmmm… off the bat, I have nothing bad to say about this. Perhaps it’s overstepping in some way I don’t realize because I’m not an expert… but I admit, I’d damn sure like to see concerts get a lil more affordable

• Reuters: Judge blocks Trump administration from stripping deportation protections for Venezuelans

  • U.S. District Judge Edward Chen in San Francisco paused Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem’s decision to remove temporary protected status from hundreds of thousands of Venezuelans.

We have to stop, because I’m listening to the most insane Post Reports podcast episode right now… I just started the whole episode over! I’m gonna paraphrase the first couple minutes cause I can’t type as fast as they talk: “On Tuesday, Wisconsin voters will go to the polls for one of the first major electoral contests since the election… The race is for an open seat on the State Supreme Court, but the most talked about person in the race isn’t one of the candidates… It's Elon Musk.” He’s been campaigning for candidate Brad Schimel. Democrats are hoping that voters will show up and vote the opposite just to give a giant fuck you to billionaires buying votes. Elon Musk is spending a lot of money, $20 million, maybe more… put out a petition that says something like ‘if you oppose activist judges, sign this petition and get $100, refer a friend with contact info and get another $100’, which buys him a bunch of data to bombard them with texts and stuff to get them to vote. He also did a lottery drawing of $1,000,000 cash to two people. Is it legal? Good question.”

We can only hope that enough voters make a point to deliver a middle finger. Damn, I worry about the consequences if he proves he can buy an election twice…

• I found the Reuters story on it just now; it’s the most expensive judicial race in U.S. history. Here’s an update, and it’s interesting how Reuters reported it: “Wisconsin’s attorney general, Democrat Josh Kaul, sued to block the state supreme court ruled it could go ahead, according to the Washington Post.” So… I guess it is legal? Really?

• Reuters: Harvard at risk of losing $9 billion in federal funds as US launches review

  • Funding will be contingent on accountability over harassment... What does that even mean?

  • Supporters of Trump’s efforts say it is a long-needed check on far-left extremism at U.S. colleges.

    • Wait, so is it antisemitism or far-left extremism? Let’s not confuse the two here…

• Reuters: US Army withholds report on key helicopter safety system use, senators say

  • Ted Cruz last week at a hearing pressed Army General Matt Braman, the director of Army aviation, on its failure to use ADS-B on most flights."I want to encourage the Army right now to revisit that policy and to revisit that policy today," Cruz said. "If today another accident occurs over DCA (Reagan National) with another helicopter that had ADS-B out turned off, the Army will have very direct responsibility for that."

    • It’s interesting to me that Ted Cruz is on the record using this language… since Trump is technically the commander in chief, this would low-key be a challenge, ultimately, that’s up to him? If the Army doesn’t comply with Congress, who will Donald Trump side with?

Once again, I find myself furious with Democrats.

The Republicans made clear who they are and what their plan was since Trump’s first week; Democrats, however, are running out of time to prove whether they serve the Constitution and We the People or if they serve their 2026 interests.

Screw your political future. The entire party should stand as one and tell the People what’s happening. I’m pretty sure this is a coup. Not even MAGA signed up to give Donald Trump absolute power (at least, I don’t think they did) and the masses need SOMEBODY opposing him. The idea that leading members of the party might still be playing politics right now scares the hell out of me.

I don’t even know how Elon Musk works into all of this, except to say that JD Vance’s entire relevance to history depends on whether Musk is interested in office… and he’s got to know that, and that makes me chuckle.