Happy Hour

I suspect even the sickos will skip the Trump speech.

The Final Frontier

I know he has nothing to do with it (presumably), but anything space-related makes me think of Musk now, and that therefore everything's gonna blow up.

NASA's long-awaited Artemis II mission is set to launch four astronauts on a journey around the moon today. Liftoff is scheduled for 6:24 p.m. ET from Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida.

Sure Why Not

I'm not even being snarky in the title. American hegemony has not been all good! Maybe time for something new.

JUST OUT: Trump has raised with SecState Rubio and other top aides the possibility of withdrawing from NATO if allies don’t help reopen the Strait of Hormuz, U.S. officials said.

He has discussed leaving NATO, or at least potentially finding ways to weaken the U.S. commitment.

— Alex Ward (@alexbward) April 1, 2026

Above my pay grade, but aside from "change is complicated" and "this is the way the world works" I don't see many convincing counterarguments.

Of Course He Did

If you have had a malignant narcissist in your life - and I have - you know it's quite the miracle that Trump left SCOTUS quietly (presumably), instead of somehow making a scene.

Reading The Tea Leaves

Based on the commentary of various SCOTUS watchers, Trump loses the birthright citizenship case 7-2.

I'm still not gonna place a bet on that.

...Trump left in the middle, of course.

Proper Respect

I do hope our glorious president pays proper respect to the Supreme Court justices the only way knows how to do: falling asleep in front of them.

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump plans to sit in on Wednesday's Supreme Court hearing on birthright citizenship, making him the first sitting president to attend oral arguments at the nation's highest court.

I try not to think too much about this case. One reason is that I decided wasting bits of my beautiful brain thinking about The Law is about as productive as playing fantasy football. The other is that it is the case that breaks everything, if the Supremos choose to do it.

Running On Air

I suppose I have predicted (not really, but I am pessimistic) 7 of the last 2 US economic crashes, but it is hard to see how stock (and today, oil!) price shifts match current world events and appropriate confidence in the man currently steering the ship.

Maybe the global economy has uncoupled more from oil than I would have thought.

Morning

late start

Happy Hour

Get happy

What Will Brian Say

My bet is still on "Trump pushes ahead catastrophically," but if Trump does "cut and run," as the kids used to say, will Brian praise him (yes!)?

Starlink Go Boom

No idea what is causing this, but it would be "funny" if they were all little time bombs.

SpaceX says it lost contact with a Starlink satellite after suffering an “anomaly.” SpaceX isn’t saying exactly what happened, but space-tracking company Leo Labs says it “immediately detected tens of objects in the vicinity” of Starlink 34343 after the event.

...

SpaceX suffered a similar episode in December when it suddenly lost communications with a satellite that also seemingly exploded. That incident occurred just a week after a near miss with a Chinese satellite.

Get Elon To Fix It

I bet it would be trivial to egg him on to claim he could.

After 16 years and $8 billion, the military’s new GPS software still doesn’t work

“It’s a very stressing program. We are still considering how to ensure we move forward.”

Critics

Well okay then.

Critics say the law will do exactly what everyone says it will do, explicitly, with no argument from the people proudly enacting the law.

Please Unshit My Bed

Nasty allies, not cleaning up my shit.

I'm scared to mock this, even here on this little blog that our fine president likely does not read, as calling losing the open strait a victory is probably better than the alternative. Let him declare victory and go home.

Trump Tells Aides He’s Willing to End War Without Reopening Hormuz

Administration officials assess that forcing the waterway back open would mean extending the military mission

He's bored now.

In recent days, Trump and his aides assessed that a mission to pry open the chokepoint would push the conflict beyond his timeline of four to six weeks. He decided that the U.S. should achieve its main goals of hobbling Iran’s navy and its missile stocks and wind down current hostilities while pressuring Tehran diplomatically to resume the free flow of trade. If that fails, Washington would press allies in Europe and the Gulf to take the lead on reopening the strait, the officials said.

I am still betting on a ground invasion/etc and that Trump isn't really ready to declare a loss a victory, but we will see!

Hegseth on when US objectives will be achieved: "He said four to six weeks, six to eight weeks, three weeks -- it could by any particular number. It will be the president's determination."

[image or embed]

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.com) March 31, 2026 at 1:39 PM

I hope Pete's having fun.

Morning

Tantalizing Tuesday.

Happy Hour

get happy

Jsrael

Just funny slang, no need to interrogate further, NYT..

Just outside the hall, 20-somethings in rumpled suits were gathered in clusters, debating the merits of a ground invasion in Iran, the conservative backlash against those who were "J-pilled" (far-right slang for skepticism of Israeli influence), the backbreaking costs of American life, and what they saw as the slow demise of the Trump era.

Imagine the coverage if left wing genocide opponents said they were "J-pilled."

Afternoon

 I got nothin'

Pony Territory

I can't remember where I drew the line so many years ago, but <35 sounds right.

A new national University of Massachusetts Amherst Poll finds President Donald Trump’s approval rating has fallen to 33%, the lowest rating of his second term in office. The poll of 1,000 respondents, conducted March 20-25, finds Trump’s approval down five points from July 2025 and 11 points lower than last April.

Never Heard Of Her

Trump respects crooks, but he also hates not being included in the scam.

Investigators searched the office of a Federal Emergency Management Agency contractor as they investigate a network of aides former Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and adviser Corey Lewandowski seeded throughout the DHS during their turbulent tenure, according to people familiar with the matter.

...

Another prong of the probe into Voorhies: her compensation. FEMA officials have been unable to locate her contract and investigators are still seeking it, according to people familiar with the matter. Senior FEMA officials were told that Voorhies was getting paid as much as $19,000 a week, some of the people said, which would amount to roughly $1 million a year.

That's *his* money!

The point of the first sentence is that all justice depends largely on who Trump will and won't pardon, an extremely corrupt thing that the NYT finds endless euphemisms for.