November 6, 2026

THE NEW SPACE RACE: ELON MUSKSpaceX’s next Starship flight set to make history on Friday the 13th.

The date lands inside the window Elon Musk sketched out last month. Speaking at Giga Texas on October 10, Musk said the flight would “probably launch a little bit before Thanksgiving,” as Teslarati reported. On SpaceX’s third quarter earnings call ten days later, he confirmed that Flight 15 would try to catch both the Super Heavy booster and the ship, and put the odds of a successful ship catch at “more likely than not.” SpaceX also aired an animation of the maneuver during that webcast, showing the ship swinging vertical over Starbase before dropping into the tower’s chopsticks.

The hardware is ready. Booster 22 fired all 33 of its Raptor engines for a full duration static fire at Pad 2 on October 25. Ship 42 followed with a single engine burn simulating a deorbit maneuver on October 26 and a 60 second firing of all six engines the next day, according to NASASpaceflight. Ship 42 had already rehearsed the catch in September, when the Pad 2 arms lifted it into position and crews connected the quick disconnect arm while the vehicle hung from the tower.

The remaining hurdle is regulatory.

That last item is just one of the many places a Dem president could start squeezing Musk, next time they take the White House. His best hope is to wed SpaceX even more deeply into our defense infrastructure over the next two years.

Posted at 12:46 pm by Stephen Green

JOHN SEXTON: Salon Is No More, Pass the Champagne.

Salon writers all seemed to have a strong dislike for anything American. I pulled this quote myself a decade ago.

But my real interaction with Salon happened over what may truly be one of their most famous stories. It was titled, “I’m a pedophile but not a monster.”

The story was pulled down long ago but here’s a bit of what it said:

Those individuals who have the courage to come forward and lay claim to this affliction with the understanding that they only want to use their pedo powers for good should be commended, not hated and feared… So, please, be understanding and supportive. It’s really all we ask of you. Treat us like people with a massive handicap we must overcome, not as a monster.’

Seth Dillon of The Babylon Bee asks the obvious question about Salon’s demise:

Posted at 12:30 pm by Ed Driscoll

WELL PUT IN ANY LANGUAGE:

Posted at 12:28 pm by Stephen Green

BY CALCULATION OR IGNORANCE?

Posted at 11:59 am by Stephen Green

SCENES FROM THE EDUCATION APOCALYPSE: Mediocrity on the march: A poster on kindness isn’t ‘critical thinking.’

When goals are mushy and impossible to measure, “anything goes,” writes Buck, a former teacher who’s now a research fellow and the director of the Conservative Education Reform Network at the American Enterprise Institute.

Nobody’s held accountable for whether students can add fractions or name the three branches of government if the standard of excellence is building a spaghetti tower.

“How can a school foster grit?,” he asks. “Maintain demanding academic gauntlets. How can schools create self-discipline? Set behavioral standards and hold students to them. How can schools enable critical thinking? Provide them the knowledge of history, science, literature, grammar, and the arts that become the tools of critical thought.”

Students don’t become”global citizens” — or just a plain old good citizens — “through kitschy activities where they make posters about how kindness is cool,” Buck concludes.

Yes, but they’re well on their way to septum rings and endorsing political violence on TikTok.

Posted at 11:44 am by Stephen Green

THEY’LL GET ONE REGARDLESS, GOOD AND HARD: No one voted for a ‘woke wave.’

It’s easy to get depressed about American politics. Some might see us shifting from the MAGA personality cult to the impending rule of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA).

That view is wrong and misreads the results of yesterday’s midterm elections. It may have been a disaster for the Republicans, and particularly Donald Trump, but not necessarily for the country. Despite the success of some awful lefties, notably Abdul El-Sayed (D-Muslim Brotherhood), the biggest – and most unheralded – victories were won by Democratic candidates professing a more moderate message.

Even in metropolitan New York, particularly in the suburbs, it was moderate Democrats, largely pro-Israel, who won the day. The suburbs may dislike Trump, but they are not hanging socialist banners or Palestinian flags in their town centres.

And yet, that’s exactly what they enabled.

Posted at 10:42 am by Stephen Green

HE MAKES A COUP UNTHINKABLE. WE NOW LIVE IN A NATION WHERE YOU HAVE TO TAKE THAT SORT OF THING INTO ACCOUNT.

Posted at 10:27 am by Glenn Reynolds

STILL, SPEED HAS A VIRTUE ALL ITS OWN:

Posted at 10:26 am by Stephen Green

IF YOU TRAIN A MODEL ON THE PRODUCTS OF A NEUROTIC CULTURE, IT IS LIKELY TO BE (AT BEST) NEUROTIC:

Posted at 10:08 am by Glenn Reynolds

GOOD THING WE HAVE THE LEFT TO STAND FOR DECENCY AND AGAINST FASCISM BY [CHECKS NOTES] PREEMPTIVELY KILLING POTENTIAL OPPOSITION:

Posted at 10:07 am by Glenn Reynolds

EVERY INSTITUTION HAS BEEN CORRUPTED:

Or bribery was involved. Bad either way.

Posted at 10:05 am by Glenn Reynolds

JONATHAN TURLEY: A Dangerous Woman: Democrats Adopt Soviet Rhetoric to Condemn Stevens as Mentally Ill.

After she declared that she would split her ticket and vote for Mike Rogers over Abdul El-Sayed, Democrats across the country declared her mentally ill. Some used the attack literally, feigning deep concern over her safety — the way that you describe a friend found raving on the subway about being probed by aliens.

Lawyer George Conway encouraged her to check into a mental facility immediately. He is, after all, a Juris Doctor.

Rep. Debbie Dingell (D., Md.) explained to CNN in the tone of an intervention that “I have been worried about her all last week. She’s a human being.”

Former Republican Bill Kristol was more direct that Stevens “seems to have had some kind of breakdown or something.”

Zeteo editor-in-chief Mehdi Hasan said that Stevens is “clearly a disturbed, deranged, dishonest woman.”
…
It is a tactic made infamous by the Soviets, who invented conditions such as “sluggish schizophrenia” to lock up dissidents in mental hospitals. Nikita Khrushchev explained that mental illness was the only plausible explanation for anyone who opposed communism.

Locking up dissidents and shooting them full of sedatives was Khrushchev’s “kinder, gentler” alternative to Stalin just having them shot.

Posted at 9:40 am by Stephen Green

HMM:

I have a not-so-old label printer that — surprise! — isn’t compatible with the Golden Gate macOS release. I’ll have to sic my GrokBot army on the problem.

Posted at 9:24 am by Stephen Green

JOSH BLACKMAN AND SETH BARRETT TILLMAN: Senator-Governor Klobuchar and the Problem of the Received Wisdom. “In these circumstances, the law does not expressly bar dual-officeholding where, as here, the two positions are U.S. Senator and Minnesota Governor. The U.S. Constitution’s Incompatibility Clause (Article I, Section 6, Clause 2) bars U.S. Senators and Representatives from concurrently holding certain other federal positions. The position of governor is a state, not a federal position. So, this provision has no application here. . . . The federal double-dipping statute, 5 United States Code Section 5533 bars drawing two salaries for two positions, where both positions are at the federal level. It has no application to state positions, e.g., governor.”

Posted at 9:21 am by Glenn Reynolds