April 9, 2026

BUT WILL THEY VOTE RED: That’s the question whenever the topic of folks leaving blue states and moving red states enters the conversation. Usually, the source data for such talks is state-to-state moves, but the sharp minds at Issues & Insights (I&I) dug deeper in the Census Bureau data and found some things that may put the whole issue into clearer focus.

“What we found was that millions aren’t just moving out of blue states, but are moving out of blue counties within states. Trump won 2,589 counties in each of the past three elections.

“From 2020 to 2025, those counties gained 5.4 million people due to net migration — which measures how many people move into and out of an area. The 433 counties where Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden, and Kamala Harris carried the day saw a net loss of 5.43 million people. And the 121 counties in which Trump won at least one of the past three elections saw a net gain of 29,000 people over those years.”

Be sure and check out the top 10 population gaining counties and the top 10 loser counties.

Posted at 12:38 pm by Mark Tapscott

IRISH ARMY CALLED IN TO REMOVE FUEL DEPOT BLOCKADES:

The Irish government has asked the army to help remove vehicles blocking fuel depots as protests entered a third day.

Haulage and agricultural businesses are angry about the response to rising fuel costs, and have also set up slow-moving convoys on motorways and disrupted major roads in Dublin.

“The blocking of critical national infrastructure will not be permitted to continue and the assistance of the Defence Forces has been requested,” justice minister Jim O’Callaghan said in a statement.

He said large vehicles would be removed – and warned owners to “remove them immediately” on Thursday morning, or face the possibility of them being damaged.

Owners “should not complain later about any damage caused to those vehicles during removal”, he said.

“Denying people access to fuel and clean water is an unacceptable interference in the most basic of human rights,” he added.

Related:

Posted at 12:30 pm by Ed Driscoll

JOHN SAILOR:  “How the Mellon Foundation Funds Trans Ideology.”  Sorry about that Mr. Mellon.  Your children put your money into a foundation and then died, leaving the foundation in the hands of a series of administrators who become weirder and weirder as time went by.

Dear 21st century titans:  Don’t let this happen to you.  If you establish a charitable foundation, make sure it spends itself down in one generation.  Make sure your money is spent by somebody who knew you, respected you, and in whom you have great trust.

Posted at 11:51 am by Gail Heriot

OTHER PEOPLE’S MONEY: Education is fond of fads: If it feels good, fund it. “Among other things, Pondiscio writes, change is how administrators show they’re leaders. The new superintendent” announces a bold vision, rebrands existing efforts, and introduces a new set of priorities. Three years later, often before results are fully visible, that leader departs,” and a new one comes in with bold new ideas. If the experiment is working, it’s hard to sustain the success.”

Too many administrators, not enough parental control and oversight.

Posted at 11:43 am by Stephen Green

WHEN YOU’RE TOO FREE-SPENDING FOR ALBANY: Mamdani’s plan for free buses in NYC hits pothole, told by Albany ‘just not financially feasible.’

New York state Sen. Jeremy Cooney, who is chairman of the upper chamber’s Transportation Committee, said lawmakers want to make transit more affordable, but “making every bus in New York City free is just not financially feasible.”

“I would tell this to the mayor: I know you care about the most vulnerable,” Cooney said. “This is a way — working within the existing system — that we could increase support for the most vulnerable and start there, and then look to do an expansion of that.”

Cooney also said that while Mamdani has asked him for some things, he has not had a “direct ask” from the mayor about free buses.

Even Mamdani seems to know it’s a non-starter.

Posted at 10:41 am by Stephen Green

CRUEL BUT FAIR:

Posted at 10:32 am by Stephen Green

WELL, WHEN YOU PUT IT THAT WAY…:

Posted at 9:54 am by Stephen Green

WHOSE STUFF IS IT, ANYWAY? John Deere to Pay $99 Million in Monumental Right-to-Repair Settlement. “The settlement also includes an agreement by Deere to provide ‘the digital tools ​required for the maintenance, diagnosis, and repair’ of tractors, combines, and other machinery for 10 years. That part is crucial, as farmers previously resorted to hacking their own equipment’s software just to get it up and running again. John Deere signed a memorandum of understanding in 2023 that partially addressed those concerns, providing third parties with the technology to diagnose and repair, as long as its intellectual property was safeguarded. Monday’s settlement seems to represent a much stronger (and legally binding) step forward.”

Posted at 9:39 am by Stephen Green

KRUISER’S MORNING BRIEFING: READ THE ROOM — 20 GOP Morons Sign Onto Bipartisan Amnesty Bill. “The first big hint that this bill is bad news is the fact that the official name of it is the ‘DIGNIDAD’ act. Opting for the Spanish version of ‘dignity’ is pretty much just a big middle finger to anyone who is truly concerned about border security.”

Posted at 9:08 am by Stephen Green

WELL, GOOD:

Posted at 8:52 am by Stephen Green

HEY, BIG SPENDER: Intel Lands Musk’s $25 Billion Terafab: A Billion-Dollar Foundry Win in the Making?

Intel’s role centers on what it does best: design, fabrication, and packaging at scale. The company’s post explicitly ties its contribution to accelerating Terafab’s 1 TW per year target using its “ultra-high-performance chips.” In plain English, this isn’t Tesla or SpaceX building a rival fab from scratch. It’s an Intel Foundry expansion in Austin with Musk’s companies as anchor customers. That means Intel just landed a marquee, high-volume partner for its 18A and future nodes — exactly the kind of external validation the foundry has chased for years.

Let’s put the numbers in context. Intel’s full-year 2025 foundry revenue reached $17.8 billion, up 3% year-over-year. Q4 alone delivered $4.5 billion, also up 4%. Yet external customer revenue for the full year totaled just $307 million, including $222 million in Q4. The majority of the foundry’s business was internal production for Intel’s own CPUs. The unit still posted a $10.3 billion operating loss for 2025, driven by 18A ramp costs.

Terafab changes the math. A project of this scale could push external revenue into the billions annually once wafers start flowing.

We already know where SpaceX will get the cash: Musk’s SpaceX courts retail investors as it aims for record-breaking stock market flotation.

Posted at 8:37 am by Stephen Green

A BERLIN WALL MADE OUT OF RED TAPE:

Posted at 8:21 am by Stephen Green

AND IT’S ALL SELF-INFLICTED BY THE WORST POLITICAL CLASS IN HISTORY: The Humiliation of Great Britain Is Complete. “A few weeks back, the Financial Times declared that Britain is no longer a global power. It’s hard to dispute that statement. In fact, the FT was only saying aloud what everybody around the world has been thinking for quite a while. The fecklessness of Keir Starmer puts this fact in harsh relief—Britain took weeks to deploy a destroyer to protect a base that had already been attacked by Iran, leaving it to a Spanish ship to provide air defense. It had to wait because none of its available destroyers were deployable at the moment, and the Navy had to rush repairs to get it out of dry dock. It took four weeks after the war’s start to get there; it lasted a few weeks, and just arrived back in Britain for repairs.”

Posted at 8:11 am by Glenn Reynolds