Welcome to Thursday, May 7, 2026, and both the National Day of Prayer and the National Day of Reason. What is one to do? I vote for the latter. that it’s also National Cosmopolitan Day, celebrating the made famous by the t.v. show “Sex and the City”, an episode of which appears below. The video features not only the drink and a rich guy trying to pick up Samantha, but also DONALD TRUMP, for crying out loud. I’m pleased at having found it!

Wikipedia describes the drink as “a cocktail made with vodka, Cointreau, cranberry juice, and freshly squeezed or sweetened lime juice. The traditional garnish is a lime slice but a twist or wedge can be used instead. Other variations substitute lemon or orange.” I’ve never had one, but the ladies on the show were drinking them constantly.

It’s also National Roast Leg of Lamb Day, and National Tourism Day.

I have only a few scattered readers’ wildlife photos, so please send in any good photos you have.

There’s a Google Doodle celebrating K-pop, an dire genre of music; you can see the YouTube animation by clicking on the screenshot below:

Readers are welcome to mark notable events, births, or deaths on this day by consulting the May 7 Wikipedia page.

Da Nooz:

*Suicides first:  The government released the text of a suicide note purportedly written by Jeffrey Epstein and found by his cellmate. Here’s the image from the WSJ credited to “the United States District Court of the Southern District of New York”:

From the NYT:

*Obituaries: Ted Turner died at 87. How many of today’s young folk even know who he was, or how influential he was?

Ted Turner, the swashbuckling media titan who helped shape the modern cable-television industry, ushering in the era of 24-hour news with CNN while building other major networks that bear his name, died Wednesday at age 87, according to a spokesman.

Adventurous and impulsive, Turner made a mark in many walks of life. He was a sailor, a conservationist who was one of the largest U.S. landowners, and a major philanthropist who helped set a model for generous giving by billionaires.

He was best known for turning the billboard-advertising company he inherited from his father into Turner Broadcasting System, an Atlanta-based television and movie giant that he eventually sold in 1995 to Time Warner. Turner joined the company and stayed with it through its ill-fated January 2000 merger with America Online before leaving in 2003.

As Turner battled rival media titans like Rupert Murdoch and Sumner Redstone in the 1980s and 1990s, they collectively brought cable TV into the mainstream, fostering an explosion of investment, new channels and consumer subscriptions.

At TBS, he seized on breakthroughs in satellite technology to turn a local Atlanta TV station into a national “superstation.” That network and TNT became cable TV counterparts to what were then the big three broadcast networks—ABC, CBS and NBC.

Starting in the 1980s, CNN redefined how breaking news is covered on television, with round-the-clock updates and live reports during major events like the first Iraq war in 1990, the O.J. Simpson murder trial and natural disasters. Programs like “Larry King Live” and “Crossfire” were early signs that talk shows and commentary would have a major role in cable TV.

. . .He at turns kept a bear and an alligator as pets, was adamantly antireligion, and, as he admitted himself, had a knack for putting his foot in his mouth.

Turner said in a 2018 interview with CBS that he had Lewy body dementia, a progressive brain disorder that he said made him tired and forgetful. Turner, labeled “Captain Outrageous” for his erratic behavior, had once been thought to have bipolar disorder. He told CBS that was a misdiagnosis, and that his confusion and the “euphoric highs and dark lows” he was known for were symptoms of the dementia.

From the WSJ

You might recall that he was also once married to Jane Fonda.

*It’s Noon in Israel predicts that “The Islamic Republic ‘will not survive 2026’.”

It’s Wednesday, May 6, and according to my colleague at Channel 12, Barak Ravid, within 48 hours, the U.S. expects Iran’s response to a framework that brings both sides closer to a deal than at any point during the war. The proposed pact trades an Iranian uranium enrichment freeze for U.S. sanctions relief, unfrozen assets, and a mutually reopened Strait of Hormuz. This framework is strictly an interim measure; if the final negotiations collapse, a return to all-out war is entirely possible.

Still, it is unfortunate timing. Last night, a very senior Israeli intelligence source estimated that if the status quo blockade remains, the Islamic Republic “will not survive 2026.” Predicting the complete collapse of a half-century-old theocracy within the next eight months sounds like a bold gamble—until you look at the math.

The Iranian rial is in freefall, crashing to 1.8 million to the U.S.dollar. That is a 25 percent plunge from the exchange rate that triggered mass protests just this past January—and it’s only getting worse. To prevent mass starvation, the government is propping up a heavily subsidized exchange rate of 285,000 rials per dollar just to import basic food supplies. The wider economy is faring no better. Even before the blockade, non-oil trade had plummeted by 50 percent. The much-touted economic “pivot to China” has failed entirely, trade is down 80 percent, and regional hubs for evading sanctions, like the UAE, have slammed their doors shut. Two million Iranians have lost their jobs already, and that number is expected to skyrocket.

But the most devastating blow has landed on the regime’s lifeblood: oil.

Right now, Iran has 184 million barrels of oil sitting uselessly on the water. Roughly 60 million of those barrels are physically trapped inside the blockade zone across the Persian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman. The other 124 million are anchored near China, but buyers are too terrified of secondary U.S.sanctions to touch them. Between stalled oil and frozen petrochemical exports, the blockade is draining the regime of an estimated $400 million to $500 million every single day.

Worse, this blockade is rapidly evolving into an existential crisis for Iran’s energy sector. Once Iran’s onshore and floating storage tanks reach 100 percent capacity—which is expected within 15 to 60 days—the state will be forced to physically shut in active oil wells. For mature oil fields, capping wells amounts to a death sentence, as the underground pressure required to extract the oil dissipates. If this happens, Iran could permanently lose 300,000 to 500,000 barrels per day of production capacity. That is $9 billion to $15 billion in annual revenue wiped out.

Iran currently has a surplus of men with guns and a deficit of loyalty. The only things bridging that gap are fear and cash—and when the latter runs out, the former loses its edge. In a desperate bid for survival, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps has begun cannibalizing the state, hoarding whatever liquidity remains at the cost of the rest of the system. Some regular army units and police forces have now gone unpaid for months.

These are not the ingredients for a peaceful transition. The regime will inevitably resort to massacres to keep its grip on power, but there comes a point where desperation will simply override fear. The ultimate result remains the same: the death of the Islamic Republic.

The end of 2026 is far, far away, and I think, given the pressure bearing on Trump to end the war, Segal is in my view overoptimistic.  I wish he were right, but I’m not confident.

*More religious mishisgass from The Free Press, which is constantly touting religion: “These two Catholics see signs of God in UFOs“. One of the Catholics is, for crying out loud, Ross Douthat, described as one of “the most thoughtful and provocative writers in America”.  Provocative, yes, thoughtful, well, I don’t think so.The other Catholic (see below) is “perhaps the only scholar of religion who has been taken to see the possible physical remains of an alien starship.” (There’s also a 44-minute video.) The interviewer is Will Rahm:

As we close out this four-part series about what everyday Americans should think about UFOs, we are joined by two people who have put a lot of thought into the religious aspect of all this: Diana Pasulka and Ross Douthat.

Pasulka, a professor of religious studies at the University of North Carolina Wilmington, is the author of American Cosmic, which examined UFOs as both a religious and nuts-and-bolts technological phenomenon. She has visited the scene of a supposed UFO crash site in New Mexico looking for the elusive hard evidence of intelligent life beyond our planet. A practicing Catholic, Pasulka also combed through Vatican archives looking for clues as to what these things might be. Her new book, out in July, is The Others: UFOs, AI, and the Secret Forces Guiding Human Destiny..

. . .WR: What does the Catholic Church make of UFOs?

DP: Catholicism already has a category called the preternatural. So they do look at nonhuman intelligence all the time. There are apparitions of the Virgin Mary. People have experiences that they would consider to be angel events. There are saints who levitate. And so the Catholic Church assesses these on a case-by-case basis. And they have a well-formed category for understanding nonhuman intelligence, be it extraterrestrial or interdimensional. And this is called the preternatural.

Pope Benedict XVI has actually written about this. His categories are natural, supernatural, or preternatural. And the supernatural is of God, things that are of divine origin, which Catholics believe in. Natural is natural: what we see is the world, science, things like that. But then there’s a category that’s called the preternatural. And the preternatural has to do with things that are not necessarily from God but are in between.

“Catholicism already has a category called the preternatural. . . they have a well-formed category for understanding nonhuman intelligence.” —Diana Pasulka

That category would include the Virgin Mary apparitions that are not yet approved by the church. The preternatural has to do with angels and fallen angels, both of which the church believes in. A lot of American Catholics today would say, “yeah, sure, angels exist,” but it’s not like they encounter an angel or see an angel. But this category of UFOs then opens up this idea of perhaps people are having experiences that are preternatural. This falls directly within Catholic theology.

RD: Most Catholics are pretty comfortable with a set of categories that are real but invisible. And it would be a shift, let’s say, if the church said, “And by the way, some of these preternatural beings can show up on Air Force cameras.” That would not be impossible, but it would be a different mode of thinking about these things than most Catholics have right now.

It goes on, but the gist is that both Catholics don’t see UFOs as a problem for their faith because they fit into the preternatural/supernatural spectrum.  And they are pre-programmed to believe things with little or no evidence, anyway.  What I most wanted to know (and I didn’t listen to the podcast) was what Pasulka saw at the UFO “crash site.” And how did they know it was a UFO crash site? And what about those possible physical remains of an alien starship.”  What were they? It would also be fun to ask the Catholics why Jesus didn’t contact the aliens, who would then be Christians.

*When the NYT’s Bret Stephens writes a column called “A Democrat who makes me listen,” I’m going to read it, as I’m still groping in the dark for a good Democratic Presidential candidate.  Stephens suggests one.

This should be a season of electoral hope for Democrats. Donald Trump’s disapproval ratings are reaching new highs. The war with Iran is overwhelmingly unpopular. As of early May, Polymarket gives the party a 51 percent chance of winning the Senate and an 83 percent chance of taking the House.

But Americans still harbor deep doubts about Democrats: A recent Pew survey shows only 39 percent have a favorable view of the party, against 59 percent who don’t. And Democrats are deeply divided about whether to steer centerward or move further left.

Jake Auchincloss — it’s pronounced AW-kin-kloss — is one of the most thoughtful voices in this conversation. The 38-year-old Harvard and M.I.T. graduate and Afghan war veteran, where he served as a Marine officer, is now in his third term as the representative from Massachusetts’s Fourth Congressional District, which stretches from the wealthy Boston suburb of Newton to the working-class city of Fall River.

Politically, he’s often described as moderate, even somewhat right-leaning when it comes to fraught issues like Israel. But as he made clear over two in-depth interviews with me, his thinking is not neatly categorizable on a simple centrist-to-progressive x-axis.

What Auchincloss and other Majority Democrats have in common is a determination to meet voters where they are. That includes acknowledging mistakes like the Covid-era school closures and the Biden administration’s lax border enforcement. Mainly, though, it’s about championing working- and middle-class concerns against the interests of what he calls “an ossified American aristocracy.” And it’s about restoring an old type of patriotism, based on foundational American ideals, against the blood-and-soil patriotism championed by the likes of JD Vance.

There’s then an interview with Auchincloss, and you can see that the man is deeply smart and thoughtful.  I have space for only two Q&As:

Stephens: You’re aware of the need for deep capital markets, for a culture of risk-taking and innovation. If you were having a conversation with a young Democratic Socialist, explain to that person where he or she goes wrong.

Auchincloss: Free enterprise is a core way that you make manifest our thesis as a party that every individual has inherent dignity and equality and that they should be able to pursue their happiness in the world. Because if you want to go start a socialist commune, you can. Go to a socialist country and try to start a capitalist commune, it doesn’t work out so well.

So what’s a Democratic case for how capitalism should work? To me, it’s an understanding that markets work, markets can be impaired by government overregulation, and markets can be impaired by corporate monopolization. And while that is pretty obvious to most economists, it’s somehow become a partisan football in a way that’s just not productive. . .

. . . Stephens: You have been, much more so than most of your caucus, outspoken in your defense of Israel’s right to defend itself. Do you worry that the Democrats are becoming an anti-Israel party? And do you worry about the antisemitic current running in at least some parts of the progressive left?

Auchincloss: Yes, about the antisemitic current running in parts of the Democratic left, and the antisemitic current running on the MAGA right. We have a horseshoe phenomenon here. Tucker Carlson and Nick Fuentes are much more influential in their party than any antisemitic hashtags are in the Democratic Party, and we should be cleareyed about that. It’s unacceptable on both sides, and it needs to be called out by political leaders of their own parties when it happens on both sides.

. . .Stephens: Let’s pivot to foreign policy: Iran.

Auchincloss: This president owns the fact that we’ve replaced one hard-line regime with a younger, more-hard-line regime. We have yielded to Iran a new strategic deterrent in the Strait of Hormuz. The highly enriched uranium is still at large. And the regime has been given the ideological tailwinds of having been seen globally withstanding more than 13,000 strikes and surviving.

I think we come out of this in a position where Iran is operationally degraded, no doubt, but strategically stronger. And this president is thereby the first president in American history to single-handedly start and lose a war by himself.

Auchincloss’s “solution,” though, assuming that we do lose the war in his sense, isn’t something that appeals to me. It’s this: “we have to have a point of view about how to build back from strategic failure. My core argument would be that it has to be based on knitting together NATO with the Abraham Accords through energy, defense and infrastructure.”  And how, exactly, is that going to prevent Iran from promoting terrorism in the Middle East and keep it from getting nuclear weapons? Yes, I’ll keep an eye on Auchincloss, but he doesn’t stand out to me yet.

*Finally, from the UPI’s odd news, we have a man pulling a ten-ton bus with his neck:

A 49-year-old athlete from Aruba earned his 10th Guinness World Records title by pulling a bus a distance of more than 65 feet using his neck.

Egmond Molina used a rope around his neck to pull the 21,737-pound bus on Jan. 9, and Guinness World Records has now confirmed he officially broke the record for the heaviest vehicle pulled by the neck.

The previous record of 17,769.26 pounds was set by Ukrainian Dmytro Hrunskyi in 2024.

“With the rope compressing my airway, I must generate force while carefully controlling my breathing under intense strain. It becomes a psychological battle to remain composed while the body is under severe stress,” Molina told Guinness World Records.

The strongman’s previous Guinness World Records titles include the fastest 20-meter bus pull with one finger, 33.32 seconds; the fastest 20-meter tram pull with teeth, 39.9 seconds; the fastest hot water bottle burst, 2.87 seconds; and the most crown cap bottles opened with both hands in 30 seconds, 6 bottles.

Molina said his records are dedicated to his children, Nigel, Egmond Junior, Benjamin and Adelinda, as well as the youth of Aruba.

Here’s the feat:

Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Szaron is trying to get rid of mosquitoes one at a time:

Hili: What are you after?
Szaron: I’m trying to cut down the mosquito population.

In Polish:

Hili: Na co polujesz?
Szaron: Próbuję zredukować populację komarów.

*******************

From Funny and Strange Signs:

From Meow Incorporated (remember that Newton invented the catflap):

From Things with Faces; some happy eggs:

From Masih, calling attention to the very sick Nobel Peace Laureate in Iranian custody. As I suspected, Iran is trying to kill her without making it obvious.

Disgusting and should be condemned at every turn. https://t.co/GNrHrntx9I

— Ambassador Mike Waltz (@michaelgwaltz) May 5, 2026

From Luana; a panacea:

WTF? pic.twitter.com/JoWrRvKG0E

— Headshok1962 (@Headshok1962) May 4, 2026

Emma’s solution to the hantavirus ship epidemic:

It strikes me that there are enough private villas in the world, with fully stocked in-room bars and whatever food and legal entertainment you want provided, to effectively quarantine 200 people for several weeks with zero non-compliance. pic.twitter.com/VJAx6kMQFF

— Emma Hilton (@FondOfBeetles) May 6, 2026

An appropriate response to Brenton’s suggestion:

Funny isn’t it how no-one is looking to stab Iranians or Russians unless they denounce those regimes ? https://t.co/Y6eFoctrRx

— Simon Schama (@simon_schama) May 2, 2026

One from my feed; the performative nature of land acknowledgements (this references Canada):

The all time best parody of Canadian Land Acknowledgement rituals.

Brilliant! pic.twitter.com/TMdn55VgJp

— Marc Emery (@MarcScottEmery) May 6, 2026

One I reposted from The Auschwitz Memorial:

This Dutch Jewish boy was gassed to death as soon as he arrivedd in Auschwitz. He was six years old and would be 89 today had he lived. https://t.co/QNKHtgcZtC

— Jerry Coyne (@Evolutionistrue) May 7, 2026

Two from Dr. Cobb. First, they managed to sequence the genome of a forty-year-old specimen of Drosophila—with carnivorous, aquatic larvae!

Here is a banger! Our new paper in @currentbiology.bsky.social is out! We have used museomics to sequence a 45yr old specimen of Drosophila enhydrobia, a rare and most unusual fly whose larvae are aquatic(!) and predatory(!). Very cool, big success. authors.elsevier.com/sd/article/S…

— Marcus Stensmyr (@marcusstensmyr.bsky.social) 2026-05-05T15:41:20.058Z

And a live puffin cam from the Farne Islands:

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Welcome to The Cruelest Day: May 5, 2026, and it’s National Hoagie Day (also called a “sub” or “submarine sandwich”. It was hard to find a photo of the longest one, but of course it was on Twitter. The damn thing was nearly half a mile long. Guinness says this:

The longest sandwich measured 735 m (2,411 ft 5 in) and was created by members of three teams in total. These teams were Groupe Notre Dame Hazmieh-Scouts de L’Independence (Lebanon), Municipality of Hazmieh (Lebanon)and Mini-B chain restaurants (Lebanon). The attempt took place in Hazmieh village, Beirut, Lebanon, on 22 May 2011.

The sandwich started at Notre Dame des Soeurs Antonines School and ended on Elie Street, in Hazmieh, Beirut, Lebanon. The width of the sandwich was 12.5cm and the overall estimated weight of the sandwich is 577.03kg.

The total number of participants from the three teams who were involved in the preparation and cooking of the sandwich was 136 and 639 participants filled the sandwich, which took 22 hours to make.

Four 4-wheel movable ovens were created especially for this attempt in order to bake one long continuous piece of bread. The dough had been divided into sections and rolled out, at which point they were then joined together by further rolling, before having the movable ovens on each end of the table rolling on top of the bread cooking it as it passed.

This sandwich consisted of chicken breast, lettuce, tomato, pickles, mayonnaise, red vinegar, salt, mustard, white pepper, lemon juice, kammoun spices and corriander.

And here’s a photo (a lot of other “long sandwich” records, like the one for Philly cheesesteaks, appear to simply involve regular sandwiches placed end to end, and no attempt to create a long piece of bread).

Today is #NationalSandwichDay therefore it’s only right we tell you that the longest sandwich was 735 metres throughout the streets of Beirut, Lebanon. pic.twitter.com/kPgN0gFoy0

— Guinness World Records (@GWR) November 3, 2020

It’s also Cinco de Mayo, Museum Lover’s Day, National Enchilada Day, Oyster Day, and National Teacher Day.

There’s a Google Doodle today celebrating National Teacher Day. Click on screenshot to see where it goes:

Readers are welcome to mark notable events, births, or deaths on this day by consulting the May 5 Wikipedia page.

Da Nooz:

*Over at It’s Noon in Israel, Amit Segal discusses diverging answer to the question of whether the U.S. and Israel have defeated Iran—so far.

All of this brings us back to the lingering question that has haunted the Israeli defense establishment since the Iranian ceasefire: If the campaign stops here, was it a success?

Two highly informed Israeli experts—both of whom I deeply respect—have come to opposite conclusions. The first is Tamir Hayman, former head of IDF Military Intelligence, who spoke with my colleague Yonit Levi on Channel 12. The second is Yuval Steinitz, a veteran cabinet minister and current chairman of Rafael, whom I interviewed on Meet the Press. And so, in the great Jewish tradition, let us argue:

We can start with their overall assessments. Hayman, ever the measured intelligence chief, concluded that the overall balance of the campaign “leans toward the negative.” Steinitz diverged slightly, calling it “a massive victory” reminiscent of the Six-Day War.

This gap in perception hinges almost entirely on their assessment of Israel’s greatest existential threat: the nuclear program. Steinitz argues that by eliminating top scientists—an achievement he enthusiastically notes happened in the “first 7 seconds” of the campaign—and destroying weaponization equipment, Israel bought itself significant time. He claims that while Iran may have previously been months away from a bomb, “this time in my opinion it is several years,” because the physical mechanisms required to build a warhead were removed from the equation.

Hayman, however, refuses to grade on a curve. To the former intel chief, blowing up weaponization labs and eliminating scientists doesn’t matter if the raw materials are still sitting safely underground. He completely rejects Steinitz’s premise, warning that the fundamental components of a nuclear breakout—the subterranean facilities, the advanced centrifuges and the stockpiles of enriched uranium—were left intact inside the country. He bluntly states that “we hardly touched the nuclear issue,” warning that Iran’s breakout time remains dangerously short, leaving Israel in a situation “similar to the one in which we started the fighting.” While Hayman acknowledges his assessment might shift if a negotiated agreement ultimately collars the Iranian program, short of that, his conclusion is stark: “If the nuclear threat is not addressed, then the question arises—what did we do in this whole event?”

This profound divide extends to their views on the stability of the Iranian regime. Steinitz sees a government on its knees. He argues that the strikes so thoroughly decimated Iranian supply chains and infrastructure that the country has “turned from a tiger into a cat.” In his view, Iran is “highly weakened” and teetering “on the verge of collapse”—suggesting the ayatollahs would have fallen completely had the U.S. not prematurely halted the war.

Hayman views the exact same scenario and sees a disaster. To him, the regime’s sheer survival against a coordinated U.S.-Israeli coalition is a terrifying victory for Tehran. He argues that “in the eyes of the regime itself, it is stronger because it experienced the most severe thing—and survived it.” Worse, he warns that Israel will inevitably have to strike again in the future, and when that day comes in a post-Trump era, there is a very high chance Israel will be left to face an emboldened regime alone.

I have to say that I agree with the pessimist Hayman.  If the attacks on nuclear facilities so far have only bought Israel a few years of respite, how can they be called a success? And isn’t it a victory for Iran if, at the end of the war, the hard-liners remain in control of its regime?  One thing is for sure: we can’t count on a Democratic administration to support Israel’s strikes in the future.

*The U.S. has offered the use of its navy to escort ships through the Strait of Hormuz, but the WSJ reports that Iran is threatening to fire on any ships that are escorted that way.

Iran on Monday rejected a new U.S. effort to help free ships trapped by the Iranian blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, threatening to attack American warships or other vessels that tried to pass through the strategic waterway without Iran’s consent.

President Trump announced the plan on Sunday, but he did not provide details on how the United States would assist the trapped ships. The U.S. military’s Central Command, which oversees operations in the Middle East, said on Monday that two U.S.-flagged ships had safely crossed the strait, but it was not clear whether they did so with American military escorts.

The rising tensions across the Strait of Hormuz, a critical transit route for global oil, put the nearly month-old cease-fire between Iran and the United States on shakier ground.

In response to Mr. Trump’s new initiative, Ali Abdollahi, a top Iranian military commander, cautioned “all commercial ships and oil tankers to refrain from any attempt to transit without coordination with the armed forces,” Iranian state media reported on Monday.

“⁠We warn that any foreign armed force, especially the aggressive U.S. military, if they intend to approach or enter the Strait of Hormuz, will be targeted and attacked,” Mr. Abdollahi said.

The U.S. effort was the latest attempt to break Iran’s grip over the strait, through which about one-fifth of the world’s oil and much natural gas is normally shipped. The Iranian blockade has rattled global energy markets, leading the Trump administration to retaliate by imposing its own blockade on shipping into and out of Iranian ports.

Scattered incidents on Monday reflected the fragility of the truce.

For the first time since a U.S.-Iranian cease-fire was reached in early April, the United Arab Emirates said that four cruise missiles had been fired from Iran at Emirati territory. Three were intercepted and one fell in the sea, the Emirati authorities said.

Also on Monday, the Emirates accused Iran of launching a drone attack on an oil tanker owned by the Emirati state oil company, ADNOC, while it tried to transit through the Strait of Hormuz. And South Korea’s government said a cargo ship belonging to a South Korean company caught fire after an explosion in the strait.

There was no immediate response from Iranian officials. State media in Iran also claimed that the country’s military forces had fired warning shots at an American ship traversing the strait, although the U.S. military denied it.

Mr. Trump, for his part, warned that any Iranian interference in the operation to free stranded ships, named Project Freedom, would be dealt with “forcefully.” U.S. forces, including destroyers and some 15,000 personnel, were work

All this shows is that the war with Iran is far, far from over, and now Iran is making the boneheaded move of attacking other Gulf Arab states.  “Wait and see” is my motto.

*The Free Press reports that a new animated version of Orwell’s Animal Farm has reversed the book’s thesis. While it was originally a parable against the Russian Revolution leading to authoritarian Stalinist Communism it’s now become a critique of, yes, capitalism.

The new film, voiced by a cast of A-list actors including Glenn Close, Seth Rogen, Steve Buscemi, and Woody Harrelson, earned bad press when its trailer was released late last year, but the reality is somehow even worse than it seemed back then. The film feels, to put it plainly, like a bad joke about Orwell that a right-wing X account would dream up to get mad at. Hey guys, what if those crazy, woke socialists in Hollyweird actually went back and rewrote “Animal Farm” to be about the exact opposite of what the author intended? In the film, the message is no longer about how the revolutionary dreams of doing away with capitalist hierarchy are inevitably dashed by the avaricious realities of human nature. The problem, as portrayed by Serkis, is instead corporate greed under capitalism.

In the film, we experience events through the eyes of a pig character named Lucky, who doesn’t appear in the book. In an opening scene, as the animals break out of a slaughterhouse truck, it becomes clear that their revolution is not ultimately against Farmer Jones, as in the original text. Rather, it’s against a bank to which Jones owes unpaid mortgage payments. And the bank is working hand in glove with a gigantic faceless conglomerate called Pilkington, which seems to own factory farms, malls, and hydroelectric plants. The conglomerate’s evil CEO also drives an unmistakably Tesla-like car. This is just the first sign that the movie is not about any longstanding political idea, but rather is an attack on right-wing figures as they currently exist. More attacks come fast and thick. The Joseph Stalin-like pig, Napoleon, voiced by Seth Rogen, repeatedly uses Trumpian locutions, arguing against the noble Leon Trotsky-like pig, Snowball, voiced by Laverne Cox, with such rhetorical flourishes as “many animals have been saying.”

You get the idea. But I promise you that it is worse than you think. For one thing, this film’s crimes are not merely its ideological smallness but also its sheer ugliness. There is the corny revolutionary rap version of “Old MacDonald Had a Farm” that plays over the opening credits. There are the fart jokes and the shaking pig butts and the terrible attempts at timely dialogue. (Napoleon, who spends half the film driving a Lamborghini, is called “Napopo.”) Upon visiting a Pilkington-branded shopping mall, the greedy pigs express their consumerism thus: “Don’t think, just buy it. Buy it all!” Some kind of disco beat dance number breaks out seemingly every five minutes, in what feels like an ill-fitting attempt to capitalize on the success of films like Shrek or Despicable Me.

The biggest problem, however, is the movie’s ending. The bleak novel ends when the oppressed animals betray their utopian vision so completely that they are indistinguishable from their former oppressors. In the Animal Farm movie, Lucky instead has a change of heart, disgusted with what he and his fellow pigs have become after they have sold the farm to the conglomerate to build, I kid you not, a hydroelectric dam. (As it happens, building out large, clean-energy infrastructure projects is just about the most pro-social kind of activity a large conglomerate could ever engage in, but it is depicted as having very bad vibes.) Lucky goes back to the other animals and apologizes that the revolution has gone wrong. “I want us to remember that feeling that we had on the first day when we chased the slaughterhouse truck off the farm,” he says. Boxer (Woody Harrelson), the kindly and hardworking horse who represents the ordinary prole, delivers this howler: “To work hard for our friends, not because we have to but because we choose to, that is freedom.”

I ain’t gonna see this movie, but it’s ironic that the movie combines the theme of Orwell’s novel with that of another novel, Nineteen Eighty-Four, which involved both the erasure and the reversal of history by the regime, which is precisely what the moviemakers are doing.

Here’s the trailer, though it doesn’t show much about capitalism:

*The U.S. Supreme Court, in line with an earlier decision, has restored mail access to the drug mifepristone, an abortion-inducing medication that’s been proven safe and effective. But it’s a temporary decision.

The Supreme Court on Monday restored nationwide access to a widely used abortion medication in a temporary order that will, for now, allow women to once again obtain the pill mifepristone by mail.

In a brief order, Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. paused a lower-court ruling from Friday that had prevented abortion providers from prescribing the pills by telemedicine and shipping them to patients, causing confusion for providers and patients. The one-sentence order imposes a pause until at least May 11. He requested that the parties file briefs by Thursday, and then the full court will determine how to proceed.

The state of Louisiana sued the Food and Drug Administration to restrict access to mifepristone, saying the availability of the medication by mail has allowed abortions to continue in the state despite its near-total ban.

Medication is now the method used in nearly two-thirds of abortions in the United States, and is typically delivered in the form of a two-drug regimen through the first 12 weeks of pregnancy.

Friday’s ruling from the conservative U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit temporarily reinstated an F.D.A. requirement that patients visit medical providers in person to obtain mifepristone while the litigation continues. That rule was first lifted in 2021.

Two manufacturers of mifepristone, Danco Laboratories and GenBioPro, on Saturday asked the Supreme Court to intervene. In court filings, they said the Fifth Circuit ruling would cause chaos for providers and patients — and upend a major avenue for abortion access across the country. About one-fourth of abortions in the United States are now provided through telemedicine.

Justice Alito’s order, known as an administrative stay, was provisional and expected, but an important interim step for women seeking to obtain mifepristone in the next week. The order does not signal how the full court may eventually handle the case.

. . .After the Supreme Court’s decision in 2022 to eliminate the nationwide right to abortion, Republican-led states like Louisiana imposed strict bans. In response, many Democratic-led states passed shield laws that protect abortion providers who prescribe pills by telemedicine and send them to patients in states with abortion bans.

Louisiana and abortion opponents have asserted in court that the F.D.A.’s decision to allow abortion pills to be available by mail posed safety risks to women and in

Alito, who may be set to retire, decided this by himself, as he’s handling emergency orders. The full court will decide the case later, and what happens after May 11 is yet unknown.  What we have here is a clash between state laws that will be adjudicated by a federal court. But the Postal Service is a federal agency, and it would be weird, I think, if the Supreme Court banned it from carrying medication that’s legal in prescribing states but illegal in some or all recipient states.  I’ve always been “pro choice,” so I applaud this decision and hope it becomes permanent.

*Some sports from the NYT: an article called “Is Padres closer Mason Miller the most unhittable pitcher who ever lived?” (archived link). But in contrast to Betteridge’s Law of Headlines, the answer is “yes.” Miller is a “closer”: a relief pitcher brought in expressly to finish the game when his team is likely to win. Miller has been pitching only since 2023, so his record is fantastic, but it’s been for only three years.

Has it hit you yet what we’re watching? Has it sunk in what is happening when Mason Miller takes the mound to finish off another thank-you-and-drive-home-safely baseball game in San Diego?

We are watching the most unhittable pitcher who ever lived. Period.

There. I said it. And now I’m here to prove it.

I’ve looked at everyone who ever had a case to hold that title: Nolan Ryan … Aroldis Chapman … Josh Hader … Edwin Díaz … Craig Kimbrel … Mariano Rivera … Eric Gagne … Pedro Martínez … Randy Johnson … Jacob deGrom … Sandy Koufax … Walter Johnson … and on and on.

I’ve talked to two of the greatest closers of modern times, Trevor Hoffman and Billy Wagner.

I’ve dug deep into every number that could shape this argument.

It has all pointed me right back to the same place: The Padres’ closer is the most unhittable pitcher who ever lived. Fortunately, I had no trouble finding two Hall of Fame closers who were right there with me.

But second, I honestly am prepared to prove this theory. It isn’t even that hard. Just check out these numbers for yourself.

I started with Miller’s appearance last Aug. 6, the day after his final run allowed last year — and kept counting until he finally gave up another run four days ago. Now get a whiff of Miller’s Sidd Finch-ian numbers in between. Unlike Sports Illustrated, I didn’t make any of these up:

• Opposing hitters went 7-for-127 (.055), with 87 strikeouts

• Let’s repeat that: 87 strikeouts … and … 7 hits

• He faced 141 hitters. Not one of them scored.

• 39 straight games with zero extra-base hits allowed

• 39 straight games without ever allowing more than one hit

Compares to Mariano Rivera, whose longevity gives him the title so far:

. . . . we’re not here to pretend that the current closer for the Padres is anywhere near that status. He’s a guy who has faced exactly nine hitters in October in his life. So he has another 500 to go before we start comparing him to Mariano. On the other hand …

So we don’t know yet where Mason Miller is going. But if it looks anything like this, whew. We might all be in for a show unlike anything we’ve ever witnessed.

“Is he going to pull off 10 seasons where he’s able to do these kinds of numbers?” Wagner wondered. “Only time will tell. But he’s — what, three years in? — and he’s as dominating a pitcher as there ever has been in the whole history of the game.

Here he is in his third season, striking out batter after batter. The ratio of strikeouts to balls on single pitches is astounding.

Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, a somewhat out-of-focus Hili’s still asking the Big Questions:

Andrzej: What are you looking for?
Hili: I’m checking whether the meaning of life isn’t lying under this bush.

In Polish:

Ja: Czego szukasz?
Hili: Patrzę, czy pod tym krzakiem nie leży sens życia.

*******************

From CinEmma:

From Stacy:

From The Language Nerds:

From Masih, another young Iranian executed for protesting:

Another life taken. Another young man hanged by Iran’s regime. Another family destroyed.

Mehrab Abdollahzadeh, 27, arrested during the Woman, Life, Freedom uprising, was tortured for over 40 days and forced into a false confession.

He told the court he was innocent. He asked… pic.twitter.com/0XZtWEoftM

— Masih Alinejad 🏳️ (@AlinejadMasih) May 3, 2026

From Luana; and yes, I agree that there’s no more cultural need for whale hunting:

The left treats the Indigenous as some sort of mythical forest elves who cannot do wrong.

Whale hunting is bad. It was necessary for some people in ages past. But it is not anymore. I don’t care that it’s “cultural.” Many terrible things are cultural. They should knock it off. https://t.co/CF7pThMuk7

— Hunter📈🌈📊 (@StatisticUrban) May 1, 2026

From Jay; what a graceful landing!

Swans have one off the coolest landing technique ever.. 😊 pic.twitter.com/HvdqdpKEY3

— Buitengebieden (@buitengebieden) May 3, 2026

Two from my feed. First, a kitty brought back from oblivion—in a 120-year-old photo.

Le photographe français Mathieu Stern a découvert par hasard un vieux film négatif datant d’il y a 120 ans.

Après l’avoir imprimé, il s’est avéré qu’il s’agissait d’un chat.

🤪👍 pic.twitter.com/Lgm3cfWM9c

— 🅶🅾🆁🅺 (@Raclure03) May 4, 2026

A very dangerous but successful solo free climb by a moggy:

The drama, the music, the sheer mysticism, even the sound effects and that POV shot….

I could watch nine seasons of this pic.twitter.com/dJi05WFehH

— Cats with Aura 😺 (@catwithaura) May 3, 2026

One I reposted from The Auschwitz Memorial:

This French Jewish boy was gassed to death as soon as he arrived in Auschwitz. He was seven years old and would be ninety today had he lived. https://t.co/tdScHWpQcE

— Jerry Coyne (@Evolutionistrue) May 5, 2026

And two from Dr. Cobb. First, the 1893 World’s Fair. I live only about a block from the Midway. There are 9 photos at the link.

The 1893 Chicago World’s Fair in 9 stunning color photos http://www.popsci.com/science/chic…

— Jennifer Ouellette (@jenlucpiquant.bsky.social) 2026-05-03T20:06:02.089Z

An Etruscan duck jug:

This delightful duck is an askos, a ceramic container used for storing and pouring oil.It was made over two thousand years ago by the Etruscans, who inhabited a reigon called Etruria in what is now central Italy.

— Ashmolean Museum, Oxford (@ashmoleanmuseum.bsky.social) 2026-05-03T07:00:47.673Z

Welcome to the first Monday in May: May 4, 2026, and Bird Day in the U.S.  A bit about the holiday:

Bird Day was established by Charles Almanzo Babcock, the Oil City superintendent of schools, in 1894. It was the first holiday in the United States dedicated to the celebration of birds. Babcock intended it to advance bird conservation as a moral value. It is celebrated on May 4 of every year.

Here are the prettiest birds I’ve seen personally in 2026, and right outside my building, hanging around Botany Pond:

It’s also Anti-Bullying Day, International Firefighters’ Day, International Respect for Chickens Day, National Orange Juice Day, National Candied Orange Peel Day (I don’t know who thought of doing this, but it was a great idea, as I love the stuff), and Star Wars Day (the site says, “The eponymously-titled first film of the series was released on May 25, 1977. Later gaining the title Episode IV: A New Hope, the film became a worldwide cultural phenomenon and helped usher in the concept of the blockbuster movie”).

Reader Jez writes, “Greenpeace is organising an online birthday card for David Attenborough’s 100th birthday on Friday that anyone can sign. Here’s the link, just in case you’re interested. I was, and I signed it.

Readers are welcome to mark notable events, births, or deaths on this day by consulting the May 4 Wikipedia page.

Da Nooz:

*Amit Segal at It’s Noon in Israel discusses something I didn’t know was in the works: trials of the perpetrators of the October 7, 2023 massacre and kidnappings are being planned by Israel. (Read more here about how the cases is being built.)

It’s Sunday, May 3, and two months ago, the Constitution, Law and Justice Committee convened for a pivotal discussion on one of the most sensitive questions of the post-October 7 era: how will the trials of the perpetrators be conducted? According to a compressive report by Yedioth Ahronoth’s Guy Asif, the committee is currently refining a bill that will serve as the legal, organizational, and moral framework for what is destined to be the largest and most complex judicial event in Israel’s history.

Amidst the legislative debate, the human dimension remains profoundly raw. Carmit Palty-Katzir, a daughter of Kibbutz Nir Oz, offered harrowing testimony to the committee. Her family was shattered: her father was murdered, her mother was kidnapped and died shortly after her release, and her brother, Elad, was murdered in captivity after 99 days. “I walk around with unsolved murder mysteries,” she told the committee, voicing a pain shared by hundreds of families seeking closure. While demanding that the perpetrators face the full severity of the law, she also issued a warning. She argued against the trials devolving into a “media circus” or a “gladiator arena,” urging that the pursuit of truth not be eclipsed by a “stampede toward the death penalty.”

Palty-Katzir’s concerns underscore the dilemmas of the Prosecution of Participants in the October 7 Massacre Events Bill. Having passed its first reading in January, the legislation is now being prepared for its final stages. Yet, even as the Knesset’s summer session approaches, several complex questions remain.

How public should the proceedings be? The judiciary must balance the public’s right to see justice served with the necessity of protecting survivors from secondary trauma.

What standard of evidence should be required? Applying the threshold of “beyond a reasonable doubt” to the scale of a mass massacre leaves a distinct possibility that a known perpetrator could walk free if the case isn’t perfectly airtight.

And then there is the most potent question of all: what punishment is truly appropriate? The prospect of the death penalty—a historical rarity in the Israeli legal system—remains the central point of debate.

. . .When it became clear that the civilian courts could not absorb the weight of hundreds of parallel cases, the responsibility shifted to the military. While the IDF didn’t want touch such a controversial process, it was the only viable option. The military possesses the unique ability to draft seasoned prosecutors and judges into reserve service, creating an instant, elite legal force. Furthermore, military infrastructure is inherently designed to manage the high-risk transport and detention of dangerous detainees—a logistical requirement that would paralyze any standard city courthouse.

The next question: where?

The Prison Service lobbied for a site near Ktzi’ot Prison for convenience, while others suggested the Gaza Envelope for its symbolic weight. Ultimately, the decision landed on Jerusalem. Plans are now underway to transform a massive industrial site in Atarot, north of the city, into a sprawling judicial complex. This “hangar city” will house a primary courtroom, multiple halls for parallel hearings, and dedicated viewing areas for the public. The court is expected to operate with an unprecedented focus: five days a week, eight hours a day, with judges dedicated exclusively to these cases. The goal is to begin within a year of the legislation’s passing and conclude the primary proceedings within a few years.

The trials promise to reveal investigative materials far more harrowing than anything yet released to the media. For the first time, victims will take the stand to testify, often face-to-face with the perpetrators. This brings a painful paradox to the forefront: the public’s right to historical truth versus the victims’ right to privacy.

. . . The prosecution faces the historic burden of framing a national narrative, but the primary challenge remains the “resolution” of proof: linking specific defendants to individual victims amidst the chaos of a mass massacre. Investigators have reportedly solved this issue by creating an exhaustive mapping system that catalogs every detainee by their military unit and infiltration point, cross-referencing their confessions with terabytes of bodycam footage, digital media, and forensic scene reconstructions.

This wil undoubtedly demonize the IDF more, but one would hope that terrorists’s own testimony would alert the world to the war crimes committed by Hamas and Islamic Jihad.  But it won’t.

*A federal appeals court has blocked mail access to the abortion drug mifepristone, and the pill’s makers have filed an emergency appeal to the Supreme Court.

The makers of the abortion pill mifepristone filed an emergency appeal at the Supreme Court on Saturday urging the justices to pause a lower-court ruling that temporarily blocked Americans from accessing the drug through the mail.

The fast-track case, filed with conservative Justice Samuel Alito, puts the drug and the issue of abortion back on the high court’s docket less than two years after the justices rejected a similar challenge — a decision that allowed the drug to remain widely available.

The rush appeal comes a day after the conservative 5th US Circuit Court of Appeals reinstated a nationwide requirement that the medication be obtained in person, undermining access to the method of abortion that has grown more widespread since the court overturned Roe v. Wade, the 1973 precedent that established a constitutional right to abortion.

The lower-court ruling, Danco Laboratories told the Supreme Court in its appeal Saturday, “injects immediate confusion and upheaval into highly time-sensitive medical decisions.”

“What happens when patients arrive for scheduled appointments this weekend and beyond, or walk into pharmacies in New York, Minnesota, Washington, and many other states today to obtain Mifeprex that was prescribed by a provider yesterday?” the company’s attorneys wrote. “What should a patient do if she cannot obtain an in-person appointment immediately?”

Danco urged the Supreme Court to issue an “administrative” stay that would immediately pause the 5th Circuit’s decision. It also urged the Supreme Court to case the case up on the merits.

GenBioPro, the maker of the generic version of the drug, filed a separate emergency application later Saturday. The court is likely to handle the two cases together.

And from CNN:

Since the Covid-19 pandemic, abortion-seekers have been able to obtain mifepristone – one of the two drugs in the medication abortion regimen – through telehealth appointments. President Joe Biden’s administration finalized rules that ended the requirement that the pills be obtained through an in-person doctor’s visit in 2023, after the US Supreme Court overturned the 1973 Roe precedent protecting abortion rights nationwide with Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization.

The Supreme Court had earlier blocked a request that the FDA ban the drug everywhere in America—based on a bogus claim that it was dangerous (there’a a lot of data showing that milfepristone is both effective and safe, and it’s now used in 2/3 of all abortions.) I’m not an expert on this, but although individual states can block the drug from being recommended or dispensed by doctors, or dispensed by pharmacies, the U.S. Mail is a national organization, and there’s I can’t see any constitutional grounds to prevent it from shipping a drug that is not federally banned. It will be interesting to see if a conservative court sides with the manufacturer or with the religious /anti-choice people who banned the drug in 15 states.

*A Washington Post/Ipsos/ABC poll reports that Trump’s approval ratings are lower than they’ve ever been, with just a 37% overall approval and not much better on any other matter (in fact, worse on most important issues):

Six months ahead of the November midterm elections, the Republican Party faces a deteriorating political climate, with Americans broadly dissatisfied with President Donald Trump’s leadership on the Iran war and other key issues and an electorate in which Democrats are significantly more motivated to vote, according to a Washington Post-ABC News-Ipsos poll.

Trump’s approval on economic issues, which were critical to his political comeback in 2024, has fallen since he launched the Iran war in late February.

Americans disapprove of his handling of the situation with Iran by 66 percent to 33 percent. His rating on the economy has declined by seven points, to 34 percent, as gas prices have spiked. His approval rating on inflation has fallen five points in that time to 27 percent and his lowest rating comes on perceptions of his handling of the general cost of living, with 23 percent approving vs. 76 percent disapproving.

Trump’s overall approval now stands at 37 percent, largely the same as the 39 percent figure in February. But his disapproval has reached 62 percent, the highest of his two terms in office. Among Republicans, Trump’s approval has held steady at 85 percent, but his ratings among Republican-leaning independents have reached a new low of 56 percent. His approval rating stands at 25 percent among independents overall.

. . . Trump gets his best ratings for handling immigration at the U.S.-Mexico border (45 percent approval and 54 percent disapproval). His ratings for handling immigration overall are worse at 40 percent approving and 59 percent disapproving, hardly changed from 40 percent positive vs. 58 percent negative in February, though that marked the worst for his second term.

The president’s weak approval ratings put the Republicans’ slender House majority in grave danger and now threaten their Senate majority as well. Among registered voters, Democrats hold a five-point advantage on the question of which party people favor in House elections. That is up from a two-point edge in February and October.

I’m surprised that the ratings are so low for both immigration and U.S.-Mexico border immigration, but that may largely be attributable to the ICE shootings. However, given the political divisions in the U.S. most Democrats are simply going to disapprove of Trump’s performance in any area.

This is going to sting the GOP in the midterms unless more centrist voters don’t cast a ballot at all, but that’s unlikely.  Pundits are saying that the House is likely to go Democratic, and the Senate less likely but still possible.

*The NYT’s Ross Douthat is both a conservative and religious, and not smart about either stand. But even a stopped clock is right twice a day, and Douthat is on the mark with his new op-ed, “Slouching toward Kamala Harris.” Oy, just the headline gave me shpilkes in my kishkas!

. . . The third [statistic that helps us understand the Democrats in 2026] is polling for the 2028 Democratic presidential primaries, in which the leading Democratic candidate is consistently Kamala Harris, the face of the party’s 2024 debacle.

All three numbers are linked to the dominant mode in Democratic politics right now. It’s not the rebellion or radicalism manifest in, say, Hasan Piker’s Twitch-streamer Marxism or Zohran Mamdani’s telegenic democratic socialism. Notable as those tendencies may be, the Democrats’ fundamental condition is a late-Trumpian stasis — in which the president’s stark unpopularity encourages his opponents to imagine that they can keep everything basically as it was in the Biden era, with the same broad priorities and deference to activists and interest groups, and float back to power automatically.

The continuing appeal of Harris is a useful indicator of this stasis. Yes, she is unlikely to be the 2028 nominee, and part of her support is name recognition; Mitt Romney did well in such polls in 2013 and 2014. But she seems to want a second run more than Romney did, and if she goes for it, she will have one notable advantage: the fact that many Democrats who find her renomination unthinkable are nonetheless incapable of acknowledging the real reasons that she lost.

I’ll list some of those reasons. First, her party was seen as too beholden to progressive activists on a range of issues, including immigration, crime, education, energy and the transgender debate. Second, Harris’s vice presidency was itself a creation of the 2020 identity politics moment, without which Joe Biden never would have picked her, and she succeeded him without a fight in part because no one wanted to acknowledge her painful limits as a politician. Finally, she tried to solve both the policy problem and the identity politics problem through evasion and distraction and yet more identity politics, with empty rhetoric of “joy” and circumlocution about her past positions and a mediocre Midwestern white guy running mate.

Despite being on the record taking radical positions, Harris was never a radical politician. Rather, she was a perfectly hapless embodiment of a Democratic establishment that aspired to manage its base without ever strongly resisting its demands and that aspired to win moderate voters not by moderating on the issues but through a change of affect or a change of subject.

That’s still clearly what Democratic elites would prefer to do, and it’s also what you see in many of the figures contending for influence in the party, outsiders and insiders alike. Politicians as distinct as Graham Platner, Gavin Newsom, James Talarico and Abigail Spanberger have all offered new directions for the Democrats that are primarily image-based. The theory is always: What if we had the same basic policy orientation that makes moderates distrust us, except that this time we’ll talk like a bearded oyster farmer … or like Trump himself on a social media bender … or like a sunny youth pastor … or like a former C.I.A. officer?

[To hold their gains and govern successfully], Democrats first need to consistently win over enough former Trump voters to claim a meaningful Senate majority — something the polls don’t show them doing yet. And then they need a theory of governance that doesn’t immediately alienate those voters — something that is nowhere in evidence at the moment.

I’m still groping about for a candidate (as in years gone by, I favor Pete Buttigieg), but I know one thing: the Democrats will not win with Kamala Harris, an unpalatable alternative to even the low-polling Trump. And I still resent those Democrats who pretended that she was a good candidate—one who even brought them “joy.”  Are we really that dumb?

*Timmy the stranded humpback whale who was rescued in a water-filled barge, towed out to sea, and then released, all at great expense, seems to be doing okay, at least for now. I’ve read that a GPS sensor was affixed to it, so we’ll know more later. But nobody’s willing to predict that Timmy will be fine.

“He is doing well,” Mr. Gunz [one of the millionaires who funded the rescue] said in a message, adding that the whale had blown a “great fountain” as it swam away.

. . . . Though rescuers said that they expected Timmy to recover in his more suitable habitat, more than 200 nautical miles from where he was stranded, experts said there was no guarantee that it would survive for long.

“Even short-term survival is very questionable,” said Burkard Baschek, the director of the Ocean Museum Germany and the scientific coordinator of the second and third rescue efforts. The whale was extremely weak, having made very little movement over the past few weeks, and suffered from other issues in addition to the freshwater skin disease, he said.

The stress of being in a barge, including the loud echo of the water splashing against the steel hull, was also probably difficult for the whale, Dr. Baschek said.

“I know how sad it is to have an animal dying at the beach where you can watch it,” he said. But the rescue, he added, was “not increasing its survival chances.”

Dr. Baschek said that he was heartened by how much empathy for the whale had spread over Germany and the world. But he noted that more than 300,000 whales and dolphins die every year after becoming entangled in fishing nets. He hoped that attention in the future would focus not on rescue operations but on making oceans safer for marine life.

Timmy has become a symbol of determination, and I want it to live, for even though lots of whales die every year from entanglement, this is one life that we know about. If it recovered and swam the open North Sea, it would be a palliative in these troubled times.

Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Hili is a keen weathercat:

Hili: It’s terribly dry.
Andrzej: Apparently it’s supposed to rain next week.

In Polish:

Hili: Strasznie sucho.
Ja: Podobno za tydzień mają być deszcze.

*******************

From CinEmma:

From Terrible Maps:

From Strange, Stupid, or Silly Signs:

From Masih; Iran hanged this 21-year-old karate athlete for protesting. He was not a criminal, just a critic.

Arrested. Silenced. Hanged at dawn.
This is Iran in 21st-century: A photo of the lifeless body of the heroic martyr Sasan Azadvar, who was executed for protesting.
Imagine building a life for 21 years and losing it to a system that treats human beings as disposable.

Twenty-one.… pic.twitter.com/HsvENKjbrI

— Masih Alinejad 🏳️ (@AlinejadMasih) May 3, 2026

David Reich on prehistoric “colonialism”.  It doesn’t fit the narrative, of course, but so be it:

David Reich on how much ancient DNA evidence has overturned so much consensus thinking how ancient cultures spread.

“It wasn’t peaceful, it wasn’t friendly, it wasn’t nice.

Some of our archaeologist co-authors were just really distressed.” pic.twitter.com/JRuOeWDIuk

— Dwarkesh Patel (@dwarkesh_sp) May 2, 2026

From Luana; a tweet that proves once again that academics don’t have to be savvy. Mohamed Abdou was at Columbia University (of course) and apparently still is.

🚨 BREAKING: “Death to America” Comes to @virginia_tech

At Virginia Tech tonight, Mohamed Abdou opened his “Death to the Akademy” speech by declaring, “We are in a war, a racial religious war since 1492.”

He told students America is “the larger monster,” praised “General… pic.twitter.com/bQwLsy0fRt

— Stu Smith (@thestustustudio) May 2, 2026

Two from my feed. First, a jailbreak:

Breaking free #Caturday pic.twitter.com/Q7wQQZk1FM

— Jurassic Snark (@underhandrea) May 2, 2026

Bird dances to phone rings:

おもしろすぎて何度も再生してしまうwwwww

https://t.co/KMBl1OFe7w

— まだ面白い (@madaomoshiroi) May 3, 2026

One I reposted from The Auschwitz Memorial:

This French Jewish girl was gassed to death upon arriving at Auschwitz. She was 2 years old and would be 84 today had she lived. https://t.co/04YZMyfHbB

— Jerry Coyne (@Evolutionistrue) May 4, 2026

Two from Dr. Cobb. First, a great optical illusion:

The footsteps illusion-like pausing and sticking illusionThe rectangles in the upper half appear to move to the right and stop periodically; however, they are moving to the right at a constant speed in the same way as the rectangles in the lower half.

— Akiyoshi Kitaoka (@akiyoshikitaoka.bsky.social) 2026-05-03T09:28:49.225Z

Interspecies friendship:

We have a wild hedgehog who lives in our garden and is friends with our cat (this isn’t their first meeting, they know each other well)

— Juliet Turner (@juliet-turner.bsky.social) 2026-05-02T09:25:30.008Z

Welcome to shabbos for gentile cats: it’s Sunday, May 3, 2026, and Lemonade Day. Here’s a lemonade joke from the FB page The Language Nerds:

It’s also National Chocolate Custard Day, National Raspberry Popover Day, National Two Different Colored Shoes Day, Paranormal Day, and World Press Freedom Day.

Yesterday my last Ph.D. student, Daniel Matute (now a professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill), was given the 2026 Distinguished Alumni Award for Early Achievement by the The University of Chicago Medical & Biological Sciences Alumni Association. The award was for his contributions to science, and he was the only Early Achievement Recipient.

Daniel, born in Colombia, showed up in my lab when I was on sabbatical, asking to do a short rotation. He was clearly a ball o’ fire, and I took him on as a student, whereupon he worked very hard and excelled beyond any expectations, publishing a gazillion papers before he graduated in 2011, and and winning the Dobzhansky Prize from the Society for the Study of Evolution awarded “to recognize the accomplishments and future promise of an outstanding early-career evolutionary biologist.” (My first student, Allen Orr, won it in 1993, and I’ve had just four students).  Daniel’s c.v. shows an astounding 153 papers already, and he’s just a kid! He’s working on the genetics of speciation, mostly with Drosophila, and I’m proud of the lad. Congrats, Dr. Matute!

Here he is getting his award:

Readers are welcome to mark notable events, births, or deaths on this day by consulting the May 3 Wikipedia page.

Da Nooz:

*Trump has reached the Congressional deadline for pursuing the Iran war without authorization, but now deems the conflict “terminated.”

President Donald Trump claimed in a letter to Congress on Friday that hostilities with Iran have “terminated” as he reached a legal deadline that requires military operations to halt unless lawmakers authorize force.

Trump’s claim came as the United States continues to enforce a naval blockade of Iran and as he declined to rule out additional strikes on the country.

The War Powers Resolution of 1973 requires presidents to remove U.S. forces from any conflict that Congress has not authorized within 60 days of the White House notifying Congress of hostilities — a deadline that Trump hit on Friday.

Trump wrote in his letter to lawmakers Friday that the conflict has been effectively over since the United States and Iran agreed last month to a ceasefire.

“There has been no exchange of fire between United States Forces and Iran since April 7, 2026,” Trump wrote in the letter, obtained by The Washington Post. “The hostilities that began on February 28, 2026, have terminated.”

The president’s argument echoed what Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said Thursday in testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee. Trump also suggested Friday that he believes the requirement to withdraw U.S. forces within 60 days is unconstitutional.

“Most people consider it totally unconstitutional,” Trump told reporters. “Also, we had a ceasefire, so that gives you additional time.”

Well, we’ll let the Supreme Court determine if it’s constitutional or not; can’t they do an emergency order if it’s not? As for Trump, he apparently doesn’t recognize the system of checks and balances that underlies our government.

*The budget carrier Spirit Airlines has shut down after it didn’t get a big bailout from the government.

Spirit Airlines reshaped aviation in the United States by stripping down flying to its essentials and selling what were often the cheapest tickets around. But the airline shut down for good on Saturday, a victim of the rising costs it once excelled at controlling.

In a statement just after 2 a.m., Spirit said it had canceled all flights and told passengers not to go to the airport. On the airline’s homepage, a bright yellow banner declared that the airline was “winding down all operations.”

The budget airline had lost billions of dollars in recent years as it struggled with intense competition at its most important airports — Las Vegas, Florida and New York among them — and rising labor and aircraft maintenance costs.

As a result, Spirit filed for bankruptcy in 2024 and again in 2025. It had aimed to emerge from the second bankruptcy this summer as a smaller company, but those plans fell apart as jet fuel prices rose dramatically in recent weeks, a consequence of the U.S. and Israeli war with Iran. The Trump administration started an 11th-hour effort to provide Spirit a lifeline, but government officials and the airline’s creditors could not reach a deal in time to save the company.

The shutdown leaves 17,000 full- and part-time Spirit employees without work and tens of thousands of customers without flights. Spirit said it would automatically issue refunds for tickets purchased on credit or debit cards and was working to get more than 1,300 flight crew members home.

Many other airlines said they would offer affected travelers discounted prices on flights to and from the airports that Spirit served. Some said that they would help stranded Spirit employees get home and United Airlines invited them to apply for jobs.

It’s gone, vanished: it is an ex-airline, singing with the Choir Invisible. There are no more bargain flights; even my favorite cut-rate airline, Southwest, is now charging for bags and its ticket prices have skyrocketed.  This is going to put a crimp on people’s summer vacations, though Duck Duty will probably keep me here this summer.  As for Southwest, well, I am no longer wedded to that airline, which is also a victim of rising prices but also of a willingness to abandon the unique character of that airline.

*After the NYT published a deeply misleading review of a book whose autistic author used “facilitated communication” to write (see my post here),, it’s now published an op-ed by Amy Lutz that’s a corrective:  “Profound autism is difficult enough without this debunked method.” (h/t Greg Mayer).

As the mother of a profoundly autistic son, now 27, I have wished for so many miracles over the years: that Jonah was not really as cognitively impaired as he appeared; that one of the countless treatments we tried would be transformative; that he would one day go to college, pursue a meaningful career and do everything parents want their children to do. So I understand the allure of facilitated communication and similar methods, which promise to grant those wishes with a simple letter board or keyboard.

Facilitated Communication, or F.C., is an intervention in which profoundly autistic individuals spell messages with the physical support of a nondisabled facilitator, who generally provides direct touch to the speller’s hand, wrist, elbow or shoulder. There are variants of F.C., such as Spelling to Communicate and the Rapid Prompting Method, in which the facilitator typically holds a letter board and offers prompts. Grouped together, these methods are often referred to as “spelling.”

Such facilitation, proponents claim, unlocks hidden literacy inside people previously considered severely cognitively impaired. In 2021, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. interviewed the father of a speller who wrote a book with his son. Discussing his takeaways from the book, Mr. Kennedy says the son “learned to do calculus in essentially a day.” According to “The Telepathy Tapes,” a popular podcast that first aired in 2024, there are spellers who can read their facilitators’ minds.

Here’s the thing about F.C., though: The science doesn’t back it up.

There are augmentative and alternative communication methods that work for many nonverbal or minimally verbal individuals: simple forms of sign language, various digital applications and the Picture Exchange Communication System — which employs small cards with images or icons primarily to convey requests. But communication produced by F.C. and its counterparts isn’t autonomous; it’s influenced by facilitators.

. . .Over time, many such studies have reported essentially the same thing: Spellers could not communicate information unknown to their facilitators. A 1995 study of seven adults in the Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis found that spellers “typed the correct answer only when the facilitator had access to the same information, never typed the correct answer when the facilitator had no information or false information and typed the picture or activity presented to the facilitator when it was different from the one experienced by the client.” In other words, when spellers and their facilitators were shown the same picture — for instance, a telephone — the speller successfully spelled out “telephone.” But when the speller was shown a telephone and the facilitator was shown a different picture — for example, a hat — the subject spelled out “hat,” which is what the facilitator saw.

A 2014 Finnish analysis concluded that messages produced using F.C. “revealed a large degree of facilitator influence on the content of the messages produced.” A review of this extensive literature published in 2014 found “unequivocal evidence for facilitator control: Messages generated through F.C. are authored by the facilitators rather than the individuals with disabilities.”

Virtually every relevant professional organization — including the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association, the American Psychological Association, the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and the American Association on Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities — has issued position statements opposing F.C. Some have also specifically issued statements recommending against the use of variants like the Rapid Prompting Method.

Not only the NYT, but also NBC fell for the notion that Woody Brown was really the “author” of the novel Upward Bound, but it worked only when Mom was the facilitator, and if you watch the videos, Woody is not pointing at the letters that his mother spells out.  If you haven’t seen this video debunking the notion that Woody is “speaking” through his mom, do watch it. Facilitated communication has become a religion, completely untethered from reality.

*I was sure that the young humpback whale (“Timmy”) who was stranded in shallow water in Germany, and then towed back to the open sea in a huge, water-filled barge, was doomed. It simply couldn’t work, I thought, despite the tremendous expense (financed by rich animal lovers) of constructing the barge, putting in the whale, and then making the long, slow trek to open water. But it appears to have worked, which makes me very happy!

Rescuers have released a young humpback whale that became a national sensation after it was beached in shallow waters off the coast in Germany, although marine experts have said its chances of survival are low.

The whale, variously nicknamed Timmy or Hope, was released into the North Sea off Denmark after being transported there in a water-filled barge by rescuers.

The 10-metre long calf swam out of the barge and was later observed blowing through its blowhole and swimming freely “in the right direction”, according to Karin Walter-Mommert from the rescue initiative.

The rescue attempt had been criticised by the International Whaling Commission (IWC) as “inadvisable” because the whale appeared to be “severely compromised” and was unlikely to survive after its release.

Experts from the Oceanographic Museum in Stralsund on Germany’s Baltic coast also recommended the creature should be left to die in peace.

The whale has been described as lethargic and covered in blister-like blemishes, and parts of its mouth were believed to be caught in a fishing net.

The museum’s director, Burkard Baschek, has said trying to save the whale amounted to “pure animal cruelty”.

The rescue attempt was funded by two multimillionaires who said they were prepared to pay “whatever it costs” to release the whale, which became stranded on a sandbank in Wismar Bay near the city of Lübeck nearly six weeks ago.

As its health deteriorated, German officials gave up trying to rescue the mammal, saying they believed it could not be freed.

But after the whale’s plight garnered national interest, with coverage from TV channels and social media influencers, German authorities were persuaded to approve a privately financed rescue plan.

Initial attempts to save the whale with inflatable cushions and pontoons were unsuccessful, but divers eventually managed to help the creature on to a flooded barge , watched by hundreds of onlookers.

. . and here’s a video:

And 0ne of Timmy blowing after release. Go, Timmy!

He might still die, but I sure hope not. (And I hope they tagged it so researchers can keep track.)

*It’s really sad when a Nobel Laureate is imprisoned for political reasons, and it’s even sadder when she has recurrent medical problems but won’t get proper care in prison. That is the situation of Narges Mohammedi, 54, who has been in and out of Iranian prisons for political activity for ten years, and she’s currently in. (She won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2023.) As the AP reports, she’s been hospitalized with serious health issues.

Iran’s imprisoned Nobel Peace Prize laureate Narges Mohammadi has been urgently transferred from prison to a hospital in northwestern Iran after a “catastrophic deterioration” of her health, her foundation said Friday.

The Narges Mohammadi Foundation said the Nobel Prize laureate had two episodes of complete loss of consciousness and a severe cardiac crisis.

Earlier Friday, Mohammadi had fainted twice in prison in Zanjan in northwestern Iran, according to the foundation. She was believed to have suffered a heart attack in late March, according to her lawyers who visited her a few days after the incident. At the time, she appeared pale, underweight and needed a nurse to help her walk.

The hospital transfer comes “after 140 days of systematic medical neglect,” since her arrest on Dec. 12, the foundation said.

“This transfer was done as an unavoidable necessity after prison doctors determined her condition could not be managed on-site, despite standing medical recommendations that she be treated by her specialized team in Tehran,” the foundation said.

Mohammadi’s family had advocated for her transfer to adequate medical facilities for weeks.

The foundation, quoting her family, said her transfer Friday to a hospital in Zanjan was “a desperate, ‘last-minute’ action that may be too late to address her critical needs.”

Mohammadi’s brother Hamidreza Mohammadi, who lives in Oslo, Norway, said in an audio message shared with The Associated Press by the foundation that her family is “fighting for her life.”

“My family in Iran is doing everything they can. But the prosecutors in Zanjan are blocking everything,” he said.

On March 24, Narges Mohammadi’s fellow inmates found her unconscious, her lawyers said she told them during the visit a few days later. Upon later examination at the prison’s clinic, a doctor told her that she probably had had a heart attack. She had chest pain and breathing difficulties since.

Mohammadi, a human rights activist and critic of the Iranian government, should have been released a long time ago, and while she was imprisoned she was not receiving much medical care.  What she really needs is to go to a good hospital in Israel, Europe, or the U.S where she can can get the best treatment. Iran, of course, would prefer that she died, as they could just say it was an act of Allah and not due to the imprisonment. But of course it was a combination of both.

Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, the kitties are playing The Wizard of Oz:

Andrzej: Where are you guys?
Hili: Look behind the curtain.

In Polish:

Ja: Gdzie wy jesteście?
Hili: Zajrzyj za firankę.

*******************

From Animals in Random Places:

From Cats Doing Cat Stuff:

From CinEmma:

From Luana; a duck story:

Masih is quiet today, but J. K. Rowling is her usual snarky self:

.@zarahsultana I assume this is a different Zarah Sultana MP to the one who was recently filmed clapping along to loudspeaker chants for intifada, on a street in Surrey.https://t.co/J9nLlYtw59 https://t.co/FUlo7Zg2rh

— J.K. Rowling (@jk_rowling) April 29, 2026

From Luana; Portland Mayor Katie Wilson, a “progressive” (and daughter of evolutionary biologist David Sloan Wilson), dodges questions about surveillance cameras after four shootings in Portland between April 26 and May 1. For the full video, go here.

Staffers for Seattle Socialist Mayor Katie Wilson abruptly end an interview with KOMO News Senior Reporter Chris Daniels when she can’t answer basic questions

Wilson has been criticized for dodging the press & being unable to answer basic questions since she came into office pic.twitter.com/eJnFtg6CLy

— Ari Hoffman (@thehoffather) May 1, 2026

The Number Ten cat is having a snooze:

The Bank Holiday weekend is here; wake me up on Tuesday x
(Photo @PoliticalPics) pic.twitter.com/IYDta63DnH

— Larry the Cat (@Number10cat) May 1, 2026

Two from my feed. What can you say about the first one?

A moment of silence for the real victim of the stabbing attack: The stabber pic.twitter.com/x42pSVv5HB

— Max 📟 (@MaxNordau) May 1, 2026

A man helps a thirsty baby elephant. Is the mother thanking him?

Mama elephant thanks a person for giving water to her thirsty baby..❤️ pic.twitter.com/0SJVcf5jwo

— Love Music (@khnh80044) May 2, 2026

One I reposted from The Auschwitz Memorial:

This Dutch Jewish boy was gassed together with his mother after they arrived in Auschwitz. He was four years old.

— Jerry Coyne (@evolutionistrue.bsky.social) 2026-05-03T10:17:30.367Z

And two from Dr. Cobb. First, voyeurs in Texas sank a boat:

Also discovering Important Sciencey Facts – in their case in the fields of weight distribution and buoyancy – were the people who gave rise to this NBC News story in 2004

— Odd This Day (@oddthisday.bsky.social) 2026-05-02T09:03:13.519Z

And an Oggsford drake:

Welcome to shabbos for Jewish cats: it’s Saturday, May 2, 2026 and National Truffle Day. They mean chocolate truffles, but let’s look at how they find the fungus-y ones. They are usually sniffed out by pigs or d*gs—the latter in this case.

It’s also Beer Pong Day, Herb Day (the plant, not the person’s name), International Drone Day, National Homebrew Day, the day of the Kentucky Derby. World Tuna Day, and National Play your Ukulele Day.  Here’s Paul McCartney playing one of the late George Harrison’s ukuleles in a star-studded version of “Something” in a concert for George. Clapton’s there, too, and too many others to name. The event was the The Concert for George at the Royal Albert Hall in London on November 29, 2002.

Readers are welcome to mark notable events, births, or deaths on this day by consulting the May 2 Wikipedia page.

Da Nooz:

*The Supreme Leader of Iran, who may in fact be dead, has issued a statement asserting that the country would not only retain control of the Strait of Hormuz, but would not give up its drive for nuclear weapons.

Iran’s supreme leader issued a rare statement on Thursday saying that the United States had no place in the future of the Persian Gulf region and making clear that his country planned to manage the strategic Strait of Hormuz waterway going forward.

In the defiant message, Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei also vowed that Iran would retain its nuclear capabilities. The lengthy statement from the Iranian leader, who has not been seen in public since he was named to the top post nearly two months ago, was shared by his office.

It touched on two of the thorniest issues stalling talks on permanently ending the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran, which began in late February and paused when a cease-fire was reached this month. Those positions put Iran at odds with the United States, which has sought to curtail Iran’s nuclear ambitions and insisted that it cannot restrict use of the Strait of Hormuz to vessels of its choosing.

“By the will and power of God, the bright future of the Persian Gulf region will be a future without America,” said the statement, which was released on Iran’s National Day of the Persian Gulf, an annual commemoration of a 1622 military victory over Portugal in the Strait of Hormuz.

Of the battle over the narrow waterway, one of the most important shipping routes for global oil supplies, the statement said: “Foreigners who come from thousands of kilometers away, acting maliciously out of greed, have no place there, except at the bottom of its waters.”

It went on to say that Iran would implement “new legal frameworks and management of the Strait of Hormuz,” suggesting that the country had no plans to relinquish control over the shipping route. Such a system, it added, would benefit its neighbors and prove economically fruitful.

. . . The war has devastated Iran’seconomy, with the Iranian rial currency sinking to new lows against the dollar this week.

Well, we’re at an impasse, then. The Iranian economy will get worse and worse, and the question is whether the people of Iran will rise up (or the regime dissolve) before pressure from the U.S. people and Congress forces Trump to quit.

*However, the WSJ reports that Iran is increasingly in trouble because it simply can’t break the U.S. blockade.

For almost five decades, Iran’s Islamic government has survived financial pressure from the U.S. by selling oil to China. It confronted American military might with guerrilla tactics. But with the U.S. Navy’s blockade, that strategy might have met its match, analysts said.

Tehran thought it was gaining the upper hand after the war started in February as it attacked ships navigating the Strait of Hormuz, shutting down commercial traffic and blocking a fifth of the world’s oil and liquefied natural gas supplies. Six weeks into the conflict, the U.S. responded by blockading shipments from all Iranian ports.

That shut down Iran’s network of shadow ships, which for years defied U.S. sanctions on Iran’s substantial oil exports by going dark at sea before clandestinely transferring their cargoes to China. The tankers have been unable to breach a cordon of U.S. warships that have chased them all the way to the Indian Ocean.

In Hormuz, “Iran was able to create a crisis of market confidence. But disruption is not control,” said David Des Roches, a former director responsible for Persian Gulf policy at the Defense Department. “With the U.S. blockade, it’s facing a reckoning.”

Alternative trade routes won’t be sufficient. Iran has been working to send some of its oil by rail to China and to import foodstuff by road from the Caucasus and Pakistan. Only 40% of Iran’s trade can be redirected away from blockaded ports, the Iranian Shipping Association said Thursday via the Fars news agency, which is affiliated with Iran’s security services.

The risk of a spiraling crisis has split Iran’s political system between moderates such as President Masoud Pezeshkian and hard-liners including Saeed Jalili, a former presidential candidate who leads Iran’s most conservative faction.

The moderates believe in holding fire and negotiating a favorable deal with President Trump, whom they view as eager to get out of the messy war as soon as possible. They worry Iranians are growing tired of the conflict after an initial nationalist uptick.

“The regime has to do something to break this deadlock,” Saeid Golkar, who studies Iran at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga. “Moderates want a deal because they think more destruction is political suicide,” he said.

A growing camp of hard-liners believe Iran has to take the military initiative and start a shooting war again to send oil prices soaring higher and increase the pressure on Trump. They argue that the blockade goes beyond the sanctions Iran has faced down in the past and amounts to an act of war that must have a military response.

Even a rule by moderates won’t stopo the oppression that has killed tens of thousands of protesting Iranians. My preference is for the U.S. to continue the blockade.  Here’s a map from the article of the U.S.’s blockade line:

*As usual, I’ll steal a few items from Nellie Bowles’s news-and-snark column in the Free Press, called this week, “TGIF: A new tux on the dirty Hilton floor.”

→ Park Slope Food Co-Op: A meeting at Brooklyn’s Park Slope Food Co-op—which I’m pretty sure is just a factory that produces news to be turned into items for this column (I’ve never been to Brooklyn)—was more aggressive than usual this week as the discussion naturally turned to Israeli products. “Jewish supremacism is a problem in this country,” said one attendee, kind of giving away the game there. The darkest part: Some 50 people applauded the comment. The topic: banning Israeli goods. The jeerers, presumably: well-heeled Park Slope parents. There are about 10 Israeli items sold in the shop, and it has led to years of battles.

Meanwhile, the hottest new fashion accessory in New York is a Hamas headband, as sported in Manhattan’s Flatiron District neighborhood, where protesters harassed diners at a kosher-style (not even fully kosher!) restaurant. They surrounded the tables and called the diners “pedophiles” and the “Epstein class,” which is, of course, reasonable criticism of Israeli policies.

→ I guess I need to learn about this new fetish now: An Oxford biochemistry professor is now teaching while wearing enormous Z-cup prosthetic breasts and low-cut shirts to class. If you’re reading this over breakfast, maybe don’t because I am obligated to inform you that his long wispy beard grazes the tits. I will not include a picture [JAC: the picture’s at the next link.] As Jo Bartosch at Spiked put it, it’s “a giant rubber rack.” We’re talking Bryon Noem–sized knockers here. She concludes: “Regrettably, it seems Matt Rattley will be at liberty to display his plastic tits until university officials find their ovaries.”

And now I’ve had to learn that this is a kink, yet another thing about men I would rather not know. Because it’s indeed the same thing as that Canadian high school shop teacher, Kayla Lemieux, who went viral for wearing, yes, Z-cup prosthetic breasts in class. Hopefully these are just strange, unique episodes. But it is funny, isn’t it, that both of these men are in charge of kids. Not ha ha funny. But you get it. When I revive a lesbian separatist commune in Michigan, I want you to know that this new kink (bearded men, Z-cup tits, teaching kids, plus we’re supposed to applaud them) tipped me over the edge. Me, Pat, Jill, and our holistic herb healer Ingrid are going to be over here keeping chickens. Zero cleavage.

→ More defense of microlooting: In the pro-microlooting podcast episode of The Opinions from The New York Times last week, there was a little part about how stealing from the Louvre is cool. Jia Tolentino and Hasan Piker agreed it’s one of the “cool crimes” that there should be more of. I need you to see now how the American progressive intelligentsia explains this as backlash inevitably arrived. This is a major writer in the movement and genuinely one of its smarter representatives:

Of course, the real threat to American museums is Climate Action protesters armed with cans of soup, but the idea that you can just replace a precious, one-of-a-kind object with another one from the basement is insane. I love it.

I think Malcolm and his ilk are smarter than they’re letting on. I think the real argument is: Yes, take apart the Louvre. Take apart Western culture, since it’s an evil thing. But maybe not. Maybe he really does think there are a dozen Mona Lisas in CubeSmart storage so who cares.

→ In other foreign policy news this week:

No further questions. As you were.

*Here, watch some British tourists in Vietnam mercilessly harass a Jewish couple simply because the woman had an Israel-shaped tatoo. They call them “rats” and “monsters”. Oy! (h/t Ginger):

A video has gone viral of a pair of tourists who filmed themselves hurling antisemitic and anti-Israel abuse at an Israeli couple dining in Vietnam, calling them “rats” and using white supremacist memes, until the Israelis get up and leave while other diners do nothing.

It was unclear when the video was made before it was apparently uploaded to social media by the British pair.

In the video, one of the abusing tourists asked the Israeli man and woman if they were “from Palestine” upon noticing an Israel-shaped tattoo on the woman’s arm.

The Israeli woman smiled and said, “It’s difficult.” The British women continue in the same line of questioning, asking the Israelis if they speak Arabic.

When the Israeli man said they speak Hebrew, the British women explode.

“Oh, right, you’re Israeli… Fake state of Israel,” said one.

A video has gone viral of a pair of tourists who filmed themselves hurling antisemitic and anti-Israel abuse at an Israeli couple dining in Vietnam, calling them “rats” and using white supremacist memes, until the Israelis get up and leave while other diners do nothing.

It was unclear when the video was made before it was apparently uploaded to social media by the British pair.

In the video, one of the abusing tourists asked the Israeli man and woman if they were “from Palestine” upon noticing an Israel-shaped tattoo on the woman’s arm.

The Israeli woman smiled and said, “It’s difficult.” The British women continue in the same line of questioning, asking the Israelis if they speak Arabic.

When the Israeli man said they speak Hebrew, the British women explode.

“Oh, right, you’re Israeli… Fake state of Israel,” said one.

“Were you part of the IDF, IOF… Did you kill innocent civilians?” asked the other. The abbreviation for “Israeli Occupation Forces” is frequently used on pro-Palestinian and anti-Israel social media to refer to the Israeli military.

The Israeli man appeared about to respond, but his partner signaled to him not to take the bait, before she herself said: “Everyone is part of the army.”

“So then you’re a murderer,” said one of the British tourists. “You can refuse to be in the IDF.”

“I want to eat my lunch in quiet,” the Israeli woman said, and continued eating.

“Well, we want to save humanity,” answered the British tourist from her own table.

“Now they’re going to cry, I didn’t have my lunch in peace,” said the second UK tourist.

. . .“Look at them, the rats running away,” said one woman as the Israeli couple moves. “Go on, rats. Murderers, savages.”

Rats have long been deployed as an antisemitic trope to depict Jews.

Israelis abroad have faced mounting harassment, sometimes descending into physical violence, since the war in Gaza was sparked by the Hamas-led onslaught of October 7, 2023. A poll last year found that a majority of Israelis fear they will be unable to travel abroad due to mounting global criticism of Israel.

Here’s a tweet with the video. The degree of hate is horrific and persistent, too. We Jews can’t catch a break:

Watch British tourists harass an Israeli couple in Vietnam. They sing “Boom boom Tel Aviv” and call them “rats”. They even invoke the Nazi trope of Jews being kicked out of “110 countries”. These pro-Pals are indistinguishable from Nazis now. I’m ashamed of them. pic.twitter.com/kod7h0su9k

— Heidi Bachram (@HeidiBachram) April 15, 2026

It would be lovely if someone could identify these moronic antisemites so they could face public opprobrium. It’s antisemitism, not anti-Netanyahuism or anti-Zionism—unless the chowderheaded critics think that a tattoo of Israel makes you a Zionist. (While we’re at it, let’s just eliminate the word “Zionist” and use “Jew”. Nearly all Jews are Zionists since they favor the right of Israel to exist as a sovereign Jewish state).

*The world record for the most expensive tuna was set by a sushi chain in Japan, which purchased a large bluefin tuna for no less than $3.25 million dollars

A Japanese sushi chain has bought the world’s most expensive tuna at auction.

Sushizanmai, part of Kiyomura Corporation owned by “Tuna King” Kiyoshi Kimura, bought a bluefin tuna for JP￥510,300,000 ($3,254,277) at the annual first fish auction of the year in Koto, Tokyo — officially breaking the Guinness World Record for the most expensive tuna fish to be sold at auction.

Following the Jan. 5 sale, Kiyomura was presented its official Guinness certificate during a ceremony at the chain’s main Tsukiji location on April 20, per Malay Mail.

“We will continue to offer high-quality tuna next year and beyond,” said Kimura, president of Kiyomura Corporation, during the ceremony.

The tuna, sold at Toyosu Market, weighed a whopping 243 kg (535 lbs 11.52 oz) and was caught in Oma in Japan’s northern prefecture of Aomori. The fish was then cut at the Tsukiji location of Sushizanmai and distributed across the company’s numerous shops across Japan.

“Although the tuna was crowned the most expensive tuna fish, the tuna sushi served post-auction was sold at the regular price range,” Guinness World Records noted in its announcement.

Kimura is no stranger to a massive fish sale. In 2020, he paid $1.8 million for another huge bluefin tuna — weighing a whopping 608 pounds — at the same annual first fish auction of the year at Toyosu Market. The fish was also caught in Aomori.

Following the remarkable sale, Kimura expressed his joy and excitement at securing the large fish for his corporation’s consumers.

“This is the best,” Kimura said, Agence France-Presse reported at the time. “Yes, this is expensive, isn’t it? I want our customers to eat very tasty ones this year, too.”

I would have liked to try some of that sushi! Here’s the hapless tuna with the Tuna King carving it up.  はい!!!

Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Hili’s still neurotic about the garden:

Hili: Dandelion!
Andrzej: We lost the fight against dandelions many years ago. Now we have decided to like them.

In Polish:

Hili: Mlecz!
Ja: Walkę z mleczami przegraliśmy wiele lat temu. Teraz postanowiliśmy je lubić.

*******************

From Bad Spelling or Grammar on Signs and Notices:

From Jesus of the Day:

From Terrible Maps (this is true. but only on Sundays!):

From Masih. Iran killed this protestor on Thursday; I was hoping they would let him go. No chance.

They hanged him💔

The regim Executes 21-Year-Old karate athlete at dawn Thursday in Prison after Iran’s Supreme Court upheld a death sentence on charges of “enmity against God.”
His crime?
Joining nationwide protests in January 2026.

Security forces reportedly surrounded his… https://t.co/Kx9doUREMs

— Masih Alinejad 🏳️ (@AlinejadMasih) May 1, 2026

From Luana; Agustín Fuentes is doing his thing again:

Birds can do what Scientific American cannot https://t.co/AOLKo10LD3 pic.twitter.com/M8ZMsjhq4Y

— Jeremy Kauffman 🦔🌲🌕 (@jeremykauffman) April 30, 2026

From the #10 Cat, reprising the history of America. I didn’t realize that Trump had lifted taxes on whiskey from Scotland in honor of the Royal visit to the U.S.

History of the USA:
– King of England imposes taxes
– America declares independence
– Things go well for nearly 250 years
– America elects a moron
– Moron imposes taxes
– King of England gets taxes removed pic.twitter.com/IU3HlAPFa3

— Larry the Cat (@Number10cat) April 30, 2026

From “Captain Ella” (now Colonel Ella), the Muslim, Arab-speaking spokesperson for the IDF. I love her. English translation:

Hezbollah threatened to occupy the Galilee, but it only occupied the homes of the Lebanese. Thousands of combat means were seized in Lebanon. What’s left? The weapons – we seized them The tunnels – we destroyed them The elements – we lined them up Their threats went down the drain.

حزب الله هدّد باحتلال الجليل، لكنه لم يحتل سوى بيوت اللبنانيين.
تم ضبط الالف من الوسائل القتالية في لبنان.
ما تبقّى؟
الأسلحة – ضبطناها
الأنفاق – دمرناها
العناصر – صفيناهم
ذهبت تهديداتهم أدراج الرياح. pic.twitter.com/T5PyiXuMTJ

— Lieutenant Colonel Ella Waweya | إيلا واوية (@CaptainElla1) May 1, 2026

Two from my feed. First, a cat gets a Hero D*g award:

I just found out that in 2015, the Los Angeles SPCA gave their annual National Hero Dog award to a tabby cat named Tara. Yes, you read that right, a cat was given a dog award.

It remains the first and only time a feline has ever won the title. A year earlier in Bakersfield, USA,… pic.twitter.com/wArmAQzenU

— Dr. Lemma (@DoctorLemma) May 1, 2026

This is a great way to get people in shape!

In Romania, passengers can pay for a bus ticket by doing 20 squats.👏pic.twitter.com/sB0fulDYzr

— Out of Context Human Race (@NoContextHumans) April 30, 2026

One I reposted from The Auschwitz Memorial:

This Yugoslavian Jewish girl was gassed to death as soon as she got to Auschwitz. She was 3 years old. Had she lived, she’d be 85 today. https://t.co/jiK9Zfw2LN

— Jerry Coyne (@Evolutionistrue) May 2, 2026

And one from Herr Doktor Professor Cobb. He went home from Chile via Amsterdam, and here is the clock he photograph at Schiphol airport. Yes, the minute hand gets “repainted” every minute, and the hour hand every hour.

The clocks at Schiphol are a hoot

— Matthew Cobb (@matthewcobb.bsky.social) 2026-05-01T07:39:40.753Z

Welcome to Thursday, April 30, 2026, with May nearly upon us.  It’s also National Bugs Bunny Day, celebrating the day the dwatted wabbit made his first appearance in 1938. And here it is, in “Porky’s Hare Hunt.” Bugs first appears 46 second in, as wily as ever.

It’s also Adopt a Shelter Pet Day, National Bubble Tea Day, National Oatmeal Cookie Day (best to abjure these and have chocolate chip cookies), National Raisin Day (one reason oatmeal cookies are lame) and International Jazz Day,  Here’s Coleman Hawkins playing one of my favorites (and his most famous song): “Body and Soul”:

Finally, there’s a Google Doodle today celebrating Route 66: America’s most famous highway (and its remaining attractions), a road that’s largely been replaced and subsumed into other roads: It’s celebrated today because, as Wikipedia says, “The numerical designation 66 was assigned to the Chicago-to-Los Angeles route on April 30, 1926.”

When you click on the screenshot above, it shows the route of that road, which extends from Santa Monica in California to good old Chicago:

Readers are welcome to mark notable events, births, or deaths on this day by consulting the April 30 Wikipedia page.

Da Nooz:

*Trump has told his aides that the U.S. should prepare for a long blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, which of course means a long war.

President Trump has instructed aides to prepare for an extended blockade of Iran, U.S. officials said, targeting the regime’s coffers in a high-risk bid to compel a nuclear capitulation Tehran has long refused.

In recent meetings, including a Monday discussion in the Situation Room, Trump opted to continue squeezing Iran’s economy and oil exports by preventing shipping to and from its ports. He assessed that his other options—resume bombing or walk away from the conflict—carried more risk than maintaining the blockade, officials said.

Yet continuing the blockade also prolongs a conflict that has driven up gas prices, hurt Trump’s poll numbers and further darkened Republicans’ prospects in the midterm elections. It has also caused the lowest number of transits through the Strait of Hormuz since the war began.

Since ending the major bombing campaign in an April 7 cease-fire, Trump has repeatedly walked back from escalating the conflict, opening space for diplomacy after earlier threatening to destroy the entirety of Iranian civilization. But he still wants to tighten the grip on the regime until it caves to his key demand: dismantling all of Iran’s nuclear work. On Monday, Trump told aides that Iran’s three-step offer to reopen the Strait of Hormuz and save nuclear talks for the final phase proved Tehran wasn’t negotiating in good faith, The Wall Street Journal reported.

For now, Trump is comfortable with an indefinite blockade, which he wrote Tuesday on Truth Social is pushing Iran toward a “State of Collapse.” A senior U.S. official said the blockade is demonstrably crushing Iran’s economy—it is straining to store its unsold oil—and sparked fresh outreach by the regime to Washington.

Trump’s decision represents a new phase of sorts of the war and highlights the fact that the president, who always seeks a quick and salable victory, is devoid of a silver bullet.

Unilaterally stopping the fight offers a quick exit to the conflict and relief to the U.S. and global economies. But Iran’s proposal last weekend would have allowed Tehran to set the terms of that off-ramp.

Restarting hostilities, meanwhile, would further weaken a battered Iran, but it would likely react by wreaking more havoc on Gulf energy infrastructure, bolstering the costs of the war. The blockade shrinks the Islamic Republic’s funds but commits U.S. forces to a longer deployment in the Middle East—with no guarantee the regime capitulates.

“Iran is calculating that its ability to withstand and circumvent the blockade outstrips the U.S. interest in preventing a wider energy crisis and potentially a global recession,” said Suzanne Maloney, an Iran expert and vice president of the Brookings Institution’s foreign policy program. “A regime that slaughtered its own citizens to silence protests in January is fully prepared to impose economic hardships on them now.”

Iran is making that calculation, but it’s risking political suicide in the hopes that the Hormuz blockage will wreak havoc on the entire world.  This, however, is probably the savviest move that Trump can make, and there’s always a chance—albeit a small one—that a population forced to suffer economic hardship on top of political oppression could revolt.  But as we know, the theocracy could give a rat’s patootie about the well-being of the Iranian people.

*It’s Noon in Israel explains the significance of the UAE’s withdrawal from OPEC.

It’s Wednesday, April 29, and the United Arab Emirates has announced its departure from the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC). As the group’s third-largest producer, the move is monumental. By way of comparison, it is akin to a permanent member of the Security Council leaving the United Nations—except, of course, the world actually cares about what OPEC has to say.

. . .So, why now?

Well, the oil market is vastly different from that of the 1970s. The first blow to the OPEC monopoly was that the U.S. now ranks among the world’s top three exporters of crude following the shale revolution in the 2010s. The U.S.’s impending control over the reserves of one of OPEC’s founding members, Venezuela, is another, and Operation Roaring Lion is the third. During the recent conflict, production policy was coordinated through OPEC, but in some ways it was every oil nation for itself: the Saudis had their contingency for bypassing the Strait of Hormuz, and the UAE had its own.

The exit also resolves a long-standing tension between the UAE’s rapidly expanding production capacity—which targeted 5 million barrels per day by 2027—and restrictive cartel quotas that forced the nation to operate roughly 30 percent below its capability. This is reflective of a fundamental difference in interests: Saudi Arabia requires crude prices near $80 per barrel to balance its national budget and fund Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s ambitious plans for the country.

Conversely, the UAE possesses a vastly more diversified economy and massive sovereign wealth funds. The UAE’s overall economic health is tied more closely to global macroeconomic growth than to the nominal price of a barrel of oil. By exiting OPEC and actively increasing global supply to lower energy costs, the UAE can deliberately stimulate the global economy, curb Western inflation and thereby bolster the returns of its own massive international investment portfolios.

Perhaps most interestingly, the withdrawal signals a deepening geopolitical rift with Saudi Arabia. Though the two nations have long clashed through proxies in Yemen and Sudan, the UAE is now charting a more permanent, independent course—one that hugs the U.S. and Israeli coasts rather than being bound to the Saudi winds. This isn’t just speculation; MBZ’s top adviser, often considered his mouthpiece, has grown increasingly vocal about his disappointment with the Arab League and the Gulf Cooperation Council. But even when the relationship isn’t overtly adversarial, the UAE is clearly finished with regional conformity.

Well, this answers the questions I had yesterday about the significance of the UAE’s withdrawal.  As for the price at the pump, it portends a decline, which is not that important to me but may well be to truckers and some impecunious consumers.

*This is ridiculous: for the second time, a federal grand jury has laid charges against former FBI director James Comey (bitter enemies with Trump)—this time over an arrangement of seashells on a North Carolina beach! Here’s the photo as posted by Comey (via Jim Acosta on X):

Excerpts:

James B. Comey, the former F.B.I. director, was indicted on Tuesday over a social media post, signaling a renewed effort by the Justice Department to pursue charges against him after its bid last year ended in failure.

A federal grand jury in North Carolina charged Mr. Comey with making a threat against the president and transmitting a threat across state lines, according to court records.

The case, which centers on an image of seashells that Mr. Comey posted on Instagram, is the latest salvo in the department’s tortured efforts to satisfy the demands of President Trump to go after longtime targets of his wrath. Under the acting attorney general, Todd Blanche, the department has sought to accelerate Mr. Trump’s retribution campaign after the president fired Attorney General Pam Bondi, in part, over his dissatisfaction with her effectiveness in bringing cases against his perceived enemies.

Mr. Comey vowed to fight the case.

“I’m still innocent, I’m still not afraid and I still believe in the independent federal judiciary, so let’s go,” he said in a video statement posted online. Mr. Comey urged Americans to “keep the faith.”

. . .The new Comey charge stems from an incident nearly a year ago, when the former F.B.I. director, vacationing on the North Carolina coast, posted a photograph on social media showing seashells arranged to say “86 47,” combining the slang term “86,” often used to mean dismiss or remove, with an apparent reference to Mr. Trump, the country’s 47th president.

After an uproar ensued over the post, Mr. Comey deleted it, saying that he did not know that it could be seen as having a violent connotation and that he opposed violence of any kind.

Members of the administration, as well as Mr. Trump’s family, declared that the meaning of “86” was to kill, and that the seashell message amounted to a threat to assassinate the president.

According to court records, the case was assigned to Judge Louise W. Flanagan of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of North Carolina, an appointee of President George W. Bush whose courthouse is in New Bern, N.C.

I simply can’t believe that Comey meant “kill Trump” when he used “8647”.  It’s much more likely that he was simply calling for the removal of the President, or simply dissing him rather then asking someone to assassinate him.  (Some people think Comey was threatening to kill Trump by himself.)  And to make a federal court case out of all this. .  well, it’s ludicrous and a waste of time and money.

*The Supreme Court voted, with the usual 6-3 conservative/liberal split, to prevent Congressional redistricting along racial lines. According to the Wall Street Journal, this lessens “protections for minority voters”:

The Supreme Court on Wednesday sharply restricted states from using race to draw voting districts that help minority communities elect their preferred candidates.

The 6-3 decision, which divided the court along ideological lines, further weakens the Voting Rights Act and could prompt some states to attempt to quickly redraw their congressional maps before this year’s midterm elections, potentially eliminating safe Democratic congressional seats and converting them into districts that lean Republican.

“Allowing race to play any part in government decisionmaking represents a departure from the constitutional rule that applies in almost every other context,” Justice Samuel Alito wrote in the majority opinion.

The case involved the congressional map in Louisiana, which has six seats in the U.S. House of Representatives. The state, prodded by rulings from federal courts, drew two of those six districts to have a majority of Black voters. Voting-rights activists said the majority-Black districts were necessary for the state to comply with the Voting Rights Act, the landmark 1965 law that prohibits racially discriminatory election rules.

But a group of self-described “non-African American” voters sued to challenge the state’s map as an unconstitutional racial gerrymander. They argued that considering race in drawing district lines—even if only to comply with the traditional understanding of the Voting Rights Act—violated the 14th Amendment’s prohibition on race-based discrimination.

Alito and the other conservative justices agreed. In doing so, they adopted a narrow interpretation of the central provision of the Voting Rights Act, known as Section 2.

Section 2, Alito wrote, applies only to state redistricting practices that “intentionally” discriminate against voters on the basis of race. It doesn’t prevent states from pursuing a “partisan advantage” in ways that may also reduce the voting power of large and geographically compact minority communities, he wrote.

What the disadvantage to blacks seems to be is that, by lumping them together with whites, it reduces their power as a group to vote for candidates more suitable to their ethnicity (this would be Representatives, of course, since we’re talking about federal law here). Apparently it’s okay to draw lines that favor parties, but not races. Since the two are somewhat correlated, the Court is drawing a fine line here, and I’m not quite sure why one is okay and the other not.  Lines should, in my view, be drawn just to contain equal numbers of people in each district, and that has been shown to be possible without gerrymandering.

*Trump’s megalomania, which compels him to slap his name or visage on everything, has now gotten his scowling mug on the inside of some (but not all) U.S. passports.

President Trump’s signature is set to be added to U.S. dollars. His name has been affixed to the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. A plan to mint a 24-karat gold coin with his image is moving forward.

Now there are plans to release a limited-edition U.S. passport bearing the president’s likeness.

The State Department revealed the plans on Tuesday, saying that the new passports would be made available in commemoration of the country’s 250th anniversary this summer. A “limited number of specially designed” passports will be released, according to Tommy Piggott, a spokesman for the State Department. They will be available for any American citizen who applies for one at the Washington Passport Agency when the rollout happens and will continue for as long as inventory lasts, the department said.

Pictures of the proposed design, which Mr. Piggott said will feature “customized artwork and enhanced imagery,” show a serious-looking Mr. Trump above his signature in gold ink.

There will be no additional cost for the Trump-themed passports, the State Department said. It is unclear how many will be produced.

News of the passports was earlier reported by The Bulwark and Fox News.

The passport redesign is the latest example of the president or his allies pushing to put his name, image or signature on institutions in Washington and across the country. This year’s National Parks passes display his face alongside George Washington’s, and some of his administration’s initiatives, such as Trump savings accounts for children and TrumpRx, where Americans can buy prescription drugs directly, are named after him.

Here’s the new passport. It seems that Trump actually likes pictures of himsef scowling; perhaps it projects an image of determination and authority. All I know is that I’m glad my passport doesn’t expire until 2034.

Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Andrzej and Hili commiserate again:

Hili: Sometimes I have doubts.
Andrzej: It happens to me too.

In Polish:

Hili: Czasem mam wątpliwości.
Ja: Mnie się też to zdarza.

*******************

From Stacy; now why would anyone want to setal that sign? (I know, so you needn’t answer.)

From Things With Faces; a happy beam:

From Funny and Strange Signs:

From Masih; another peaceful Iranian protestor sentenced to death.  Somehow Trump has managed to leave such people out of his rationale for war, though he mentioned them in his initial announcement:

Iran’s Regime Sentences 21-Year-Old Karate Champion to Death for Protesting، Execution Imminent!

So let me get this straight;
Sasan Azadvar goes to a protest… and the regime’s response is not a debate, not reform, but a rope?

He isn’t a criminal. He’s a kid with medals, a… pic.twitter.com/L2Feijr9Md

— Masih Alinejad 🏳️ (@AlinejadMasih) April 29, 2026

From Luana; a bit of protest brewing on my campus. For some reason the size of the “demonstration” is miniscule:

The University of Chicago’s “Popular University” may not have many participants, but its rhetoric is hard to miss.

“Bring 🔻 the Intifada Home” is an obvious riff on the Weather Underground’s “Bring the War Home.” pic.twitter.com/icqDtySP9r

— Stu Smith (@thestustustudio) April 28, 2026

Emma answers a conundrum by saying that she’d sacrifice herself:

Different question that requires over 50% of people to voluntarily self-sacrifice for anyone to survive.

I switch to red – no dependents, not gonna repopulate the world, not about to cure cancer.

This iteration would solve the pension crisis 😉 https://t.co/KBNBJxCyih

— Emma Hilton (@FondOfBeetles) April 29, 2026

The #10 Cat stands up for Jews—sadly, in the face of a new anti-Jewish crime, which is being treated as an act of terrorism.

Attacks on Jewish people on the streets of Britain are attacks on us all. I am so incredibly sorry that these disgusting and horrifying things are happening. https://t.co/b2PJkQtXRN

— Larry the Cat (@Number10cat) April 29, 2026

This seems to be real, not AI, despite an objection on “Community Notes”. But of course one can never tell (Grok says it’s real):

The laws of physics don’t apply to mountain goats. 🐐 pic.twitter.com/8j6FCUs9yX

— Earth_Wanderer (@earth_tracker) April 28, 2026

One I reposted from The Auschwitz Memorial: I didn’t know they had a free monthly online magazine, but it looks, well, very instructional. I read “Children of Block 10” in the issue highlighted below:=

A new edition of “Memoria” – the online monthly magazine of the Auschwitz Memorial.

📖 It is available to read online or download as a PDF:https://t.co/2XRv6mAc22

Inside:
🔹 Nazi Party Membership Files Online
🔹 Children from Block 10
🔹 Auschwitz Museum acquires the original… pic.twitter.com/KiVPkyGaPb

— Auschwitz Memorial (@AuschwitzMuseum) April 30, 2026

Two from Dr. Cobb, heading back to the UK from Chile. First, a painting by Jacob DUCK, a Dutch painter:

Dividing up the spoils of war: Some soldiers. And their dogs. By Jacob Duck, whose day is today.

— Dr. Peter Paul Rubens (@peterpaulrubens.bsky.social) 2026-04-27T16:06:02.652Z

A crab feast:

Not sure what this crab 🦀🦑 is eating, but she's going to town on it. #crustaceans #nature #smallwonders #Maui #marinelife #nokings #love #eat

— Menestune (@menestune.bsky.social) 2026-04-22T06:33:33.194Z