OPEN THREAD: You waited for it, and here it is.

THE NEW SPACE RACE: China’s mysterious space plane released an unidentified ‘object’ in orbit, US intelligence reveals.

WE SHOULD BE PRODUCING RESISTANT STRAINS, AND BETTER FUNGICIDES: Fungal Infections Could Obliterate Our Food Supply, Scientists Warn. “Humans have invited this crisis in other ways, too, the researchers write, like establishing vast monocultures of genetically similar crops, which are especially susceptible to fungal outbreaks.”

Monocultures are a problem in all sorts of settings.

SHORTCUTS MAKE LONG DELAYS: A Lawyer’s Filing “Is Replete with Citations to Non-Existent Cases”—Thanks, ChatGPT? “The lawyer’s colleague, who drafted the filing, says he relied on ChatGPT to draft the filing and provide the text of the cases, and neglected to check them.”

HISTORY OF THE AMERICANS: Sidebar: “The Soldier’s Faith,” a Memorial Day Speech.

On May 30 – Memorial Day — 1895, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., a Harvard man and then a justice on the Supreme Court of Massachusetts, delivered an address to the graduating class of 1895 in Cambridge. The speech, known as “The Soldier’s Faith,” is in and of itself fascinating substantively and also for its indirect effects. Regarding those, Theodore Roosevelt, another Harvard man, read the speech some seven years later and determined to appoint Holmes to the Supreme Court on account of it.

Beyond that, the speech is incredibly prescient, in certain respects, and eloquent, even poetic, on the question of personal courage and purpose to a degree that will seem alien to most Americans today, at least those of us who have never served.

I’m not at all convinced that Holmes took the right lessons from his service, but read (and listen to) the whole thing.

JULIETTE OCHIENG: Instinct: “I screw, therefore I am.”

I SAW ONE OF THESE IN THE WILD FOR THE FIRST TIME THE OTHER DAY: 2023 Lexus RX500h F Sport Performance First Test: This sporty hybrid SUV brings enjoyment to daily driving.

I had its predecessor, the RX450h — though not the “F Sport” version — and liked it a lot.

READER FAVORITE: DEWALT 20V Max Cordless Drill. #CommissionEarned

OUT: FLORIDA MAN. IN: MAINE WOMAN. Maine woman takes raccoon into Petco for nail trim, possibly exposing people to rabies. The reaction seems a bit overwrought, since there’s no actual reason to think the animal was rabid.

COVID IS OVER (CONT’D): COVID hospitalizations reach new record low nationwide, CDC says.

IT WAS THE ONLY BIT OF THE ONCE-AMBITIOUS APOLLO APPLICATIONS PROGRAM TO BE IMPLEMENTED: 50 years later, Skylab remembered as major force in space exploration.

PROFESSIONAL ETHICS CAN’T GET IN THE WAY OF POLITICAL POINT-SCORING: Ind. abortion doctor violated privacy laws in revealing girl’s rape, board rules. “An Indianapolis doctor who provided an abortion to a 10-year-old rape victim violated privacy laws when she spoke to a newspaper about the case, the Indiana Medical Licensing Board concluded. The seven-member board, which is appointed by the governor, imposed a $3,000 fine and a letter of reprimand Thursday on Dr. Caitlin Bernard. The panel cleared her on the more serious charge of failing to report abuse of the girl in a timely manner, meaning she will keep her medical license. . . . The girl’s case made national headlines and ignited a political firestorm following the June 24 Supreme Court ruling that overturned the landmark abortion decision in Roe vs. Wade.”

Sounds as if she got off light.

THOUGHTS ON LYING FOR MONEY.

LIGHTNING DEAL: CAR GUYS Super Cleaner. #CommissionEarned

GOODER AND HARDER, SAN FRAN: Old Navy store in downtown San Francisco set to close, following other retailers.

GET WOKE, GO BROKE: Bud Light, Target Bleeding Money As Conservatives Boycott. The Dollar Amount Is Staggering.

THE POWER LINE WEEK IN PICTURES: Senile Liberalism Edition.

ANNALS OF LEFTIST AUTOPHAGY: The left is doing to CNN what the right is doing to Bud Light.

A SMALL VICTORY: Arizona drops charges against ASU student arrested for handing out Constitution. “All witnesses who testified to Tizon’s actions confirmed that the table did not block pedestrians nor interfere with other groups, his attorneys had argued, adding university officials disregarded their own policy, unlawfully restricting Tizon’s freedom of expression.”

Now punish the people responsible.

FEDS CHARGE CLIMATE PROTESTERS FOR ALLEGEDLY DEFACING EDGAR DEGAS EXHIBIT AT NATIONAL GALLERY OF ART: “If convicted, Martin and Smith face up to five years in prison and a fine of up to $250,000.”

HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: Speculation about the tuition bubble is not new, but years of warnings are not deterring universities from jacking up costs to fund a bloating bureaucracy of administrators and non-academic services.

THE MAN THE MYTH, THE LEGEND: Report: Fired Biden energy official Sam Brinton led D.C.’s Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence.

Sam Brinton, according to a report Thursday on Fox News, had been the leader of the Washington D.C. chapter of the group of drag-queen “nuns” known for ribald and blasphemous humor.

Citing “tax filings reviewed by Fox News Digital,” the network reported that Brinton was the D.C. Sisters’ principal officer and went by the nuclear-punning name Sister Ray Dee O’Active.

Both Brinton and the San Francisco-based “nun” group have been in the headlines recently.

Brinton was arrested as a fugitive from justice in Maryland earlier this month in the third of three airport-luggage thefts after having entered pleas that avoided jail time in two other thefts in Minneapolis and Las Vegas.

The Sisters were invited, then uninvited, then reinvented by the Los Angeles Dodgers to the team’s June 16 Pride Night, the flip-flopping resulting from first pressure from Catholics and then pushback from LGBTQ advocacy groups. The “nuns” regularly mock Christianity and the church by, for example, pole-dancing around a cross.

As head of the D.C. Sisters, according to Fox News, Brinton regularly led group events including “bar ministry” gatherings, drag brunches, White House protests and at least one “high heel race.”

Blair’s Law in action: “Coined by Australian journalist, Tim Blair as ‘the ongoing process by which the world’s multiple idiocies are becoming one giant, useless force.’”

WELL, THAT SHOULD BOOST THEIR STOCK PRICE: Target Donates To Group That Promotes Secret Child Gender Transitions, LGBTQ Books In Schools.

NEO: Wherefore woke corporations?

The right has a saying: “Get woke, go broke.” It’s not always true, but it does seem as though it is sometimes the case that taking a woke leftist stance hurts the bottom line. Just ask Budweiser or Disney. And yet it’s seemingly done all the time.

It certainly didn’t used to be that way – that is, companies were far more rigorous in enforcing a “no-politics or alignment with causes” stance (see this). What changed? On the surface, it would seem to make no sense, but there are a host of reasons for it that probably would take a book to explain (and there may be a book someone has already written, and that someone isn’t me).

In 2015, Ashe Schow, then with the Washington Examiner wrote, “With all the attention being paid to college-aged social justice warriors and microagressions, one has to ask: What happens when all these delicate snowflakes enter the workforce?”

Target, Bud, Disney, and the L.A. Dodgers are finding out good and hard — just as the New York Times’ newsroom did in 2020.

EVERYONE HATES THEM: The QR-Code Menu Is Being Shown the Door: A dining innovation that once looked like the future has worn out its welcome with many restaurateurs, customers and servers who say it takes the joy out of dining. Plus, the real downside: “It’s very hard to order a $70 steak off a QR code — or a $200 bottle of wine. It just doesn’t feel right.”