PEAK SHARING: For Some Strange Reason, an Umbrella-Sharing Service Isn’t Working Out.

WHO’S COLLUDING WITH WHOM? The narrative of the meeting with Donald Trump Jr. and the “Russian Lawyer” doesn’t pass the smell test.

NO FREE PARKING: Searching for Parking Costs Americans $73 Billion a Year.

INRIX today published a major new study combining data from the INRIX Parking database of 100,000 locations across 8,700 cities in more than 100 countries, with results from a recent survey of nearly 18,000 drivers in the U.S., U.K. and Germany, including close to 6,000 across 10 U.S. cities. With the goal of analyzing and ranking the economic costs of “parking pain” in these markets, INRIX research found that, on average, U.S. drivers spend 17 hours per year searching for parking at a cost of $345 per driver in wasted time, fuel and emissions.

INRIX analyzed the parking market in 10 of the U.S.’s largest cities, and revealed that New York drivers endure the worst challenges. On average, drivers in the Big Apple spend 107 hours per year searching for a parking spot at a cost $2,243 per driver in wasted time, fuel and emissions, amounting to $4.3 billion in costs to the city as a whole.

A Federal “parking tax” levied on automobiles in our most congested cities, with rapidly escalating fees based on a vehicle’s size and price, and with revenues devoted to carbon reduction, ought to alleviate the problem.

Glenn hasn’t had any luck getting wealthy coastal residents to pay their fair share towards saving the environment, but given the vitriol progressives direct at car owners, perhaps this proposal will gain more traction.

JONAH GOLDBERG ON THE UGLY ENVIRONMENTALIST:

The environment editor for the left-wing British newspaper the Guardian, Damian Carrington, recently wrote a piece fretting about how having kids doesn’t help fight climate change. Jill Filipovic, a feminist writer, endorsed the article. “Having children is one of the worst things you can do for the planet,” she wrote on Twitter. “Have one less and conserve resources.”

I found this interestingly dumb. Filipovic is precisely one of those writers you’d expect to go ballistic if some conservative Christian opined about the reproductive choices women should make. But if it’s in the name of the environment? Let’s wag those fingers, everybody!

I believe, along with the late economist Julian Simon, that humans are the ultimate resource. We solve problems, and I think we’ll solve climate change too.

But if you really want to yoke your reproductive choices to the issue of climate change (a bizarre desire if you ask me), maybe you should have as many kids as possible and educate them in science and engineering so they can come up with a solution.

It’s fascinating watching the Malthusian enviro-left return to the original stance of “Progressivism,” and shout “Eugenics now, eugenics tomorrow, eugenics forever!” to paraphrase George Wallace 1963 inaugural address as the Democrat Governor of Alabama — but then, increasingly, the left believes in Wallace’s original message as well.

Related: Somewhere, Henry Luce, the son of Christian missionaries, weeps at the feeble current incarnation of Time magazine. The remains of the magazine he founded seems awfully upset that pressure from the right (read: the Wrong People) has put sufficient pressure on a British judge to allow a US specialist to examine Charlie Gard.

Yes, you read the last half of that sentence correctly. As Ed Morrissey notes, “Remember well that had this court and the Great Ormond Street Hospital gotten its way, this would have been an autopsy rather than an examination.”

But Sarah Palin was the dummy for suggesting that sooner or later, socialized medicine invariably leads to death panels.

SARAH HOYT: When I Think Back On All the Cr*p I Learned In High School…

DISPATCHES FROM THE INTERSECTION OF THE EDUCATION APOCALYPSE AND DAVID BROOKS’ SANDWICH SHOP. In “The language of privilege,” Robert Pondiscio of the Fordham Institute writes, “We are ruining America, notes dour New York Times columnist David Brooks, suddenly and considerably alarmed by a standard feature of American life, if not human nature—the tendency of the privileged and powerful to guard jealously every advantage they have been handed or earned:”

To be highly proficient in Brooksian English—the language of privilege—requires mastery over not just an alphabet and rules of grammar, but also an enormous range of assumed knowledge, historical references, and cultural allusions that are commonly held by members of a speech community. “My kids know how to be Black,” one parent tells Delpit. “You all teach them how to be successful in the white man’s world.”

American education remains deeply reluctant to do this, since it requires overthrowing any number of traditions and practices—from child-centered pedagogies, assumptions about student engagement, and other progressive education ideals, to local control of curriculum, the privileging of skills over content, and the movement toward mass customization of education. Each of these in ways great or small work against the cause of language proficiency; in doing so, they make the task of educating for upward mobility more difficult.

Make yourself a soppressata, capicollo and prosciutto sandwich on a striata baguette and read the whole thing.

ATTEMPT NO LANDINGS THERE: Shifting ice on Jupiter’s moon could probe its interior.

Tremors on Earth have helped scientists probe the interior of the planet, and shakeups on icy moons could do the same. By simulating icequakes on Jupiter’s icy moons Europa, Callisto, and Ganymede, as well as Saturn’s frozen satellite Enceladus, researchers have concluded that each world would have its own unique sound signature. Including an instrument to track the trembling crust on each world on future missions could reveal insights about the habitability of the icy layers beneath the surface.

“It’s doubtful that it’s completely quiet on Europa,” said Steve Vance, a geophysicist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Vance presented the results of how seismic investigations can shed light on the interior of icy worlds at the Astrobiology Science Conference in Mesa, Arizona, in April.

A global ocean is thought to lie beneath Europa’s icy crust. As Jupiter tugs on the moon with its enormous mass, it pulls and stretches the world enough to melt the ice that would otherwise remain solid.

Many of us have been waiting to see under Europa’s crust for 35 years already.

MINIVAN SURROGATES: 2017 Dodge Durango vs. 2017 GMC Acadia, 2017 Honda Pilot, 2017 Mazda CX-9, 2018 Volkswagen Atlas.

AT AMAZON, deals galore in Office Products.

Plus, save in Home Brewing and Wine Making.

GET READY FOR BAD NEWS: North Korea may have more reprocessed plutonium on hand than previous estimates. That means Kim Jong Un can make more nuclear bombs.

38 North produced the detailed analysis on which the Reuters report is based.

DEFINITELY RELATED: My NY Observer essay sketching six policy options for stopping Pyongyang.

ALSO RELATED: U.S. House moves to bar Pentagon contracts with telecommunications firms knowingly supporting North Korean cyber-attacks.

The DNI will provide a list of these firms. You have to wonder why this list isn’t already available.

TRAGEDY OF THE COMMONS: Self-driving Taxis Will Become the Most Disgusting Spaces on Earth.

ANDREW KLAVAN CAN SEE THE LEFT’S TRUMP-RUSSIA NARRATIVE FROM HIS HOUSE: Where There’s Smoke, There’s Leftism.

SPACE: John Becknell, designer of the Nuclear Thermal Turbo Rocket, is answering questions.

YOU FIRST: The Four Most Effective Things You Can Do About Climate Change, According To Science.

Don’t bother clicking. The four things are what you’d expect from people happy to have everyone else reduced to a pre-modern existence: “Do Not Have That Child,” “Live Car-Free,” “Skip That Flight,” “Eat a Plant-Based Diet.”

Steak, I’d just add, is entirely plant-based.

CHINESE BOMBERS PROBE JAPANESE RESPONSES:

China urged calm after Japan scrambled fighter jets in response to the flight of six Chinese strategic bombers over the area between Okinawa and the Miyako Islands.

The flight of the twin-engine Xian H-6 bomber, built for the People’s Liberation Army Air Force, took place on Thursday.

The Chinese government called it a “regular” exercise. Japan said six Chinese bombers were involved. Japan also reported the Chinese aircraft did not violate Japanese airspace.

RELATED: Japanese F-15J Eagle fighters training with USN EA-18G Growlers. I don’t know that F-15Js scrambled to meet the Chinese bombers but the Japan Air Self-Defense Force (JASDF) deploys the F-15J as an all-weather air superiority fighter.

WHEN EVERYBODY’S DIRTY, IT’S HARD TO MAKE THE MUD STICK: Spare me your Donald Jr. indignation. “To be clear, none of this is okay. This isn’t an effort to justify Donald Jr.’s decisions. But politics is a dirty industry. Many of the people criticizing him have spent plenty of time playing in the mud. They could at least wipe themselves off before handing down hypocritical moral judgments on others.”

Given that we have the worst political class in our history, yelling “Trump is not normal!” doesn’t persuade. Given that our political class is also deeply corrupt and incompetent, calling Trump corrupt and incompetent doesn’t carry a lot of weight either. Given how many of them — *cough*Hillary*cough* — are on the take from foreign countries, the Russian thing seems like weak sauce. And given that everyone was hopped up to destroy him on any possible grounds as soon as their post-election hangovers started to recede, it’s easy to doubt the sincerity of Trump’s critics.

PROCUREMENT: France and Germany to develop new European fighter jet.

“Today there are too many European standards and qualifications and sometimes there is competition among Europeans internationally,” French President Emmanuel Macron told a news conference, flanked by German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

“I can confirm this is a deep revolution but we are not afraid when they are carried out peacefully, in a structured way and over time,” Macron said.

France and Germany said their new combat system, which analysts say could involve a mixture of manned and unmanned aircraft, would replace the Rafale and Eurofighter, rival jets that compete fiercely for global sales.

That would mark the end of a decades-long split since France withdrew from the Eurofighter project in the 1980s to produce its Rafale warplane with Dassault Aviation.

Defense industry experts called the move a setback to Britain and its leading arms contractor, BAE Systems.

“It is a sign to the British. It means ‘you are leaving the EU and we are driving forward. We are no longer interested in you blocking the EU on defense’,” a senior German defense industry official told Reuters.

Anti-British nastiness aside, presumably the new jet will be stealthy — and it’s also a safe bet that Europe won’t buy nearly enough of them.

WHY ISN’T THE E.P.A. DOING ANYTHING ABOUT THIS? Transgender Fish Are A Result Of Women Flushing Their Birth Control Down Toilets. “What makes it even scarier, especially for me (a hardcore pescatarian), is that people may be eating these things, causing the contraceptive hormones to be passed along. . . . Aside from just being strange, this could greatly affect the fish population as the sperm quality is plummeting. Another issue is that their behavior is less aggressive and competitive than usual, which may lower their chances of breeding successfully.”

BUT OF COURSE: Vulnerable Dem. Senator Profits From the Very Outsourcing He Condemned.

If it weren’t for projection, they’d have nothing left but lies and hate.

AT AMAZON, Summer Deals on Levi’s.

GOOD MONEY AFTER BAD: Department of Energy Invests Additional $46M in Struggling Solar Energy Sector.

When it comes to solar power, the forecast seems only partially sunny. The industry has long benefitted from federal subsidies, but the future of these programs is uncertain. On Wednesday, the Department of Energy announced that it was investing $46.2 million in 48 solar energy projects as part of its SunShot Initiative. The timing of the investment is somewhat unusual, though, since the industry has struggled in recent years. Investor interest in solar energy companies has been declining for several years, the result of a slew of major bankruptcies and overall difficulty bringing the technology successfully to market.

“The SunShot Initiative is a proven driver of solar energy innovation,” SunShot Initiative Director Charlie Gay said. “These projects ensure there’s a pipeline of knowledge, human resources, transformative technology solutions, and research to support the industry.”

That’s not an investment; it’s a subsidy.

FASTER, PLEASE: Why CAR T-cell immunotherapy is such a big deal for cancer treatment.

HMM: US retail sales fall for a 2nd month as consumers pull back.

Retail sales fell 0.2 percent after declining 0.1 percent in May, the Commerce Department said Friday. Spending at retailers has grown 2.8 percent over the past 12 months, a relatively modest pace given that the sales figures aren’t adjusted for inflation.

The decline reflects in part a transformative shift by consumers toward Amazon and other online retailers. Sales at department stores, once the anchors of shopping malls and the pride of local communities, have steadily dwindled. Even former sources of strength in retail, like restaurants and auto dealers, have faced weakening sales.

The spending figures are closely watched because consumers account for roughly 70 percent of U.S. economic activity. If their spending slows, it can drag down growth across the broader economy.

The U.S. economy has expanded at a tepid annual pace of roughly 2 percent since the Great Recession ended eight years ago.

A “big, big tax cut” sure would be nice about now.

21ST CENTURY RELATIONSHIPS: After Months of Dating, Girl’s Boyfriend Reveals to Her That He’s Addicted to Being A Furry.