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.”

RAVING AND DROOLING: Will Former Pink Floyd Bassist Roger Waters Be Arrested In Germany For Illegal Nazi Style Costume?

According to the BBC, he might have gone too far this time. You see, wearing a Nazi uniform or displaying Nazi flags and other symbols in Germany can get you tossed into the poky) but at a recent concert in Germany, he wore what seemed to be an SS uniform.

Performing at Berlin’s Mercedes-Benz Arena on May 17, Mr. Waters was seen wearing a long black overcoat with a red armband.

He also aimed an imitation machine gun into the audience.

(…)”We are investigating on suspicion of incitement to public hatred because the clothing worn on stage could be used to glorify or justify Nazi rule, thereby disturbing the public peace,” said police spokesman Martin Halweg.
“The clothing resembles the clothing of an SS officer,” he added.

Waters probably won’t be arrested — and he’s no doubt absolutely loving the additional publicity.

THERE ARE LEFTIES WHO THINK, THEY’RE JUST NOT EMPLOYED IN THE MSM: Left-wing Breakfast Club slams Dems over DeSantis Twitter launch criticism.

Even The Breakfast Club, which is very left wing, recognizes the genius in DeSantis doing the Twitter Space and how much more effective he is than Trump.

Ignore the Twitter noise. This is the type of talk that hits with average voters. #DeSantis2024 pic.twitter.com/DLCJgh543H

— Free (@KaladinFree) May 25, 2023

The notion that being popular enough to overload the servers and raise record money is somehow a failure seems odd to me.

JONATHAN TURLEY: “I Don’t Want to Do Any of This:” IRS Whistleblower Defies the Biden Administration and the Media.

The media have worked hard to minimize the blowback after acknowledging the laptop’s authenticity and the growing evidence of millions in influence-peddling.

Part of this effort at “scandal implosion” has been to dismiss any criminal charges as relatively minor tax violations unconnected to the president.

Indeed, when the president recently agreed to a rare sit-down interview, the White House chose MSNBC’s Stephanie Ruhle.

Before asking about his son Hunter’s scandal, Ruhle emphasized it was “something personal” with “no ties to you.”

Many of us guffawed at the claim given multiple references on the laptop to President Biden, including possibly sharing in the proceeds from influence-peddling with foreign governments.

The problem is [14-year IRS veteran Gary Shapley] suggests some uncomfortable questions on how Biden’s administration may have worked to minimize charges against his son and, according to Shapley, “slow-walked” the investigation.

His interview explains why the Justice Department can indict figures like Rep. George Santos (R-NY) on a variety of fraud and money-laundering charges in a few months while spending years investigating Hunter Biden with no conclusion.

Shapley made clear he had never seen this level of interference in his long service at the IRS and said it was done “at the direction of the Department of Justice.”

And he said the interference began as soon as he “took control of this particular investigation”: “I immediately saw deviations from the normal process. It was way outside the norm of what I’ve experienced in the past.”

Shapley did not rush forward or leak to the media.

Rather, after watching decision after decision made to benefit Biden, Shapley reached a breaking point in what he called his “red-line meeting” when he and his team were removed from investigating the president’s son.

Read the whole thing.

THERE’S A REASON IT’S CALLED A DERANGEMENT SYNDROME: Trump gets blame for what the left is doing. . . in France.

From the comments: “Trump always gets the blame for what the left does. ‘See what you made me do?!’ They cry the cry of abusers everywhere.”

Macron is right about “decivilization” throughout the West at the hands of the left, though, and it’s amusing that the only response is that it’s a term originally employed by the right. Well, yes, the right noticed it first. But you wouldn’t listen then, would you, pundits?

SHOCKING NEWS FROM THE WORLD OF SCIENCE:

Left-wing extremism linked to psychopathy and narcissism: study https://t.co/vzooJLocaC pic.twitter.com/546NsVeXKd

— New York Post (@nypost) May 25, 2023

FROM HOLLY CHISM: The Schrödinger Paradox: Heisenberg’s Point of Observation.

To save the future, sometimes you have to reach to the past.
Thomas Sutton was not your average fourteen year old, not even in an Ark City. Born in one of the three refuges of the last remnants of life on earth, deep underground, he knows his history. A century after an asteroid shattered and struck the earth, they have been trapped below by volcanic eruptions, toxic gasses, and radioactive dust. But what if he could…change things? What if he could reach the past, to prevent the asteroid’s impact?

THINGS I NEVER EVEN THOUGHT ABOUT BEFORE:  How 500 horses get to Mackinac Island each spring.

SHUDDUP, THE SCIENCE IS SETTLED:  Betelgeuse continues to fluctuate in unexpected ways.

THEY CAN’T BE ANY MORE DIRE THAN NORMAL PUBLIC EDUCATION:  As parents and students continue to flee public education the consequences are both good and dire.

THEY THINK THE OLD TWITTER IS THE COUNTRY:  Wherefore woke corporations?