A SWEET STORY: Elon Musk fulfills teen’s last wish in touching X post after she was too weak to take his call.

ALITO NOT RETIRING:

The fact that you who are reading this care as much as you do about prospective SCOTUS vacancies is an indictment of how far afield our Constitutional system has strayed.  There was a time when the Republic did not wait with bated breath every summer to learn whether a justice… pic.twitter.com/A3OUe8ZT8B

— Margot Cleveland (@ProfMJCleveland) April 18, 2026

She’s right, But this still makes a win in the midterms more important than ever.

OPEN THREAD: Ring out the weekend.

WELL, GOOD: Artemis 2’s heat shield seems to have aced its trial by fire. The matter was not free from doubt.

LIFE DOESN’T ALWAYS HAVE TO BE EXCITING: Getting Stuck in a ‘Boring’ Conversation Could Have a Surprising Benefit.

ARTICLE III CONTINUES ITS SWAN SONG: “Unserious Leaders Are Unsafe,” Opines a Federal Judge About RFK, Jr. ‘That’s the opening line from yesterday’s Oregon v. Kennedy, by Judge Mustafa Kasubhai (D. Or.) (the only federal judge I’ve seen who includes pronouns.)”

Plus: “My tentative sense is that, whatever one might personally think about Kennedy’s seriousness, judges’ decisions are more credible when those decisions focus solely on the law, rather than deciding which of our leaders are serious.”

It’s theater kids all the way down.

METFORMIN UPDATE: After 60 Years, Scientists Uncover Unexpected Brain Effects of Popular Diabetes Drug Metformin.

LIFTING WEIGHTS CAN HELP: Osteopenia: Loss of bone mineral density affects millions of people. Here’s what you need to know.

NOW THIS IS THE 21ST CENTURY I WAS PROMISED: GM Uses AI to Turn Hand Sketches Into Car Designs in Minutes Instead of Months: GM’s car designers are using AI to help them accelerate new car designs and visions.

STANDING UP FOR CIVIL RIGHTS: The DOJ Has Warned Virginia About Its Anti-Gun Jihad.

OOPS: AST Spacemobile BlueBird 7 Satellite Lost. “ASTS admits the satellite is too low and cannot be saved. Based on what the orbit appears to be. 20kg of fuel they can only raise it part of the way. During the New Glenn 3 mission, BlueBird 7 was placed into a lower than planned orbit by the upper stage of the launch vehicle. While the satellite separated from the launch vehicle and powered on, the altitude is too low to sustain operations with its on-board thruster technology and will de-orbited. The cost of the satellite is expected to be recovered under the company’s insurance policy.”

THEY HELPED OFFSET THE MORONICITY OF HEALTH POLICIES: Why private gardens mattered so much during the first COVID-19 lockdown.

HMM: Monica Reza Is a Missing Scientist: The Strange Circumstances of Her Disappearance.

SCIENCE: Torpedo-shaped robots diving deep into ocean help solve mystery of Antarctica’s sea ice.

I SUSPECT THERE MAY BE A THIRD FORCE BEHIND THIS:

It's still astonishing that the establishment (on both sides of the Atlantic) didn't follow "the most basic theory of how to respond to a populist era: Move to the cultural right, especially on immigration."

What were Obama and Hillary thinking? https://t.co/1G5IFZ3Ude

— Mickey Kaus (@kausmickey) April 19, 2026

Of course, that force may simply be deep idiocy.

ASKING THE IMPORTANT QUESTIONS: Can Swapping Out Your Plasma Slow the Aging Process?

SEEMS ABOUT RIGHT: Psychology asserts that children of the 1960s and 1970s did not become emotionally strong thanks to better parenting, but because they grew up with enough daily neglect to learn to self-regulate, solve problems on their own, and develop a resilience that modern comforts make difficult to build.

SALENA ZITO: Dr. Helen Smith’s newest book His Side is a fresh look at male alienation. “Noted forensic psychologist Dr. Helen Smith’s newest book, His Side: Men Speak Out on Dating, Marriage and Life in America, is a provocative look at the male experience. Smith uses interviews to examine how straight men are forced to navigate shattered norms in a turbulent society. Smith, who has long studied the human experience, takes the conversation outside of clinical data and brings the reader into the living rooms, workplaces, and communities of everyday men. There she uncovers the cultural fraying of the male experience in this country, one that has often been narrowed, stereotyped, and viewed with hostility. She uncovers a deep-seated ‘connective tissue’ that has been unraveled by a culture that often views the male experience through a narrow, and sometimes hostile, lens. . . . Smith’s book is a central guide for both men and women who are eager to understand navigating our modern world. The book offers great insights into men’s needs and a perspective that is clear-eyed and useful for both genders.”

You can read the book here.

HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: Colgate faculty hold teach-in to discuss ‘resistance’ to ICE, police.

YOU LOST ME AT “BERKELEY SOCIOLOGY.” UC Berkeley sociology names transgender activist and AI researcher as commencement speaker.

JOHN LUCAS ON VIRGINIA’S SPECIAL ELECTION: Scrapping the Work of the Founding Fathers: Crafting a revolution with an end-run around the Constitution.

HAPPY PATRIOT’S DAY:

Patriots Day. Marking April 19, 1775. When Americans took up arms against their king, and bled, at the crack of terrible dawn.

It's a holiday in Massachusetts and Maine, which was then part of Massachusetts. Should be a national holiday.

July 4 marks the day they published a… pic.twitter.com/K39h8fwSTZ

— Northern Barbarian (@xnoesbueno) April 19, 2026

SANITY REAPPEARING? Democrats turn on Spanberger over plummeting popularity amid redistricting.

THE NYT BESTSELLER LIST HAS BEEN AN OBVIOUS SCAM FOR A WHILE NOW: New York Times Puts Gavin Newsom on Best Sellers List Despite ‘Bulk Sales’ It Has Used To Disqualify Conservatives: Nearly three-fourths of the copies Newsom sold around the time he landed on the list came from his campaign.

WHY LEFTISTS ARE ANTI-SPACE: In Space, No One Can Whine About Inequality.