JAMES PETHOKOUKIS: Is there a long German word for regret over rejecting nuclear energy?

ALL IS PROCEEDING AS I HAVE FORESEEN: America’s College Towns Go From Boom to Bust: Many state universities are losing more students every year, failing the local economies they once fostered.

If only there had been some kind of warning.

I should note that not all schools are failing: “At the University of Tennessee Knoxville, the state’s flagship school, enrollment jumped 30% in 2023 compared with 2015.”

PLAUSIBLE:

I'm slowly becoming convinced that a majority of the opposition to Trump are boomers who think Trump is cancelling social security because the TV told them so. https://t.co/rJ2yA0RcfY

— Reddit Lies (@reddit_lies) May 19, 2025

WELL SAID:

Congress is like a wedge salad. Less work to produce yet it costs more money.

— Tim Burchett (@timburchett) May 19, 2025

OPEN THREAD: Monday, Monday.

THE NEW SPACE RACE: Venus Aerospace debuts potentially revolutionary rocket engine with landmark 1st flight (video).

DEAL OF THE CENTURY: Harvard Paid $27 For a ‘Copy’ of The Magna Carta. It Turned Out to Be The Real Thing.

OF COURSE: Just like the M.I.A. stock market crash, the long-promised airline travel slump is nowhere to be found.

CHANGE: Supreme Court Allows DHS to Suspend Temporary Protected Status for Venezuelans.

MORE NEW ANTIBIOTICS, PLEASE: Growing Public Health Threat: New “Northern Lights” Bacteria Resists Multiple Antibiotics.

RUNNING ON EMPTY: History shows that the veneer of civilization is thin. A moral vacuum makes it thinner. “I was born into and grew up in an era of miracles wrought by hard work, dedication, and dearly earned competence. So it’s a bitter pill to swallow when I look around now and see that our greatest challenge isn’t going to the moon and back with slide rules and vacuum tubes; it’s trying to figure out who gets to use the girls’ bathroom at an Ivy League swim meet.”

Plus: “We are, these days, a nation in the thrall of lazy, dishonest, spineless, clueless, incompetent, yet endlessly entitled and arrogant academics, bureaucrats, politicians, media figures, and other ‘experts’ who can’t seem to find their way from their heads to their asses with their hands when something important, like, say, COVID or the 25th Amendment, is in play.”

Kick them in the asses a few times and they’ll be able to find them in the future. The problem has been the lack of consequences.

THE E.V. BUBBLE CONTINUES TO DEFLATE: Nissan’s Planned Battery Plant is Officially Cancelled.

Related: General Motors Company (GM) Reportedly Seeks to Overturn California’s Electric Vehicle Mandate.

HMM: Criticisms of the Military’s XM7 Rifle Spill Into the Open. “But, despite widespread criticism, the Army has gone all-in on defending the brass’s choice of the XM7. The first soldiers to experiment with the weapon, we’ve been told, gave it glowing reviews. Then, subsequent units that picked it up had nothing but good to say about it. This led public opinion to waver a bit. Maybe the brass was right if all of the grunts love it . . . right? It turns out that (as is often the case) we may not have been told the whole story.”

ENCRYPTION IS OVERRATED AS A MEANS OF SECURITY: Paris kidnap bid highlights crypto data security risks. “Since 2014, software developer Jameson Lopp has recorded 219 physical attacks targeting cryptocurrency users.”

Remember, if it’s secured by your fingerprint, all they need is your finger.

OUT: LEARN TO CODE! In: OpenAI introduces Codex, its first full-fledged AI agent for coding.

READING BLOGS WILL FIX THAT PROBLEM FOR SURE: Easily distracted? How to improve your attention span.

WARM UP THE STERILE SCREWFLIES: U.S. suspends live animal imports from Mexico amid screwworm outbreak.

JESSE SINGAL: Of Course Liberal Institutions Are Engaging In Illegal Hiring Practices On The Basis Of Race: And of course this will turn out to have been a very bad idea. “Lucas notes that until recently Harvard touted, right on its website, the reduction in the proportion of white male faculty members. . . . I’m going to go out on a limb and say that if the Trump administration does engage in a thorough investigation here, it is unlikely to come away empty-handed.”

IT’S NEVER ABOUT WHO THEY HELP, IT’S ABOUT WHO THEY HURT: If Publishing’s Efforts to Diversify Haven’t Done Anything, Why Did You Fight for Them? Why Do You Defend Them Now?

FLASHBACK: The climate change jet set: If climate change is such a crisis, then why don’t global leaders make a few sacrifices for the team?

MY LATEST SUBSTACK ESSAY: Report from Down South.

HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: Whitman College president officiates anti-Trump lesbian wedding featuring a ‘wusband.’ Bridesmaids spread dental dams instead of flower petals.

THE FARTHER THE BETTER, I EXPECT: I found real intellectual diversity far away from elite colleges.

THEY SHOULD: Crossfire Hurricane Hoax: Will Anybody Pay a Price for Attempted Coup?

Examples need to be made. The Left’s culture of impunity needs to be ended.

FLASHBACK: Congress on Easy Mode: Get Into Gear, Please.