HMM: Reiki might help ease pain for cancer patients.

THIS DOESN’T SOUND GOOD: We Spent Four Days Alone in the Woods With the Mammoth Overland TL Tall Boy Adventure Trailer—and Didn’t Die.

HMM.

POLICE CHIEF: Deceased victims are a teenage student and a teacher

"We're not releasing the age or gender of the shooter." pic.twitter.com/BLNyc2fbiB

— Breaking911 (@Breaking911) December 16, 2024

LAWFARE: We Can’t Stop Crime, So We’ll Go After Glock: New Jersey, Minnesota AGs Sue Manufacturer.

CHANGE: Once taboo, more Japanese women are brewing sake.

SPACE: Rocket Report: Chinese national flies drone near Falcon 9, Trouble down under.

THE NEW SPACE RACE: NASA updates ‘Moon to Mars’ roadmap for exploring Red Planet.

HMM: Breast, ovary removal might extend lives of women with breast cancer genes. Color me skeptical.

OUT: TWITTER/X IS A CESSPIT OF HATE SPEECH. In: Bluesky’s Death Threat Problem. “Bluesky advertises itself as the X-alternative for the nice, compassionate left. It claims to be less toxic and a place for civil discussion, without all the misinformation that plagues X. What crap. Bluesky is a leftist sewer in which anybody who deviates from leftist orthodoxy is not only shunned but outright threatened, often with death. That’s not hyperbole, and to demonstrate how awful it is let’s discuss the case of Jesse Singal. . . . It’s not randos on Bluesky who are calling for Singal’s death or doxxing him–obviously hoping somebody will carry through on the death threats–but journalists, VPs at companies like Microsoft, and prominent lefties who jumped off of X because they claim it is too toxic. The claim, as with all such leftist calls to violence, is that holding disapproved views and expressing them is a form of violence and should be suppressed or their holders destroyed.”

ALL THE CENSORSHIP AND ELECTION INTERFERENCE AND LAWFARE HAS BEEN DRIVEN DRIVEN BY THE RULING CLASS’S FEAR THAT VOTERS WILL FIGURE OUT WHAT’S BEEN DONE TO THEM: Hilarious: DC Anti-DOGE Residents Find Out How Their Money Is Actually Being Spent.

ROGER KIMBALL: The Mystery in the Skies and the Shift on the Ground: Drones may be swarming the skies, but the real buzz is America’s cultural and political counter-revolution taking flight.

LOL: Top schools urge foreign students to return from break before Trump takes office.

OF COURSE: Binghamton University ‘Pride in December’ to provide ‘gender affirming haircuts.’

STRANGE NEW RESPECT: Eric Schmitt deems Tulsi Gabbard ‘a patriot’ in a rebuke against ‘smearing’ her.

Plus: Romney defends Trump after ‘overwhelming’ win: ‘Can’t complain.’

SALENA ZITO: Whiskey Resurgence in the Heart of the Rebellion.

MARTIN GURRI: ‘Revolt of the Public,’ 10 Years On. The failure of the Biden-Harris experiment in governance has brought elites to the edge of a stark ideological wilderness, where the only justification for power is the will to attain it.

HMM: Partitioning Ukraine: An Idea Whose Time Has Come? A ceasefire would help Ukraine by allowing the country to focus on its domestic problems.

The war isn’t working out well for anyone. I’ve been happy to see Putin bled white, but an actual collapse in Russia would be bad for everyone except China, which would wind up effectively in charge, even more than it already is.

RETURN TO NORMALCY:

This is a completely reasonable firing, but it’s interesting that in 2017 this type of behavior was widely tolerated and often applauded. That’s over. And it is a very good thing that it is. https://t.co/v5uemi22gd

— David Marcus (@BlueBoxDave) December 15, 2024

THIS:

Pardon every single J6 defendant. Apologized to them. Pay the millions to settle their civil rights claims. Fire every AUSA who has anything to do with this judicial abortion. https://t.co/INKFEApy3I

— Kurt Schlichter (@KurtSchlichter) December 15, 2024

IF YOU’RE IN A FAIR FIGHT, YOU’RE DOING IT WRONG: Grandfather Of Teen Killed During Burglary Says AR-15 Made Fight ‘Unfair.’

And burglers deserve to be shot. They don’t deserve a fair fight.

OPEN THREAD: Ring out the weekend.

JOHN HINDERAKER: How Much Voter Fraud In 2020?

FROM THE DEPARTMENT OF EARTH-SHATTERING KABOOMS:

In 1981, Israel destroyed the Osirak nuclear reactor in Iraq, preventing the world's worst weapons from being used by Saddam Hussein.

Today, Israel is destroying chemical and strategic weapons in Syria, preventing the world's worst weapons from being used by jihadist rebels.… pic.twitter.com/lC8SdFbYoG

— Aviva Klompas (@AvivaKlompas) December 15, 2024

UPDATE: I mean, I did say earth-shattering kabooms.

WATCH⚡️

An absolutely monstrous explosion in Northwestern Syria near Tartus on a munitions depot. This explosion was so large that it registered as 3.0 earthquake on seismic sensors in the area. Brought to you by the Israeli Air Force.

Via @inside_IL_intel pic.twitter.com/CnV8qGR66L

— Open Source Intel (@Osint613) December 15, 2024

LEFTIES: TWITTER SUCKS BECAUSE THERE’S NO MODERATION CONTROLLING VIOLENT NUTS. WE’RE GOING TO BLUESKY!

LEFTIES ON BLUESKY:

There's a culture of just total impunity over there when it comes to violence. On Twitter, as far as I can tell, it's rare for people to post violent threats or musings under names identified with their IRL identities. Over there, they know they can do so without any risk. pic.twitter.com/3xRWdAo3Kl

— Jesse Singal (@jessesingal) December 15, 2024

SOME PARTS OF THE 21ST CENTURY ARE TURNING OUT AS I’D HOPED:

It’s ~120m tall today. Probably grows another ~20m over time. https://t.co/wYEHq26gOE

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 15, 2024