OF COURSE THEY WILL: US Air Force F-22s and F-35s will soon launch and control recoverable attack drones from the cockpit of the plane.

This fast-approaching technology, which calls upon advanced levels of autonomous navigation, is closer to reality due of DARPA’s Gremlins program which plans to break new ground by launching – and recovering – four drones from an in-flight C-130 next year.

Air recoverable drones, slated to become operational over just the next few years, will bring a new phase of mission options enabling longer ranges, improved sensor payloads, advanced weapons and active command and control from the air.

“The team looked at how fifth generation aircraft systems like the F-35 and F-22 respond to threats, and how they could incorporate Gremlins in higher risk areas,” a DARPA statement said.

Gremlins also can incorporate several types of sensors up to 150 pounds, DARPA statements said.

That’s enough of a payload for a sensor and a small bomb.

SACRED COW SLAUGHTERHOUSE: Why We Should Still Be Talking About Killing Communists.

POP: NYC Home Sellers Are Slashing Prices “Like It’s 2009.”

STEPHEN KRUISER: Politicized Entertainment Award Shows Continue to Hemorrhage Viewers. “Shut up and act.”

ALLIES: Turkey Trims Unjust Sentence for NASA Scientist, Won’t Release U.S. Citizen. “Gölge’s reduction to five years behind bars sends him into another appellate process at a higher court that could take years.”

REPLACE “CLIMATE CHANGE” WITH ALMOST ANY OTHER ISSUE: Jerry Brown Made Climate Change His Issue. Now, He’s Not Sure How Much Politicians Can Do.

THAT WOULD BE A NICE CHANGE OF PACE: New Pentagon Strategy Putting Pressure on Private, Public Maintenance Yards to Deliver Ships on Time.

GROPEY JOE: Progressives Aim To Torpedo Biden 2020 Run.

Sixty-three million “dregs of society” could not be reached for comment.

LIZ SHELD’S MORNING BRIEF: Presumed Guilty Until Proven Guilty and Much, Much More. “If the Senate Judiciary can’t stand up to this attempt to derail the confirmation of the President’s nominee to SCOTUS, the Republicans deserve to lose the senate. What’s the point of having control if the Democrats are still calling the shots?”

SHOT: The Logical Fallacy of Christine Blasey Ford’s ‘Choice.’

CHASER: With Kavanaugh, McConnell’s throne is on the line.

HANGOVER: Brett Kavanaugh is a blend of toxic male privilege and affluenza.

The thinner the case against Kavanaugh is revealed to be, the shriller the headlines against him become.

PRIVACY: Google Says It Continues to Allow Apps to Scan Data From Gmail Accounts.

In a letter to senators, a top Google official said the company allows app developers to scan Gmail accounts, even though Google itself stopped the practice for the purpose of ad targeting last year. The company also disclosed that app developers generally are free to share the data with others, as long as Google determines that their privacy policies adequately disclose potential uses.

“Developers may share data with third parties so long as they are transparent with the users about how they are using the data,” Susan Molinari, the company’s vice president for public policy and government affairs for the Americas, wrote in the letter. She added that the company, a unit of Alphabet Inc., makes sure the relevant privacy policy is “easily accessible to users to review before deciding whether to grant access.”

For a few bucks a month you can own your own domain with virtually unlimited and secure email addresses. I’ve used HostingMatters since 2002 (on Glenn’s recommendation) and have nothing but good things to say about them.

AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL: Venezuela murder toll worse than some war zones.

Amnesty’s report highlighted violence carried out by security forces during operations against criminals in impoverished neighborhoods of Venezuela’s biggest cities.

“State officials, adopting military methods, use force in an abusive and excessive manner, in some cases intentionally killing during security operations,” said human rights defense organization Amnesty in a statement.

“In cases documented by AI, victims were unarmed. Autopsies revealed bullet wounds in the neck, throat, head. They were killed while on their knees or lying down,” said Esteban Beltran, director of Amnesty International Spain.

“The number of murders in Venezuela is greater than those in many countries at war.”

Venezuela’s murder rate is 89 per 100,000 inhabitants, three times more than crime-wracked neighbor Brazil, said Mariana Fontoura Marques, director of international justice policy at Amnesty International Argentina.

I’ll say what Amnesty won’t: Socialism is war — of “The People” against the actual people.

BUT HOW DOES IT COMPARE TO WHEN THE BABY BOOMERS WERE TEENS? Marijuana use is now as common among baby boomers as it is among teens, federal data shows.

THEY CHOSE… WISELY: The Russian military has backed down after the US Marine Corps called its bluff in Syria.

Russia warned the US twice on September 1 and again on September 6 that the Russian military, together with Syrian and pro-regime forces, planned to carry out counterterrorism operations inside the 55-kilometer deconfliction zone. It accused the US and its coalition partners of harboring terrorists.

Immediately following Russia’s threats, the US Marine Corps conducted a live-fire demonstration at the At Tanf garrison to drive home the point that the US military did not need Russia’s help eliminating terrorists.

In the nearly two weeks since, the Russians have not contacted the US military about operations inside the deconfliction zone, an area the Syrians and the Russians want to access to build a strategic land bridge between Tehran and Damascus.

The story stressed the Russia angle, but the real significance is that the USMC hampered Iran’s imperial ambitions in the area.

TWO-EDGED SWORD: HHS Controls New National Biodefense Strategy Against ‘Poor Man’s Nuclear Weapon.’ “All of the great research that we do to advance biomedicine has its opposite side, which is the threat potential.”

A relatively inexpensive bioweapon, properly deployed, has the potential to kill far more than a single nuclear weapon.

21ST CENTURY HEADLINES: Robotic Jellyfish Might Be the ‘Guardians of the Ocean.’

SCRAPPLEFACE: Kavanaugh’s Accuser Says Why She May Not Testify.

Satire… or is it?

THAT CAN’T BE ANY WORSE THAN WHAT HAPPENED TO HIM AS SOON AS HE GOT HOME: Sushi fiend who ate 100 plates of sushi is now banned from an all-you-can-eat buffet.

PATRICK POOLE: Yet Again, Hillary Clinton Exhibits Shameless Hypocrisy on Questioning Election Legitimacy. Before 2016 election she said attacking election’s legitimacy was “threatening our democracy.”

But that was different because she was certain she’d rigged the election for herself.

SKYNET SMILES: MQ-9 Drone Gets First Air-to-Air Kill in Training Exercise, Air Force Official Says.

On the other hand, the idea of robots killing robots instead of people killing people isn’t without its appeal.

WELL, GOOD: Terrorism-Related Deaths Fell 27 Percent In 2017, State Department Says.

JOHN HAWKINS: Accusation Against Kavanaugh Is Exactly Why Men Should Be Leery of #MeToo Movement. “Are men innocent until proven guilty or just innocent until accused?”

Don’t be silly, John — men are guilty until proven guiltier.

FLORIDA WOMAN: Democrats fear Shalala campaign is in ‘sleep mode’ while challenger surges.

The congressional seat was supposed to be the easiest of Democratic pickups. Hillary Clinton carried the Miami-based 27th District by nearly 20 percentage points just two years ago. Donna Shalala, the Democratic nominee, was a well-known, former Cabinet secretary with a talent for raising money.

But now local Democrats are dismayed as Shalala is struggling to put away her Republican rival, a popular former Spanish-language television newswoman named Maria Elvira Salazar.

According to internal polls from both campaigns obtained by POLITICO, Salazar is either ahead — or just narrowly trailing — Shalala.

Salazar leads the former Clinton Foundation head by 7 percentage points in a poll conducted for the Republican’s campaign that was completed Thursday. In a poll from Shalala’s campaign, completed Sept. 1, the Democrat leads Salazar by 4 percentage points.

I’ve wondered what her game is since she entered the primary earlier this year — Congress seems like a big step down for someone with Shalala’s resume.

A FINE EXAMPLE OF MAKING THEM PLAY BY ALINSKY’S RULES: The Circus Around The Kavanaugh Accusations Expose The Extraordinary Sexism Of The Left.

MICHAEL WALSH: The Playbook, the Press, the Plan, and the Patsies. “This week will be crucial to putting the Democrats back in their boxes. Let’s see if the GOP will take it.”

Our two-party system can only work if both sides are of good will, in common agreement on fundamental principles, and profess fidelity to the country as founded. In their lust for power and the “fundamental transformation” of the Republic into a leftist tyranny, the Democrats can no longer function within such a framework—just as they couldn’t in 1860-61, declaring war first on Lincoln and then on the United States of America itself. It took four long and bloody years for Ulysses S. Grant and William T. Sherman to show them the error of their ways. And even then, a Democrat murdered the president.

Today’s Republicans are, in the main, made of lesser stuff. More patsies than potentates, they roll over at the first hint of trouble; indeed, the late John McCain (R-Ariz.) made a fetish of what he called “comity,” which in his definition meant surrendering to the Left and poking his finger in the eye of the Right. His love children, Senators Bob Corker (R-Tenn.) and Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.), would dearly love to inherit his mantle, but alas for the both of them, they’re self-retired short timers, and nobody cares what they think.

But Democrat memories, while long—they stretch back to Aaron Burr, Jefferson’s vice president, who shot Alexander Hamilton and founded Tammany Hall—are selective. They, like Iago, see themselves as victims, frustrated by the evil Federalists/Whigs/Republicans/conservatives from realizing their political program: free pie (in the sky) for all, but all power to themselves. It never occurs to them that, like Michael Douglas in “Falling Down,” they’re the bad guys.

Needless to say, read the whole thing.