Being term limited as CA governor and out of office after 2026 would give Gavin Newsome ample time to prepare infrastructure and early networking for the presidential primary contest.

In comparison, it is devious to think of a politician running in 2026 for Governor - of CA, one of the world's largest economies by GDP- as a part time gig, while also preparing for a presidential run less than two years in the future.

A role in any sort of Congressional operation, beholden to rules and standards set ages ago would absolutely bore Elon.

From a passive observer of Musk and how he handles his business operations: he flies from project to project, kicks over a few trash cans, slams a few doors, fires off some "directives from the top" emails, breathes down the necks of the actual day to day professionals, then leaves to his next company.

Elon Musk locked into a situation where Congressmembers are doing Congressional activities would be dreadfully boring compared to his current optempto of going places for the perception of being everywhere and doing everything.

On face value this award is comedic, but you have to hand it to Tom Cruise - the outstanding portrayal of the service in Top Gun films fueled some generations to pursue military aviation as a dream job.

And even if they didn't achieve that dream - those flight school drops make for decent officers in other designations.

It's a thank you or End of Tour award for impactful contributions on a DoD-Hollywood project partnership ;).

that the Pentagon has adequate competition in its space programs to prevent over-reliance on the billionaire's SpaceX

SpaceX is the only current program which is capable of delivering the quick-launch LEO cape that is a key priority for the Space Force. Boeing was once viewed as an opportunity to diversify the field to ensure a competitive bidding process, ensure some redundancy for the continuation of operations if one org is over tasked, underperforming, or otherwise unable to perform.

It is true that there are a handful of other alternatives with the most recognizable name being Bezo's Blue Origin, but it is a sad fact that nothing is currently as reliable for high value, high priority assets as SpaceX launch systems.

In my headcannon of funding government operations, the DoD should be fully funded and not subject to political whims for paying troops who are already pre-positionedon a global scale.

Alas, it does feel like military pay is kept in stasis to be used as a forcing function to get these CR or funding measures passed, as there would be less bipartisan political will to fund operations which are predominantly federal civilian dominated.

Having been military, only working in joint environments with all services + federal civilians + DoD contractors ...

Government shutdowns do not save any money whatsoever! The civs get furloughed, and any holiday leave they have planned for next week will be cancelled as they are also not allowed to come to work* (and not allowed to take leave). Over the last decade+, the unpaid, unworked hours from those folks have all received full back pay for ... nothing!

Military members have to show up and often USAA and NFCU cover military pay to their AD members until a CR or funding bill passes.

Contractors in fully funded contracts will be there, ensuring the lights stay on - as long as the facility is declared essential, and there are some military members or essential/excepted gov employees to enact action/change/implement the products done by contractor employees ... but is this whole situation what people want as taxpayers?

*there will be some limited essential/excepted fed civs, ensuring the totality of operations aren't being run by contractors and semi-unpaid military members.

From a business sense this might make sense, but I wonder what the parts of such a joint venture vehicle would be in implementation. I could guess at some complicated trickle down effects when it comes to maintenance and repair.

Posted from a friend.

#4 | POSTED BY BOAZ

lol c'mon now, who is writing fan fiction about Retorters?

I was wondering what happened to Pam Bondi the other day when I read a list of other FL politicians who may either be AG or fill the appointed senate seat in FL.

Figured she was passing the time at Morgan & Morgan with other in between jobs politicians.

10 | POSTED BY MADBOMBER

They must have really wanted to live in the District. 1.4m can get you totally different property types whether it be over the bridge in North VA, DC proper, or the portion of Maryland that'son the DC metro line.

Hey LFTy ...

I've been on an "eating through history" YouTube/recipe kick recently, and into the 21 century, most of our politicians in Congress eat garbage - I don't even want to waste ingredients or time on the cookware to cook the slop that some of them call their favorite dishes.

Try again next fiscal year

I wonder what the army knew of this law enforcement action, if anything.

I know in the Guard it's more difficult to keep track of what's going on with individual members, but this seems like the type of situation that is heard about if it was an unrestricted report of SA.

Regarding the great women's fight in the co-main event, and the comparatively tame and boring Tyson v Paul match. The two women boxing received 6m and 8m, which is one heckuva payday.

A interesting theory from Threads:

No s"t-that fight before was the main event and was an outstanding fight to watch. This fight brought an entire new generation of spectators as well. The reason he chooses the fights he does, if you analyze it, is that those fighters all come from different disciplines of combat sports. He's deliberately annoying because he knows people want to see him get beaten. He's a WWE heel in the world of boxing and he's embracing that because he ultimately wants to be a promoter.

It was free entertainment. Easier to track down a way to see this than the 6 different venues to watch NFL these days

On Tyson vs Paul: no one got seriously hurt. Very cautious (respectful?) fighting by Paul, reactive and defensive by Tyson.

Glad this was not PPV, or that I paid whatever it cost to get in the arena LOL.

I had no issues on the Netflix side.

Taylor vs Serrano is crazy. These girls are bleeding from their everywhere.
#11 | POSTED BY CLOWNSHACK

Caught the last few rounds of this bout and now THAT was a fight!

I'll tune in around 11pm when main event walkouts are slated to happen.

I do find it interesting that there are a collective of apartheid era South African guys who have earned an outsized amount of social and economic capital via the tech industry in the US.

While Trump and Musk are still paired together, before the eventual split of the two, I want a sound bite of Trump introducing Musk as, "Here's my favorite African!"

With his educational background I'm surprised that he stuck with the Guard for 20+ years and multiple mobilizations with active duty time. It's a meme in the DC area that folks with his type of Ivy background apply, get selected, do the minimum obligated service period to "get military experience," then resign their commission as they ticked the servicemember box.

One week til Gladiator 2 debuts!

This is some palace intrigue theory lol

The amount of the bid was not announced.

Bummer.

No bets? #70 | POSTED BY LFTHNDTHRDS

I'm game to work out a deal.

100 $usdc (ask Boaz what that is if you're not savvy), that Gaetz is not the Attorney General on 31 December 2025.

USDC so there is a publicly verifiable means to discern proof of payment.