“A free press isn’t the ‘enemy.’ It’s the way we hold officials responsible.” -Barack Obama, 44th President of the United States

NASA has announced ten new astronaut candidates, the astronaut class of 2025. The media notes that this is the first astronaut class with more women than men, but the thing that caught my attention is that they're wearing the Flight Operations emblem, which I designed for NASA.

"Careful, buddy. That foreigner wants your cookie." [Via Robert Reich]

Global warming caused by humans is an observed fact. Yes, science still needs to learn more, but it's no more in overall doubt than the theory of gravity. And it's bad. Willful ignorance, enforced by those who choose to deny science, is an existential threat to our civilization.

“I don't think folks fully realize just how many people stick in awful jobs they hate to keep the health insurance. There's a reason big companies have spent billions fighting universal health care even though it would save them trillions in premiums.” - via berniegirl67_3

Legendary Star Trek production designer Herman F. Zimmerman received the Imaginator Award yesterday at Eagle Con at Cal State LA. As long-time members of the Art Directors Guild, we were honored to be the presenters to the man who was instrumental in giving both of us our start in the film industry.

I'm watching Jimmy Kimmel Live tonight. Because.

I'm watching Jimmy Kimmel Live tonight. Because.

Donald Trump comes off like the arrogant third grader trying to do a book report without having read the book. He's dumb enough to think he's getting away with it. And, tragically, some Americans are willing to let him do exactly that.

You really shouldn’t take medical (or any!) advice from a willfully-ignorant fool who stared directly into a solar eclipse.

Science doesn’t care about your gut beliefs or if you own a company that sells supplements. Science is a powerful tool 'cuz it requires peer-reviewed, double-blind testing & statistical validity. Otherwise, it’s easy to be fooled with wishful thinking, a recipe for disaster.

This is a great and easy way to learn the difference between correlation and causation. We should all learn this by about 3rd grade to help prevent the shenanigans happening at the White House right now.

This is a post about Tylenol and autism. By @azmatthews.

"Privatization" of vital public services means privatizing profits and socializing losses, so public burden grows because private entities extract value. That's why costs of privatized services inevitably go up as quality of service goes down.

Back in the 1960s, the Smothers Brothers made fun of President Johnson and his policies many times on their television show. The president wrote them a letter in response.

20 September 1939 | Dutch Jewish boy, Joseph Jacob Pinto, was born in Amsterdam. He was deported to #Auschwitz from Westerbork in October 1942. He was murdered in a gas chamber with his sister Sientje. --- The first gas chambers near Auschwitz II-Birkenau: https://youtu.be/Rr6lF75fDmU

This is a disaster for tech companies and the extension of Trump's xenophobic bigotry, refusing to acknowledge that immigrants can be smarter than Americans. Trump Says the U.S. Will Institute $100,000 Fee for Skilled Worker Visas www.nytimes.com/2025/09/19/u...

When the government can silence one artist, it threatens freedom for all. Credit: The Roddenberry Foundation.

It’s happening. The takedown of Jimmy Kimmel is likely the start of a campaign to use the murder of Charlie Kirk as a pretext to use the power of the White House to wipe out Trump’s critics and his political opponents. But we aren’t powerless. We can mobilize and organize. Now.

This is Hollywood's McCarthy Moment. This is the litmus test. Learn from history. Who will step up and fight? Who will bend the knee and be complicit? History will remember.

18 September 1872 | A Hungarian Jew, Miksa Herman, was born in Gyöngyös. In 1944 he was deported to #Auschwitz and murdered in a gas chamber. --- Learn about deportations of Jews from Hungary to Auschwitz: https://lekcja.auschwitz.org/en_6_dep_zydow/

A long, devastating read. NASA is dying and 47's administration killed it. 💔 @loracs.bsky.social @zarazee.bsky.social @seasidesunbeam.bsky.social @breakaway71.bsky.social

"When I made my annual trip last March, the Trump Administration was in the process of vilifying federal workers and pursuing an anti-diversity, equity and inclusion strategy across the federal workforce, which was resulting in plain old discrimination." I like when astronauts tell it like it is.

This👇 is exactly right. They want an influx of money. The market IS a gamble- not generally a horrible one if you have a million or so invested- but people with less can quickly be wiped out- but SS is guaranteed.

Truth: "Rich People" by Carsie Blanton youtu.be/pD_eZg70Ms0

Why is Wall Street so hot to "privatize" Social Security? So they can gamble with our money, even as they suck a fat profit margin in fees and commissions from our retirement savings. Spoiler alert: If this happens, we’ll end up with less money when we retire.

RIP Robert Redford. youtu.be/vETxuL7Ij3Q

We've had the pleasure of working with Garrett Reisman on For All Mankind, where his expertise as an engineer and astronaut is invaluable. His opinion piece in TSR on NASA's decline is deeply disturbing. NASA was once a shining example of US excellence. www.thespacereview.com/article/5060/1

Privatization of public schools (vouchers) is touted as the key to more efficient, better education. But it's really just a scheme to suck public funds from public schools to subsidize the wealthy. Result: Costs soar as quality of education plummets and students suffer.

Jeri Taylor was remembered in the In Memorium tribute of this evening's Emmy Awards.

Last night, we attended a concert performance of Fiddler on the Roof, performed in Yiddish at the Soroya, directed by Joel Grey. We had no trouble following the story, partly because of the subtitles, but mostly because we both know and love the original. Thanks, Adam and Leslie Schneider.

I was hoping more people would respond to my lame Mission Impossible joke in yesterday's post about the 50th anniversary of Space: 1999. I'd made this MI:1999 mashup, hoping to explain how Rollin and Cinnamon ended up on the moon, but didn't have a reason to post it. Nevertheless, here it is.

13 September 1900 | A Pole, Wacław Strzelczyk, was born in Przedbórz. A clerk. In #Auschwitz from 18 April 1942. No. 31313 He perished in the camp on 2 July 1942. --- Online lesson "Poles at KL Auschwitz”: http://lekcja.auschwitz.org/en_2020_06_polacy/

The world will soon understand that nothing can stop the release of #TheEPSTEINPedoFiles.

Deaths from diphtheria are incredibly rare because of vaccines, but not nonexistent. Sarah lost her sister to the disease in 2011. www.voicesforvaccines.org/diphtheria-c...

September 13, 2025: It's been 50 years since the premiere of Space: 1999, when the moon was blasted out of orbit, and two of the IMF's best agents were lost forever. (Seriously: I watched that show from the beginning, and I remain a big fan of Space:1999's production design and visual effects.)

Sing it!

Every country has mentally ill people. But other countries don't have easy access to weapons of war, nor do they have a terrorist "news" organization or a radical Republican right fanning the flames of violent racism and domestic terrorism.

For those with conveniently short memories:

America has the highest health care costs, by far. And the poorest life expectancy among developed nations, by far. We are victims of the deadly for-profit healthcare and insurance industries who don't care if you suffer and die prematurely, as long as it's profitable for them.

From me, a list of Trump supporters who killed, or tried to kill, Democrats and opponents of Trump in recent years (since the right are now claiming all the political violence is from the left!) Receipts: zeteo.com/p/charlie-ki...

If you want to give your opinion on gun violence. Please post real victims of political gun violence. Do not continue to promote someone who wasted the life he got and the privilege that this society gifted him with to promote hate, misogyny, racism and violence let him fade into obscurity.

Those who suggest that "both sides are bad" are effectively supporting the worst party in American history and their corrupt enablers. The difference between bad and worse can be huge, literally between our nation's survival and our destruction.

Minnesota House Speaker Melissa Hortman, 1970-2025. (Via @busyjunco)

It is long past time to politicize the horrific rise of gun violence and the astoundingly stupid policy of allowing easy access to deadly weapons to all. To hell with the corrupt radical Republican right, who have sold their souls to the NRA.

11 September 1937 | Dutch Jewish boy, Godfrey Hoepelman, was born at The Hague. He was deported to #Auschwitz from Westerbork in August 1942 & murdered in a gas chamber after the arrival selection. --- Learn about Jews deported from the occupied Netherlands: http://lekcja.auschwitz.org/32_en/

In the brochure, there were also two reports of other camp escapees: Jews Arnošt Rosin and Czesław Mordowicz as well as a Pole Jerzy Tabeau. With the report printed in the press, the message contributed to the spreading of the knowledge about the crimes committed in Auschwitz in the Western world.

11 September 1924 | Slovak Jew, Rudolf Vrba (b. Walter Rosenberg), was born in Topoľčany. On 15 June 1942, he was deported to Majdanek, from where, after a few weeks, he was transferred to Auschwitz. No. 44070 On 7 April 1944, he escaped from #Auschwitz together with Alfred Wetzler.