Professionally Aggressive Morons

Hello, dear reader! I've returned a week later than I had expected. Thank you kindly for the patience. I had a lovely vacation, but picked up some kind of sinus infection upon my return. Thankfully not COVID, but left me unable to put together a proper show last week.

Here's a collection of stuff I could wrap my head around. Obviously a LOT has happened since last we spoke, but here's some of it.

Policy

Habeas Corpus? Never Heard of it

Stephen Miller—the answer to the question, "what if we scientifically constructed a human being who embodies every vile trait imaginable"—wants to remove the right to habeas corpus in the US in an effort to speed up deportations of the people whose skin color offends him.

Habeas corpus is essentially the right to due process. It gives you the right to challenge the circumstances of your arrest, providing at least some kind of path towards freedom if you've been illegally detained. Removing that right allows the state to detain you with no due process and no way to request review.

Miller is a loud white supremacist who endorses the concept of "re-migration," which is a not-particularly-clever way to say "deport anyone who is not of white, European descent," which is a not-particularly-clever way to say, "ethnically cleanse the United States of America." This man wants to remove the right of everyone in the states—citizens, included—to the ability to check the government.

Reminder: He's Anti-"Windmill"

17 states plus the District of Columbia are suing the Trump administration over one of the executive orders he shat out on his first day in office.

The order—titled, "Temporary Withdrawal of All Areas on the Outer Continental Shelf from Offshore Wind Leasing and Review of the Federal Government's Leasing and Permitting Practices for Wind Projects"—halts all permits for wind energy and requires reviews of existing permits and permit processes.

This is of course because Trump is famously anti-"windmill", somehow still managing to confuse "windmill" and "wind turbines" despite being the sitting president of a country. Again.

He's mad about wind farms because one was built within view of one of his properties in Scotland. Seriously. An entire country's energy system is barred from expanding on a widely available renewable energy source because Trump is mad about turbines being visible from his golf course.

Human beings with circulatory systems voted for this man to be president. I dunno about that one, y'all.

ICE Bullshit

The United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement has continued with their very realistic SS cosplay, despite the DHS being in danger of running out of money months before the new fiscal year.

Just emphasizing: they're over-budget by about a billion dollars, and if they burn money they don't have allocated in the budget, that is an Actual Crime.

But it's all good, because the money is going towards good causes, such as detaining a 54-year-old Irish-born legal resident for 17 days due to a crime on record from 20 years ago. She was returning from a visit to her sick father when she was detained.

Or you can check out their other recent greatest hits, such as sparking a neighborhood-wide panic as masked officers rushed multiple women in broad daylight at their residences.

Or even arresting the mayor of Newark, NJ for joining in with constituents in protesting an ICE facility which is largely unwanted by the state. Classic Republican administrative tactic of crushing states rights. Love it.

Anyway here's a slight upshot: hackers broke in to the systems for GlobalX, an airline that the Administration has been favoring for deportation flights. The hackers defaced their website and leaked a bunch of data to the press, who in turn was able to find records of people whose families have been barred from learning their whereabouts.

Fetterman is Losing it

John Fetterman, the US Senator from Pennsylvania, is losing his shit.

I wanna start by saying that Fetterman's seat is probably still better off in his hands than the alternative, which would have been literally Dr. Oz; a quack doctor whose fame is derived from a TV show sponsored by Oprah Winfrey. So like, I'm glad he didn't win the seat, but Fetterman has been a pretty serious trainwreck.

Fetterman suffered a stroke on the campaign trail which then led to major issues with mental health, which seem to be getting markedly worse lately.

Among several reported outbursts and aggressive anecdotes from staffers, we're now learning that he had a whole-ass breakdown during a teacher's union meeting, which resulted in his staffers clearing out the meeting. One of the staffers ended up shaken and crying outside of the meeting, where confused teachers did what they could to provide some comfort.

Reportedly, Fetterman started repeating, "why does everyone hate me? I didn't do anything!"—maybe it's the absolute fucking heel-turn you did on progressives (despite it being generally known that'd happen), or the gleeful friendship with a war criminal who gifted you a silver-plated beeper after using beepers with bombs hidden in them to conduct a terror strike against a civilian population. Or maybe its the alignment with the Trump admin after promising to represent the progressive, working-class values you campaigned on.

Dunno dude, but maybe shut the fuck up and resign. Just a suggestion.

Defending Against the Defense Secretary

Pete Hegseth, the US Secretary of Defense (War) is already understood to be a serial-security-breaching, unqualified alcoholic abuser with no business heading up a military, and now the White House seems to agree.

The very pale house has blocked Hegseth's choice for his chief of staff, with one source saying,

He doesn't have adequate experience, lacks the political chops and is widely disliked by almost everyone in the White House who has been exposed to him

Instead, the Administration will be overseeing the choice, as Hegseth continues to do absolutely nothing to instill a sense of confidence and capability in his role. This is of course shocking, as we all expected great things from a man who served some time in the national guard then became a Fox News host. Really thought he was the guy for the job, but hey, we all make mistakes.

World News

We Got a Pope

The Pope died. But now we have a new one so its okay.

Pope Francis finally kicked it a little while back, and while I was on vacation, a bunch of old Religion Boys went to that one painted chapel place and burned some stuff in a chimney. This, of course, means that we now know which of these Religion Boys speaks for God. What a relief.

Introducing Pope Leo XIV, originally John Prevost, the first US-born Pope, and likely the first Pope with a pre-determined hot dog order, given that he hails from Chicago.

What does this mean? I dunno; I genuinely don't know what all the Pope does in 2025. But the selection of a Pope from the states who is largely centrist (as far as Popes go) is pretty significant, and has already sent the MAGA world into a torrent of fury, calling the Pope "woke" because they are incapable of a life outside of anger at minorities.

Pakistan and India Ceasefire

Pakistan and India have agreed to a ceasefire after weeks of ramping up increasingly violent attacks on each other. The two nuclear-powered nations have a history of this, though this time made more severe by the already-extreme tensions around the world between ongoing wars, genocides, trade disruptions, and economic instability.

Washington is loudly proclaiming that we brokered the deal, though it seems more accurate to say the US pressured them to broker their own deal, with officials from India and Pakistan citing that the deal with direct with each other.

However, just hours after the agreement, explosions in Kashmir caused the Indian government to accuse Pakistan of violating the agreement.

This is a touchy and ongoing situation. Hoping the ceasefire holds, and we don't see further escalation. At time of writing, the latest on this is that both India and Pakistan have claimed "victory," and the ceasefire appears to be holding about one day on.

Tech

Apple Got Got

Apple has been stuck in a legal battle with Epic Games for years now, where Epic sued Apple over Apple's stranglehold on payments on iPhones.

In short, Epic is mad at Apple because Apple required developers to handle payments through their 1st-party payment system which also lets Apple take a cut of around 30% on each purchase. You may have seen some apps remove the ability to subscribe in-app, or perhaps you've seen situations where prices are increased on iOS compared to Android or on the web. This is all from Apple's requirements around payments.

In 2021, a judge ruled that Apple cannae do dat. The ruling said that Apple must allow third party payment flows, and cannot enforce their 30% take on those. This past week, Apple was threatened with being held in criminal contempt of court, after it came out that they've basically been taking every step they can to skirt the ruling, effectively maintaining their grip. According to the court, it seems that Tim Apple (Cook) has been pushing for the company to do everything they can to avoid adhering to the court order, despite other executives pushing for adherence.

Apple's lawyers complain that this change will cost apple "vast sums of money," but if it helps them at all: I took out a calculator and entered Apple's cash-on-hand then subtracted "vast sums of money" and the result was "still vast sums of money"

So I dunno. Don't ask me; ask the little man in the calculator who does the math.

What in the Blackest Mirror?

A family decided to feed a bunch of images and video of their dead relative into an AI video/audio generator to produce a posthumous impact statement to play for the court.

I—uh, yes, really.

Chris Pelkey was shot and killed during a road rage incident back in 2021. As the trial is ongoing to determine the sentencing for the killer, Pelkey's sister said she had been wondering "what Chris would say," and decided to seek the answer from AI.

The result is a robotic, monotone, emotionless rendition of Chris speaking through a digitally animated image of him, talking to the court about how pleased he is to see everyone and how "it means a lot" that everyone was there, as if a robot could navigate the emotions of a human being who was shot to death being brought back to life??

The wildest part of this story is that the Judge loved it, and his family was the driving force behind it. If that's what they wish for their loved one, that's on them. But lemme take this moment to just into writing that I do not ever want someone to recreate me using AI for any purpose, triply so when I'm dead. Let me be dead.

New Scam, Same as the Old Scam

Elizabeth Holmes is back in the news, baybeeee

Holmes is currently a Prison Lady after she was found guilty of doing a lot of financial crime around Theranos, her would-be blood-testing medtech company. As a refresher, she basically defrauded a bunch of investors while claiming her company was going to advance medical testing by decades.

It didn't.

So now, Holmes' partner is out raising money for—I shit you not—an AI startup focused on medical testing. Holmes has been voicing her support of this venture from prison, and even plans to hop back into medtech when she's out of jail, claiming to be writing patents from her cell.

Gaming

GTA 6 Delayed (Wow!)

Grand Theft Auto 6 has officially been delayed until Spring 2026, fulfilling one of my 2025 predictions—though I'll be the first to acknowledge that was the easiest prediction of them all.

Rockstar Games posted a short entry just kinda saying, "yeah, it's delayed. oop."

We are very sorry that this is later than you expected. The interest and excitement surrounding a new Grand Theft Auto has been truly humbling for our entire team. We want to thank you for your support and your patience as we work to finish the game.

This is a good thing for everyone, really. Less crunch in the gaming industry, please. I mean, there's almost definitely a ton of crunch still happening for this game, but we can still trend in the right direction.

Stop Right There, Criminal Scum

Bethesda recently pulled a fast one on folks and released The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Remastered, re-releasing the 2006-era open world RPG with updated graphics and—crucially—non-updated NPC interactions.

The game is glorious: walk into the main town for the first time and receive a torrent of greetings from NPCs all staring directly at you, followed by unintelligible cross-talk as each NPC fulfills their purpose: say the most out of pocket shit imaginable at every turn.

For real though, it's a nice thing to see. Game preservation is rad, but even still, as games get older, they become harder to play beyond just hardware or emulation requirements. Oblivion was maybe still more playable than some other options, but a modernizing refresh that respects the original game's vibe is always welcome.

Joja Mart Haters Rejoice

Eric Barone, developer of the wildly popular Stardew Valley, stated recently in a podcast that he may eventually make a Stardew Valley 2.

Now, before you run out and buy new overalls: this is not an announcement of Stardew Valley 2, just a first nod towards it even existing.

Barone has a long history of claiming he's stepping away from Stardew Valley development, only to then turn around and pour his soul into massive, free updates for the game. He's been working on a new game called Haunted Chocolatier for years now, though it seems to often go on the back burner as he, again, makes more Stardew Valley expansions.

Still, given the fact that Stardew Valley effectively resparked an entire genre, and given that the "cozy farming sim" genre is now MASSIVE, it's good to know that he's not jumping right to a Stardew 2. Maybe we do something else for a bit. Like chocolate.

Here's the Weather

More Stuff

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• In his own words, the MyPillow guy is "in ruins" financially as he is required to pay tens of thousands in legal fees
• Some dude has been stalking Eminem and recently broke into his house for the third time. He is now Very In Jail.
• New research into improved Lyme disease treatment looks promising. Still, always check for ticks after going hiking!
• Warren Buffett is retiring at 94, meaning he never would have made a good Senator.
• An 8-year-old in Kentucky ordered 70,000 lollipops for himself and his friends using his mom's phone
• There now exists video of the worlds tallest dog meeting the worlds shortest dog. This is important.