Todd

Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication. -Leonardo da Vinci

[Robert Sterling @RobertMSterling]

> you’ll never start a rocket company
> you’ll never build your own engines
> you’ll never be able to use off-the-shelf parts
> you’ll never survive three launch failures
> you’ll never reach orbit
> you’ll never win NASA’s trust
> you’ll never launch cargo to the ISS
> you’ll never compete with Boeing
> you’ll never compete with Lockheed
> you’ll never make rockets reusable
> you’ll never land a rocket vertically
> you’ll never land one on a drone ship
> you’ll never reuse a booster
> you’ll never fly the same booster 10 times
> you’ll never fly the same booster 20 times
> you’ll never fly the same booster 30 times
> you’ll never recover and reuse the fairing
> you’ll never lower launch costs
> you’ll never launch every month
> you’ll never launch every week
> you’ll never launch multiple times a week
> you’ll never carry astronauts
> you’ll never replace Roscosmos
> you’ll never fly civilians to orbit
> you’ll never manufacture satellites at scale
> you’ll never build the biggest constellation ever
> you’ll never make satellite internet work
> you’ll never make satellite internet fast
> you’ll never make satellite internet affordable
> you’ll never serve rural customers
> you’ll never serve aircraft and ships
> you’ll never build a methane rocket engine
> you’ll never make full-flow staged combustion work
> you’ll never build the most powerful rocket ever
> you’ll never build a rocket bigger than Saturn V
> you’ll never build it out of stainless steel
> you’ll never launch Starship
> you’ll never separate Super Heavy and Starship
> you’ll never relight Raptor in space
> you’ll never bring Super Heavy back
> you’ll never catch a booster with Mechazilla tower arms
> you’ll never launch 85% of mass to orbit worldwide
> you’ll never change the economics of space
> you’ll never force the entire industry to copy you
> you’ll never win
> you’ll never IPO

Congratulations to @elonmusk and the SpaceX team. You did what countless people said was impossible, and you did it time and time again.

Today is your day. You deserve this. May it be a glorious one.

[Todd @dobroblues]

@BowTiedBroke Only been to Maui. Road to Hana: love or hate(extremely windy road). The Bamboo forest on the Pipiwai Trail was cool. I really enjoyed leaving Hana "the back way," where there's no development on that side of the island. Had one of the best sunsets of my life on top of Haleakala.

[William Penn @penn_williamE]

Today is Michaelmas.

The autumn feast of St. Michael the Archangel: guardian of high places, weigher of souls, heavenly warrior against evil, defender against the dark.

Below, the light strikes the high altar at the Magnificat for Michaelmas Vespers.

[Todd @dobroblues]

@penn_williamE @BowTiedOx
Thought you would like this. God bless.

[Chief Nerd @TheChiefNerd]

Van Jones Gets Emotional After a Newly Discovered DM from Charlie Kirk

“After he was murdered, my team called and said he was trying to reach you … This guy is reaching out to his mortal enemy saying, we need to be gentlemen and sit down together … I've sat on it long enough.”

[Todd @dobroblues]

@BowTiedOx People don't form their own opinions more than anything. I wager many of those who came out against Charlie were parroting what their own social/political circle said. Doing the homework takes effort & we don't live in a time where people are willing to put in the work.

[Reagan Reese @reaganreese_]

I love this tidbit from JD Vance on Charlie Kirk. Vance recalls how he walked away from his debate with Walz kinda liking the guy. He shared this with Kirk who told him, yeah, this is why I debate + meet people in person. It bridges the gap, it brings us -- as humans, as Americans -- closer together.

On a personal note, this is a big reason why I love what I do. I get to actually MEET the people I cover. And it really changes the way you think about them.

I love that Kirk thought the same. There were so many things that made him special + so many lessons we can take from him and continue to share.

[Chris Ripa @CHRISsW0RLD]

They proved him right…

[Todd @dobroblues]

@Rob_ThaBuilder "When the rights of two identity groups clash, all rhe Left does is find which one is ranked higher, and they give that group everything while taking from the other group everythibg, regardless of any context or nuance of the situation."

Articulated so well.

[The Heretical Liberal 🇨🇦 @Rob_ThaBuilder]

The lightning speed that the Political Left went from being the staunchest defenders of women and girls to their biggest threat is something thats going to be studied in PoliSci classes for decades.

Literally overnight they went from #MeToo to #FuckYou when it came to W&G, and the reason is not even that difficult: the Woke Left has taken over the Political Left, and their entire worldview is wrapped up in a warped morality where every person is distilled down into an identity group based on nothing but their superficial characteristic (race, gender, sexuality, religion), and then those identity groups get ranked based on the Lefts Hierarchy or Oppression. When the rights of two identity groups clash, all rhe Left does is find which one is ranked higher, and they give that group everything while taking from the other group everythibg, regardless of any context or nuance of the situation.

In the case of womens rights, they were thrown under the bus so quickly because their rights came into conflict with other ide city groups thar were ranked higher (specifically Trans and Illegal Migrants).

The problem with this warped worldview (besides rhe obvious unfairness and injustice of it) is that the Woke Left cannot distinguish between "unjust oppression" and "reasonable concern" and so many of the groups at the top of the Left's HoO are there not because they're genuinely oppressed, but because they are genuinely causing real social problems.

Society has a very reasonable concern with vross dressing men because we know its a paraphillia and paraphillias often cluster. Its entirely appropriate to oppose cross dressing men into womens spaces due to basic safeguarding, but the Woke Left turns that reasonable concern into unjust oppression.

Same thing with the invasion of Muslim immigrants in Europe. They are not so unpopular among the native Europeans because theyre racist and hate Muslims. Europe is famously tolerant actually, empathetic to the point of suicidal its. Theyre unpopular because they're importing ACTUAL rape culture and believe women are property and they are causing massive social unrest and destroying the social fabric of Europe. But the Woke Left, in its infinite stupidity, interprets that completely reasonable opposition as "unjust oppression" and ranks them as high as any other group than trans.

So besides the fundamental unfairness of structuring society according to a "Hieracrchy of Oppression" and favoring those groups at the top (while ACTUALLY oppressing those groups below them) its an insane way to view the world because it places the groups causing the most harm to society in the most privileged potions. This is how you destroy a society from the inside out.

All of us - but especially sane liberals amd progressives - need to understand the Woke Left in this way and aggressively push back everytime we encounter this grotesque worldview out in the wild.

[The Heretical Liberal 🇨🇦 @Rob_ThaBuilder]

"Charlie Kirk deserved it because he was homophobic and transphobic"

Are you going to apply that same logic to the Palestinian ppl? Or the massive influx of Islamist migrants coming into the West?

[Todd @dobroblues]

@Cernovich "Hold on to Your Kids" by Gordon Neufeld should be read by all parents.

[Todd @dobroblues]

@BowTiedOx Check out: Ralph Vaughan Williams - Five Variants of Dives and Lazarus, also Lark Ascending. I think you'll like both of them.

[Peter J. Hasson @peterjhasson]

"My political opponents are Nazis"

"Violence against Nazis is good"

..."of course I condemn this violence against my political opponents"

[JD Vance @JDVance]

A while ago, probably in 2017, I appeared on Tucker Carlson's Fox show to talk about God knows what. Afterwards a name I barely knew sent me a DM on twitter and told me I did a great job. It was Charlie Kirk, and that moment of kindness began a friendship that lasted until today.

Charlie was fascinated by ideas and always willing to learn and change his mind. Like me, he was skeptical of Donald Trump in 2016. Like me, he came to see President Trump as the only figure capable of moving American politics away from the globalism that had dominated for our entire lives. When others were right, he learned from them. When he was right--as he usually was--he was generous. With Charlie, the attitude was never, "I told you so." But: "welcome."

Charlie was one of the first people I called when I thought about running for senate in early 2021. I was interested but skeptical there was a pathway. We talked through everything, from the strategy to the fundraising to the grassroots of the movement he knew so well. He introduced me to some of the people who would run my campaign and also to Donald Trump Jr. "Like his dad, he's misunderstood. He's extremely smart, and very much on our wavelength." Don took a call from me because Charlie asked him too.

Long before I ever committed (even in my mind) to running, Charlie had me speak to his donors at a TPUSA event. He walked me around the room and introduced me. He gave me honest feedback on my remarks. He had no reason to do this, no expectation that I'd go anywhere. I was polling, at that point, well below 5 percent. He did it because we were friends, and because he was a good man.

When I became the VP nominee--something Charlie advocated for both in public and private--Charlie was there for me. I was so glad to be part of the president's team, but candidly surprised by the effect it had on our family. Our kids, especially our oldest, struggled with the attention and the constant presence of the protective detail. I felt this acute sense of guilt, that I had conscripted my kids into this life without getting their permission. And Charlie was constantly calling and texting, checking on our family and offering guidance and prayers. Some of our most successful events were organized not by the campaign, but by TPUSA. He wasn't just a thinker, he was a doer, turning big ideas into bigger events with thousands of activists. And after every event, he would give me a big hug, tell me he was praying for me, and ask me what he could do. "You focus on Wisconsin," he'd tell me. "Arizona is in the bag." And it was.

Charlie genuinely believed in and loved Jesus Christ. He had a profound faith. We used to argue about Catholicism and Protestantism and who was right about minor doctrinal questions. Because he loved God, he wanted to understand him.

Someone else pointed out that Charlie died doing what he loved: discussing ideas. He would go into these hostile crowds and answer their questions. If it was a friendly crowd, and a progressive asked a question to jeers from the audience, he'd encourage his fans to calm down and let everyone speak. He exemplified a foundational virtue of our Republic: the willingness to speak openly and debate ideas.

Charlie had an uncanny ability to know when to push the envelope and when to be more conventional. I've seen people attack him for years for being wrong on this or that issue publicly, never realizing that privately he was working to broaden the scope of acceptable debate.

He was a great family man. I was talking to President Trump in the Oval Office today, and he said, "I know he was a very good friend of yours." I nodded silently, and President Trump observed that Charlie really loved his family. The president was right. Charlie was so proud of Erika and the two kids. He was so happy to be a father. And he felt such gratitude for having found a woman of God with whom he could build a family.

Charlie Kirk was a true friend. The kind of guy you could say something to and know it would always stay with him. I am on more than a few group chats with Charlie and people he introduced me to over the years. We celebrate weddings and babies, bust each other's chops, and mourn the loss of loved ones. We talk about politics and policy and sports and life. These group chats include people at the very highest level of our government. They trusted him, loved him, and knew he'd always have their backs. And because he was a true friend ,you could instinctively trust the people Charlie introduced you to. So much of the success we've had in this administration traces directly to Charlie's ability to organize and convene. He didn't just help us win in 2024, he helped us staff the entire government.

I was in a meeting in the West Wing when those group chats started lighting up with people telling Charlie they were praying for him. And that's how I learned the news that my friend had been shot. I prayed a lot over the next hour, as first good news and then bad trickled in.

God didn't answer those prayers, and that's OK. He had other plans. And now that Charlie is in heaven, I'll ask him to talk to big man directly on behalf of his family, his friends, and the country he loved so dearly.

You ran a good race, my friend.

We've got it from here.

[Todd @dobroblues]

@ErwanLeCorre May God watch over his loved ones.

[Todd @dobroblues]

@AJA_Cortes "Optimal protocols," like delaying coffee intake, because cortisol spike or whatever, do not take into account happiness/improved mood, which I'd wager probably has greater benefit in the long run.

[Todd @dobroblues]

@antidoc Where would you put cardio if you're lifting at 5AM?

[Todd @dobroblues]

@user_mm_ Followed for the sweet haircut, might stick around for the rest.