I’m going to be completely honest with you – I wasn’t the biggest fan of Captain N: The Game Master. Castlevania is one of my favorite NES games, and it did my boy dirty. As CONTINUE READING... The post Captain N and More Games That Need Cartoons appeared first on The Retro Network.

Secure Technology Value Solutions is a company with a boring name and a bland website that is staffed by jovial-looking former policemen and corrections officers. It doesn’t exactly scream “Chinese Communist Party threat,” and that’s precisely the point. Secure Technology Value Solutions is actually a front for Nuctech, a Chinese government- and military-owned company, and it’s selling sensitive security equipment to police and corrections departments all across the United States. Nuctech sells devices such as the body scanners that passengers must use during airport security checks, as well as larger devices, such as cargo scanners for commercial ports. It was an early adopter of a technique that’s become popular among Chinese companies that fall under national security scrutiny: Change the name of your American subsidiary to something that sounds benign and hope to fly under the radar. Nuctech’s U.S. subsidiary changed its name to Secure Technology Value Solutions in 2022, after Nuctech was hit by several forms of national security sanctions. Nuctech equipment was blocked from U.S. airports a decade ago by the U.S. Transportation Security Administration and sanctioned by the U.S. Commerce Department in 2020 on national security grounds. Notably, the Commerce Department cited concern that Nuctech’s “lower-performing equipment means less stringent cargo screening, raising the risk of proliferation” of “nuclear and other radioactive materials.” Doing business with Nuctech is essentially doing business with the Chinese Communist Party itself. Nuctech was spun out of Tsinghua University, an elite institution that works closely with the Chinese military. It was co-founded and led for years by the son of Hu Jintao, Xi Jinping’s predecessor as general secretary of the CCP. According to Wirescreen, a business intelligence platform that provides data on Chinese companies, Nuctech is one-fourth government-owned, majority owned by a Chinese defense contractor, and is a supplier to China’s own security agencies. Nuctech is a subsidiary of China National Nuclear Corp., a state-owned company that runs China’s civilian and military nuclear programs, and which has been identified by the U.S. as a Chinese military-industrial complex company. NuctechDownload In April of this year, another China National Nuclear Corp. subsidiary was sanctioned by the Treasury Department for proliferating weapons of mass destruction technology. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security assessed in 2020 that, among other concerns, “Nuctech’s screening and detection systems likely have deficiencies in detection capabilities, which may create opportunities for exploitation by the Chinese government. … [If] backdoors or deficiencies are present, remote access could be enabled to gain access of Nuctech systems and other networked infrastructure.” The U.S. Department of Transportation has also repeatedly warned port operators about the threat of Nuctech equipment. The threat is a global one, with the Homeland Security Department flagging “the alarming rate at which the security company continues to gain control over various strategic security infrastructure” in Europe—as much as 90% of Europe’s sea-cargo screening equipment market and 50% of the market for airport baggage and cargo screening. In light of those concerns, the U.S. has pressed its allies to dump Nuctech. European countries awarded more than 160 contracts to Nuctech over the past decade in spite of warnings, but finally show some signs of moving on from a “see no evil” attitude toward Nuctech’s takeover of the security screening market. However, Europe’s action against Nuctech is part of an anti-dumping investigation, making it unclear whether and when Nuctech devices will be phased out of Europe’s critical infrastructure. Canada, likewise, had awarded several contracts to Nuctech, operating their devices “across Canada,” and in 2020 were poised to install Nuctech devices in Canadian embassies across the world until the U.S. intervened. Despite the federal and international scrutiny, Nuctech and its Secure Technology Value Solutions front company have found plenty of localities and state governments willing to buy its devices using taxpayer dollars. Often, the customers are corrections and police departments, and Secure Technology’s top leadership consists of former corrections and police officers, no doubt to leverage their professional networks and trusted relationships. Secure Technology’s website brags about a sale in Louisiana, and even features a video of its equipment appearing to be connected to the computer system of a jail. Arizona spent millions of dollars acquiring Nuctech equipment in 2023. Pennsylvania has maintained a contract with Nuctech since 2018, which was renewed in February. Virginia purchased Nuctech equipment in 2023. Nuctech devices also operate in Ohio. The list goes on. It’s a safe bet that Americans don’t want a Chinese military-linked company providing security for sensitive sites or plugged into states’ computer networks and surveillance systems. States should stop doing business with Nuctech and Secure Technology, and advance policies to block CCP-controlled companies from participating in taxpayer-funded procurement. Granting the CCP access to government infrastructure and troves of sensitive data—let alone paying it for the privilege—just doesn’t make sense. The post States Should Stop Buying Security Scanners From China’s Nuctech appeared first on The Daily Signal.

If you're tired of censorship and dystopian threats against civil liberties, subscribe to Reclaim The Net. New York Attorney General Letitia James has been actively campaigning for stricter controls on AI and social media platforms, invoking concerns about “misinformation.” James has a history of social media censorship demands that have faced allegations of First Amendment violations. ABC News reports that James has contacted key players in the AI industry, such as Google, Meta, and OpenAI, through a letter, urging them to implement mechanisms that could restrict what she defines as misleading and deceptive speech related to elections. “While misinformation has been a concern in past elections, with the rise of gen AI, barriers that prevent bad actors from creating deceptive or misleading content have weakened dramatically,” said the letter, sent to social media and AI companies, including Google, Meta, and OpenAI. “As tens of millions of voters in the U.S. seek basic information about voting in this major election year, X has the responsibility to ensure all voters using your platform have access to guidance that reflects true and accurate information about their constitutional right to vote,” it reads. James has proposed an in-person meeting to discuss these strategies more thoroughly, calling for cooperation while hinting at possible enforcement actions, which further raise censorship alarms. If you're tired of censorship and dystopian threats against civil liberties, subscribe to Reclaim The Net. The post Letitia James Demands Big Tech Curb Election “Misinformation” appeared first on Reclaim The Net.

'Light 'Em Up': Paintball Tim?

Sometimes, it can be hard to comprehend the enormity of climate change without seeing any immediate effects. That shouldn’t be a problem for much longer: in a grim sign of the planet’s current condition, last year wasn’t only the hottest on record – it also likely caused more heat-related deaths in Europe than any other year bar one.How was this result calculated?According to researchers at the Barcelona Institute for Global Health (ISGlobal), approximately 47,690 people in Europe died from heat-related causes in 2023. That’s more than any other year on record other than 2022, when the same team reached an estimate of 61,672 excess deaths from heat.Now, we should point out right off the bat that this conclusion was probably not found how you’re imagining. Rather than simply counting how many coroners’ records across the peninsula were labeled “cause of death: too hot”, the figure comes from epidemiological models – basically, researchers analyzed temperature and mortality data from 823 regions in 35 European countries between 2015 and 2019, and used that to estimate the death toll in 2023.As such, while the team put the number of heat-related deaths in Europe last year in the mid-47,000s, they caution that the true number may be as low as 28,853, or as high as 66,525.More worryingly, however, is the other caveat: that these numbers may be a significant underestimate. While the team used mostly the same methodology as 2022’s report, they hit a snag when it came to sourcing data – rather than standardized daily mortality records, they were forced to rely on weekly updates from Eurostat, the statistical office of the European Union. It may not seem like much of a difference, but less regular updates can result in lower estimates of the heat-related mortality burden. The researchers can correct for this, and they did – finding that the heat-related death toll may actually have been more than 10,000 higher than their headline figure.Who was the worst affected?Perhaps unsurprisingly, the worst affected countries were those in the south of the continent: Greece topped the list with 393 deaths per million from heat in the year, followed by Bulgaria with 229, Italy with 209, Spain with 175, and Cyprus with 167. Many of the worst-hit nations are also those with the highest share of elderly people – a correlation borne out in the study, which found heat-related mortality to be close to eight times higher for people over 80 years of age than in people aged between 65 and 79.Also worse affected were women, whose mortality rate was found to be 55 percent higher than men’s. Again, this is not totally surprising: women are known to fall prey to heat-related mortality at higher rates than men, even if the reasons why are not totally understood – it’s potentially to do with the fact that women sweat less, and are therefore less able to lose heat; it may be that women have higher core body temperatures on average; it could be a combination of factors, or something as yet unknown.Obscured by adaptationNow, perhaps you’re thinking that 47,000, or 58,000, or even 62,000 aren’t such high numbers, all things considered – it is, after all, at most one in every 125 deaths in the region. But there’s a second conclusion drawn in the study which, depending on how you look at it, is either reassuring or even more worrying: in the past two decades of ever-increasing temperatures, we’ve learned to adapt to extreme heat in such a way that it almost halved the number of likely deaths through the year.“Our results show how there have been societal adaptation processes to high temperatures during the present century, which have dramatically reduced the heat-related vulnerability and mortality burden of recent summers, especially among the elderly”, said Elisa Gallo, a researcher at ISGlobal and first author of the study, in a statement. “For example, we see that since 2000, the minimum mortality temperature – the optimum temperature with the lowest mortality risk – has been gradually warming on average over the continent, from 15°C in 2000-2004 to 17.7°C in 2015-2019,” she explained. “This indicates that we are less vulnerable to heat than we were at the beginning of the century, probably as a result of general socio-economic progress, improvements in individual behavior and public health measures such as the heat prevention plans implemented after the record-breaking summer of 2003.”What this means in real terms is that, had the summer of 2023 occurred back in 2003 when we were all still making fun of Al Gore, the death toll would have been much, much higher – like, nearly double. We simply weren’t ready for it. Now, extreme heatwaves are so commonplace that we’ve adapted our lives around them.A warning for the futureSo, what’s the major takeaway of this report? Well, it’s hardly a surprise: the planet is warming, and we’re running out of time to mitigate the damage.“In 2023, almost half of the days exceeded the 1.5°C threshold set by the Paris Agreement and Europe is warming at a rate twice as fast as the global average,” pointed out Joan Ballester Claramunt, Principal Investigator of the European Research Council’s Consolidator Grant EARLY-ADAPT – a project designed to analyze the environmental and socioeconomic causes of trends in public health.“Climate projections indicate that the 1.5°C limit is likely to be exceeded before 2027, leaving us a very small window of opportunity to act,” Claramunt said.Whether or not you care about the planet, one thing this report makes clear is that we each have a vested interest in slowing and – science willing – maybe even reversing climate change. After all, we can’t adapt forever.“We need to take into account that inherent limits in human physiology and societal structure are likely to set a bound to the potential for further adaptation in the future,” Claramunt warned. “There is an urgent need to implement strategies aimed at further reducing the mortality burden of the coming warmer summers, together with more comprehensive monitoring of the impacts of climate change on vulnerable populations.” “These adaptation measures must be combined with mitigation efforts by governments and the general population,” he advised, “to avoid reaching tipping points and critical thresholds in temperature projections.”The study is published in the journal Nature Medicine.

Good news, conspiracy theorists: Atlanteans are real after all. There’s just one catch: they’re actually not a heroic race of people from an ancient and mythical land lost to Poseidon’s wrath. Turns out, they’re volcanoes.Discovered in the oceans north of the Canary Islands, the three underwater volcanoes have been named “Los Atlantes” – Spanish for “the Atlanteans” – by the team who found them. The title isn’t random: it’s a reference to the “Atlantis” research project, launched in late June by institutions across Spain and Portugal to investigate features of the local marine environment, during which the trio was accidentally discovered.That’s not the only thing the volcanoes have in common with the myth. While the discovery of hitherto unknown geological features is always pretty cool, Los Atlantes are far more than just a zit on the ocean bed: sitting as they do in the Canaries – a Spanish archipelago off the northwest coast of Africa, comprising the islands of Lanzarote, Tenerife, La Palma, and so on – they speak to a history millions of years in the making. “They were islands in the past and they have sunk,” explained geologist Luis Somoza, coordinator of the Atlantis project, in a translated statement. “They are still sinking, as the legend of Atlantis tells us.” Indeed, the geological story of the Canary Islands is much more tempestuous and mysterious than the region’s reputation as a vacation spot would suggest. Located firmly inside the African continental shelf, the archipelago is nevertheless a hotbed of volcanic activity: all seven islands currently making up the region began as submarine volcanoes, built through millions of years of eruptions into the landmasses we know today. Evidently, however, not all the islands were so lucky. Los Atlantes haven’t been above the waves since the Eocene age some 56 to  34 million years ago – with an honorable mention for a few of the inactive volcanoes during the last ice age, when sea levels were lower and they could poke their calderas out into the air for a while. Now, though, these three mounts are at least 60 meters (200 feet) below the surface, home to marine microorganisms and crucial elements.Which is a shame, really – because Los Atlantes sounds just as idyllic as their sisters. The team has "been able to verify that they still maintain their beaches,” Somoza explained in the statement; the team also identified “cliffs and sand dunes at the flat summit of the seamount,” he told Live Science. During the last ice age, he said, “these islands could […] be used for inhabiting wildlife.”“This could be the origin of the Atlantis legend,” Somoza suggested.

A significant new Media Research Center poll finds that large majorities of registered Democrats and Independents who voted for Joe Biden in 2020 — exactly those who would be expected to support Vice President Kamala Harris in this year’s contest — are mostly in the dark about many of the controversial and radical positions Harris has taken. When asked about ten different aspects of Harris’s public record — on issues as varied as her sponsorship of the Green New Deal, abolishing ICE, and eliminating private health insurance — between 71% and 86% of these Democrats and Independents said they either had not heard of Harris’s position or were unsure. When these voters were asked about where they got most of their news about political elections and candidates, by far the top answers were broadcast television (ABC, CBS and NBC) or cable news (such as CNN and MSNBC). This suggests that the knowledge gaps found by our poll reveal a failure of these outlets to report on radical positions once (and perhaps currently) supported by the now-Democratic nominee for President. In fact, a detailed Media Research Center examination of ABC, CBS and NBC evening news coverage in the three weeks since Harris became the leading Democratic candidate (July 21 to August 10) shows eight of these ten issues received ZERO attention from these newscasts, while two others received only minor coverage. This poll was conducted for the Media Research Center by McLaughlin & Associates between August 2 and August 5. The survey consisted of 1,200 people — 800 registered Democrats plus 400 Independents who reported voting for Joe Biden in 2020. Each was asked about where they typically received their political news, as well as their familiarity with a list of left-wing positions taken by Harris. Each voter reported their top two sources for election news. Just over half (50.2%) listed broadcast television as a main source of news, followed by cable news (41.2%), social media (34.4%), online news sites (23.9%), and search engines (16.7%). A smaller number of respondents listed national newspapers (10.8%), public broadcasting (9.2%), local newspapers (7.6%), radio (4.9%) and AI chatbots (1.0%) as a main source of political information. But when it came to recalling Harris’s radical record, most of these voters said they were in the dark. Details on media coverage and voter awareness of each of the ten issues we probed: ■ Harris supported cutting funding for the police: Back in June 2020, before she was selected as Biden’s running mate, Harris told a Los Angeles radio show host that she favored cutting police funding. According to ABC News, Harris “told Power 106 Los Angeles host Nick Cannon that she believes ‘we have to redirect resources’ from police to other areas of government, mentioning schools and small businesses.” “For too long, people have confused achieving public safety with putting more cops on the street,” Harris said in the same interview. But those watching the ABC, CBS or NBC evening newscasts for information about Harris’s positions have heard nothing about this since the Vice President became the likely Democratic nominee on July 21. And, our poll found, 71% of Democrats and Biden-supporting Independents were unaware or not sure that Harris had ever advocated cutting police funding. ■ Harris co-sponsored the Green New Deal: As a Senator in 2019, Harris was one of the original co-sponsors of the “Green New Deal,” a laundry list of left-wing aspirations focused on the environment and social justice. An economics writer at the time calculated the costs at up to $2.5 trillion a year, a massive expansion of federal spending. Another economist, The Heritage Foundation’s Nicolas Loris, wrote in 2019 that, if enacted, the Green New Deal would by 2040 cost more than 1.4 million jobs, lead to more than $40,000 in lost income for a typical family of four, and a loss of nearly $4 trillion in U.S. GDP. Yet since her latest run for the presidency began on July 21, the ABC, CBS and NBC evening newscasts haven’t said a word about Harris’s push for the costly Green New Deal. And nearly three-fourths of the Democrats and Independents we polled (73%) were unaware or unsure of Harris’s position. ■ Harris supported the elimination of private health insurance: During her first presidential campaign, Harris advocated a fully government-controlled health insurance program, nicknamed “Medicare for All.” And at a June 2019 candidate debate, she raised her hand when moderator Lester Holt asked the Democrats: “Who here would abolish their private health insurance in favor of a government-run plan?” Harris later backtracked, telling CBS This Morning the next day that she misheard the question as about “giving up” private insurance rather than “abolishing” it. Harris insisted: “I am in support of Medicare for All,” which would apparently only permit private plans that follow existing Medicare (i.e., government) standards. A Heritage Foundation paper from 2019 found plans such as “Medicare for All” would leave nearly three-fourths of Americans (73.5%) worse off financially. Such a radical plan would certainly be worth discussing, but so far ABC, CBS and NBC have been silent about whether Harris would push for such a program if elected. And most of the Democrats and Independents we surveyed (81%) were in the dark about Harris’s past advocacy for Medicare for All, saying they were either unaware or unsure of her position. ■ Harris supported reparations payments to atone for slavery: During her 2019 campaign, Harris joined with other far-left Democratic candidates to support massive payments as a form of “reparations” to the descendants of those enslaved prior to 1865. According to a PBS account, “Harris has proposed monthly payments to qualified citizens of any race in the form of a tax credit.” While there are various proposals for possible reparations, a CNBC report in 2020 suggested an ultimate price tag of $10 to $12 trillion, or vastly more than the size of the current U.S. federal government budget (on track to surpass $6 trillion in 2024). Since July 21, the Big Three evening newscasts haven’t said a word about Harris’s past support for reparations. And according to our poll, 71% of the Democrats and Independents we polled were unsure or completely unaware of her position on the issue. ■ As “Border Czar,” Harris never visited a conflict zone on the border: Back on March 24, 2021, President Biden announced he was tapping Harris to “lead our efforts....in stemming the movement of so many folks, stemming the migration to our southern border.” Yet since then, Harris has only visited the border once, and chose not to go to the Rio Grande Valley, the epicenter of the crisis. Since then, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) have reported approximately 8 million border encounters in the Southwest region, revealing the extent to which Harris has failed at her assignment of “stemming the migration.” And her failure to visit the areas hardest hit by the crisis demonstrates a lack of interest in understanding and solving the problem. Since July 21, the evening newscasts have spent 7 minutes, 46 seconds on the candidates’ positions on immigration, but only 44 seconds on Harris’s failure to visit the border. The only coverage: NBC Nightly News (twice, on both July 21 and July 22) showed clips of Harris lying to anchor Lester Holt in a 2021 interview: “We’ve been to the border. We’ve been to the border.” Holt immediately fact-checked the Vice President: “You haven’t been to the border.” Flummoxed, Harris argued: “And I haven’t been to Europe...I don’t understand the point that you’re making.” Apart from that, the network evening newscasts have said nothing about Harris’s failure to visit the worst areas on the southern border. So it’s no surprise that nearly three-fourths (72%) of Democratic and Biden-supporting Independent voters were unaware or unsure of this fact about Harris’s tenure as Biden’s “Border Czar.” ■ Harris said it should not be considered a crime to enter the U.S. illegally. As California’s Attorney General, Harris in 2015 denounced the idea of referring to illegal immigrants as criminals. “I’m a career prosecutor,” Harris told CBSLA. “I’ve personally prosecuted everything from low-level offenses to homicides. Unfortunately, I know what crime looks like. I know what a criminal looks like who’s committing a crime. An undocumented immigrant is not a criminal.” Given the explosion of illegal migration since 2021, it’s pretty clear that the Biden-Harris administration has decided not to treat undocumented immigrants as criminals. Yet this aspect of Harris’s record has gone unmentioned on the ABC, CBS and NBC evening newscasts during the first weeks of Harris’s presidential campaign. https://www.cbp.gov/newsroom/stats/southwest-land-border-encounters Our poll found that Democrats and Biden-supporting Independents are mostly in the dark about this aspect of Harris’s worldview, with 74% either unaware or unsure of this statement. ■ Harris supported abolishing ICE: In a June 24, 2018 interview with MSNBC’s Kasie Hunt, Hunt asked Harris about the “Abolish ICE” signs at a rally Harris had just attended. “Is that a position you agree with?” Harris made the case: “Listen, I think there’s no question that we’ve got to critically reexamine ICE and its role and the way it is being administered and the work it is doing, and we need to probably think about starting from scratch, because there’s a lot that is wrong with the way that it’s conducting itself. And we need to deal with that....Their mission, I think, is very much in question and has to be reexamined.” “Starting from scratch” sounds very much like eliminating the agency and starting over, presumably with something a lot more lenient on those trying to evade U.S. immigration laws. Yet since July 21, the ABC, CBS and NBC evening newscasts haven’t once mentioned this past position Harris has taken. Consequently, our poll showed most (77%) Democrats and Biden-supporting Independents were unsure or completely unaware that Harris had once called for “starting from scratch” when it came to revamping the government’s immigration enforcement agency. ■ Harris promoted a fund to bail out violent protesters during 2020 riots: Back on June 1, 2020, in the wake of the riots over the death of George Floyd, Harris posted a message on both Facebook and Twitter promoting a nonprofit: “If you’re able to, chip in now to the Minnesota Freedom Fund to help post bail for those protesting on the ground in Minnesota.” Two months later, the local Fox affiliate in Minneapolis reported “among those bailed out by the Minnesota Freedom Fund (MFF) is a suspect who shot at police, a woman accused of killing a friend, and a twice convicted sex offender, according to court records reviewed by the FOX 9 Investigators.” Even as Harris has pitched herself as a tough-on-crime prosecutor during her current campaign, the Big Three evening newscasts haven’t said a word about Harris’s past advertisement seeking donations to bail out violent offenders. And our poll found most Democrats and Biden-supporting Independents (78%) had no idea or were unsure that Harris had ever done this. ■ Harris would consider allowing death row inmates to vote: At an April 22, 2019 “town hall” event on CNN, moderator Don Lemon asked Harris if she would want “people who are in — convicted, in prison, like the Boston Marathon bomber, on death row, people who are convicted of sexual assault, they should be allowed to vote?” Harris would not say “no,” instead replying: “I think we should have that conversation.” While reporters in recent days have suggested that Republican vice presidential nominee JD Vance is an extremist for musing about parents being able to cast additional votes on behalf of their children, ABC, CBS and NBC have been silent about this whopper from Harris five years ago. And as you might expect, nearly all of the Democratic and Independent voters we surveyed didn’t know anything about it. Only 14% claimed they knew of Harris’s past comment on “having a conversation” about death row inmates voting, vs. 86% who were unaware or unsure of the candidate’s position. ■ Harris was named the most liberal U.S. Senator in 2019: Harris was only in the U.S. Senate for four years, but consistently ranked among the most liberal. In 2019, the nonpartisan research service GovTrack rated Harris as the most liberal of all senators that year. Her lifetime rating from the American Conservative Union is a piddling 4.45%. (For comparison, Vermont socialist Bernie Sanders gets a slightly more pro-conservative score of 6.05%.) The media used to acknowledge this fact. In a 60 Minutes interview aired October 25, 2020, CBS Evening News anchor Norah O’Donnell confronted Harris: “You’re considered the most liberal United States Senator....The nonpartisan GovTrack has rated you the most liberal Senator.” Unfortunately, the GovTrack rating has been scrubbed from the firm’s Web site. Yet Harris’s outside-the-mainstream beliefs have barely been a topic in coverage of her presidential campaign. There have been 21 evening news stories which have included brief GOP soundbites (mostly Donald Trump and JD Vance) saying Harris is a “radical left” candidate, but the charge has never been explored, let alone documented, by any reporter. Total coverage of Harris’s extremism since July 21: 2 minutes, 57 seconds, all consisting of Republican soundbites. Consequently, fully 75% of the Democratic and Independent voters we surveyed were unaware or unsure that Harris was the most liberal Senator before she joined the Biden ticket in 2020. +++++ If our poll had been conducted even as recently as June, voters’ lack of knowledge about Harris might be understandable. But this poll was conducted in August, when the Vice President was receiving the most intense news coverage of her political career. Our study found heavy coverage of Harris on the ABC, CBS and NBC evening newscasts during this period: 184 minutes in just 21 days, eclipsing even that of Donald Trump. Yet our survey of Democratic voters and pro-Biden Independents, who say their top source for news about the campaign are these same networks, shows the damage caused by today’s one-sided news coverage. These voters should be at least familiar with these key points about Harris’s past, even if they don’t agree with conservatives about their significance. The fact that huge majorities don’t even know about these issues is damning evidence of the media’s selective and partisan approach to covering the 2024 presidential campaign.

Who knew Stephen Colbert was so funny?“The Late Show” host uncorked his best line in ages during his Monday night chat with CNN’s Kaitlan Collins. The two were attacking President Donald Trump and celebrating VP Kamala Harris when Colbert hurled this killer quip.“I know you guys are objective over there [at CNN], that you just report the news as is,” Colbert began before the live audience began to howl.“Is that supposed to be a laugh line?” Collins asked.“It’s not supposed to be, but I guess it is!” Colbert responded.This Colbert guy is one to watch. Here’s hoping he shares more howlers this week.The Last WalzNow it all makes sense.Stolen valor-adjacent Tim Walz is hitting the Hamptons Thursday for a tony fundraiser.Nothing new there. The catch? The musical act chosen to lure people to see Captain Folksy and friends.Mumford & Sons.Yes, the same band that hung founding member Winston Marshall out to dry when he had the gall to support brave journalist Andy Ngo’s anti-Antifa book in 2021.Marshall decided to leave the band and start a new career where he could speak his mind sans consequences. He’s done that and more.Now his remaining bandmates are stuck with the unenviable task of making the Democrats forget Walz’s disastrous record.If they play “I Will Wait” LOUD enough, they just might pull it off.Life support for terminal TerminatorAudiences have spoken. We’re so done with “Terminator” movies.The last two “Terminator” films, including 2019’s “Dark Fate” co-starring OG players Linda Hamilton and Arnold Schwarzenegger, fizzled at the box office. The latter lost a reported $120 million.Franchises end. It happens. MoveOn.org.Tell that to James Cameron.He teased yet another “Terminator” in a recent interview.The self-described “overbearing” director has struck it rich, again, with the “Avatar” franchise. He’s booked for "Avatar 3, 4 and 5," but evidently has enough time to revive a franchise already read its last rites.Why did he have to take "I’ll be back” so seriously?Clooney a movie star? QT calls BSGeorge Clooney has it all. Looks. Money. Fame. A thin skin.The “Ocean’s Eleven” lead is sore at Quentin Tarantino for saying he’s not a “movie star.” The two worked together on 1996’s “From Dusk ‘Til Dawn” but apparently grew apart after filming.We’re siding with Tarantino. If anything, Clooney is a TV star first and foremost. Who else could rock a mullet like his “Facts of Life” do?You're Sorkin in it Screenwriter Aaron Sorkin of “West Wing” fame is getting attention for a provocative attack on today’s GOP. Sorkin says it would be impossible for him to write a “reasonable” Republican character were the NBC series on the air now.“People would watch that and it would be unfamiliar to them as the country that they live in. On the show, while the Republicans were the opposition, they were reasonable, the Republicans that they dealt with.”Remember how Sorkin’s party demonized Mitt Romney, the most “reasonable” Republican in sight? Methinks the celebrated court scribe of the Democrats doth protest too much.Something else Sorkin could never write today? The climactic monologue of 1995's "The American President," in which the titular character (Michael Douglas) makes a full-throated defense of free speech: America isn't easy. America is advanced citizenship. You've gotta want it bad, 'cause it's gonna put up a fight. It's gonna say, "You want free speech? Let's see you acknowledge a man whose words make your blood boil, who's standing center stage and advocating at the top of his lungs that which you would spend a lifetime opposing at the top of yours."Nowadays, Dems like Sorkin know better. Those words that make your blood boil are called "misinformation."Coy GeorgeWith Kamala Chameleon making a run for the presidency, now's as good a time as any for "Karma Chameleon" crooner Boy George to return to the spotlight. An adaptation of the pioneering gender-bender's autobiography is headed to the big screen.Don't expect an unflattering "warts and all" treatment. In an era in which singers routinely sell their song catalogs for millions, biopics, and documentaries are elaborate exercises in brand management.Just ask Pink, Taylor Swift, Elton John, and others. Who needs a publicist when you have entire movie studios shaping your image?Meanwhile, actress Christine Baranski is threatening a third “Mamma Mia!” movie. To paraphrase the great Boy himself, "Do you really want to hurt us, Christine?"

The American people can’t pretend the European Union’s attempt to extort Elon Musk on Monday — threatening to punish him unless he canceled his planned interview with President Donald Trump on X — didn’t threaten to fundamentally change our relationship with longstanding European allies.Fully 22 of the 27 countries that belong to the European Union also belong to NATO, meaning that they benefit from the U.S. security umbrella and from our obligation under Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty to defend them if they’re attacked.How can we ignore that 22 of our European allies, acting through the EU, are trying to interfere with and affect the outcome of our presidential election?This works out well for Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, and Spain.It’s sometimes less of a good deal for the United States, which has long shouldered a disproportionate share of Europe’s security burden.Those same 22 countries dominate — and certainly have the power to restrain — the European Union.Those counties (which control the EU) tried to wield the EU’s regulatory power over a U.S. company to influence our presidential elections — based on the absurd contention that the EU had to act to protect EU citizens from misinformation.They tried to help Kamala Harris by depriving Donald Trump of an opportunity offered to both Trump and Harris (but accepted by Trump and declined by Harris): a live interview with Elon Musk on X, one of the few channels of information in America that isn’t “all in” for Harris.How can we ignore that 22 of our European allies, acting through the EU, are trying to interfere with and affect the outcome of our presidential election? When we put American blood and treasure on the line — as we do by honoring our NATO commitments — that should mean something. At a minimum, it should mean that they won’t extort U.S. companies to interfere with our presidential elections.What do you think this should mean for the future of NATO and America’s involvement in it?Our often-unreciprocated security assistance to these European allies makes it easier for them to do other things with their money — like funding extravagant welfare-state programs and the EU, which has now been weaponized against us to influence our presidential elections.Europe had a good thing going — we pay for their security (far more of it than we should) so they can do whatever they want.With the “whatever they want” approach culminating in what happened Monday — with Commissioner Thierry Breton trying to extort Musk to help Kamala Harris defeat Donald Trump — the EU has now offended at least half of American voters. (I hope it’s more than half, given that this should bother Democrats, too).Imagine what would have happened if the EU had tried to do this four years ago to help Donald Trump and hurt Joe Biden. I know, it would never happen that way, but imagine the outcry if it did. The media would be incensed and outraged over this. They would have spoken of little else.And yet what is the corporate media saying about this? Basically nothing.This is a good time for Americans — despite what they’re hearing, or not hearing, from the media (and regardless of their political ideology) — to stop and think about what this outrageous act by the EU should mean for America and our interests in Europe.If the EU’s attempt to extort a U.S. company in an obvious effort to influence the U.S. presidential election isn’t cause for us to re-evaluate our relationship with our European allies, I don’t know what is.