The southern polar vortex is typically circular – but not right now.

If the launch happens, the first private space walk is just days away.

CBS’s Stephen Colbert turned The Late Show into The Democratic Strategy Show on Thursday as he welcomed Arizona Sen. Mark Kelly to the program to promote his new children’s book and Kamala Harris 2024. Colbert lobbed an open-ended softball Kelly’s way when he asked, “You’re a battleground state. Arizona is very close. Joe Biden won by, like, 10,000 votes four years ago or almost four years ago. Now, FiveThirtyEight has it, basically, a dead heat between Trump and Harris. What do you think could make the difference? What is it that people of Arizona would like to hear?”     Kelly began by claiming Arizonans are mostly concerned with abortion, “Well, a lot of issues in Arizona. What happened with Roe v. Wade. Specifically, that one issue has forced women in Arizona to bounce back and forth between, like, one really bad abortion ban and another, and it's been really tough. That issue is going to be on the ballot. So, people have an opportunity to vote on this.” He then blamed Donald Trump for the border crisis, “We've had times when it's been a crisis at the border and we finally came together, Democrats and Republicans working across the aisle, the way the Senate and Congress is supposed to work, and we had an agreement, and it's really unfortunate that the former president, Donald Trump, told Republicans in the Senate that they weren't allowed to vote for this and the reason is he realizes that he needed this for the election, so he doesn't actually want to solve this problem.”  Next, Colbert turned to the specific issue of gun control, “another issue that has been brought to the fore tragically recently gun reform is important to you as a lawmaker, but obviously to you in a deeply personal way. There’s another tragedy yesterday in Georgia. One reaction to that, which is perfectly natural, is grief and rage, and another one is to shut down because there is so much of it. What would you say to people out there who just don't want to think about this anymore?”     After recalling the moment when he was informed his wife, former Rep. Gabby Giffords, was shot, Kelly declared, “In states that have stronger gun laws, there are less people that get shot and killed, and there are common sense solutions that most Americans support that could really, really help.” However, Kelly didn’t attribute resistance to gun control to sincerely held Constitutional beliefs, but rather, “The problem is this has gotten really politicized over the years and money from the gun lobby that's put into our elections, but we know what to do. That's the good part, so I would recommend people don't shut down and when you're deciding upon who you're going to vote for in an election, you should make a decision based on issues, and if this is an issue you want fixed and we can fix it, hold your elected people, your elected leaders accountable. So, please do that.” After a commercial break, Colbert mentioned that Kelly is a retired naval aviator who flew 39 combat missions before asking, “How do you feel or what is your reaction when you see the former president, who avoided the draft through bone spurs, disrespecting in a myriad ways the men and women who have served, sacrificed, and many of whom have died for our country?”     Kelly responded in part: I mean, we, people go into the military for different reasons, but most of us go there because there is something more important than ourselves. The safety of our fellow citizens, our country, you know, service, patriotism, and I don't think the former president gets that, but I know who does get that, and that's Kamala Harris. I've talked to her about service. I've talked to her about the military. So, we've just got to make sure that Donald Trump should not be commander-in chief again. That is very clear to me.  Instead of putting the ball on the tee for the Democratic senator, Colbert should have asked about vice presidential nominee Tim Walz’s military embellishments. Here are transcripts for the September 5-taped show: CBS The Late Show with Stephen Colbert 9/6/2024 12:18 AM ET STEPHEN COLBERT: You’re a battleground state. Arizona is very close. Joe Biden won by, like, 10,000 votes-- MARK KELLY: Right. COLBERT: -- four years ago or almost four years ago. Now, FiveThirtyEight has it, basically, a dead heat between Trump and Harris. What do you think could make the difference? What is it that people of Arizona would like to hear? KELLY: Well, a lot of issues in Arizona. What happened with Roe v. Wade. Specifically, that one issue has forced women in Arizona to bounce back and forth between, like, one really bad abortion ban and another, and it's been really tough. That issue is going to be on the ballot. So, people have an opportunity to vote on this. COLBERT: There's actually a resolution. KELLY: There’s a resolution. So, I would say that issue, in this election, looms pretty large. The other issue is the border. We’re a border state. Border security is very important to me, it's important to Arizona and Donald Trump is the guy who killed a bipartisan border deal and we've had times when it's been a crisis at the border and we finally came together, Democrats and Republicans working across the aisle, the way the Senate and Congress is supposed to work, and we had an agreement, and it's really unfortunate that the former president, Donald Trump, told Republicans in the Senate that they weren't allowed to vote for this and the reason is he realizes that he needed this for the election, so he doesn't actually want to solve this problem.  He just wants to talk about the problem or take a picture of the border which is what we've seen from him and we've seen this from JD Vance. So, that's very disappointing but that issue is going to be part of the election in Arizona and statewide elections in Arizona are very close so we are going to work really hard to make sure Kamala Harris and Tim Walz win in Arizona and win the election.  COLBERT: Another issue—another issue that has been brought to the fore tragically recently gun reform is important to you as a lawmaker, but obviously to you in a deeply personal way. There’s another tragedy yesterday in Georgia. One reaction to that, which is perfectly natural, is grief and rage, and another one is to shut down because there is so much of it. What would you say to people out there who just don't want to think about this anymore? KELLY: Well, what you said is true. For me, this is really personal. There are parents and family members in Georgia yesterday that got the call that I got. That, in my case, that Gabby, my wife, Gabby Giffords, was shot and then a call a little bit later that she was shot in the head. There are people that lost their loved ones yesterday and it's tragic that today we live in this country that has the highest rate of gun violence, especially gun violence against children, and it makes us stand out as a country, like in the worst of ways and the really sad thing about this is we know what to do about it.  In states that have stronger gun laws, there are less people that get shot and killed, and there are common sense solutions that most Americans support that could really, really help.  The problem is this has gotten really politicized over the years and money from the gun lobby that's put into our elections, but we know what to do. That's the good part, so I would recommend people don't shut down and when you're deciding upon who you're going to vote for in an election, you should make a decision based on issues, and if this is an issue you want fixed and we can fix it, hold your elected people, your elected leaders accountable. So, please do that. … COLBERT: Hey, everybody, it’s the author of the new children's book Mousetronaut Saves The World. You served the country for 25 years in the Navy and did 39 combat missions. How do you feel or what is your reaction when you see the former president, who avoided the draft through bone spurs, disrespecting in a myriad ways the men and women who have served, sacrificed, and many of whom have died for our country? KELLY: Yeah, it's troubling. I've watched Donald Trump over his four years as president, as commander-in-chief. The things he has said about veterans who – service members who have paid the ultimate price, World War I veterans who are buried in the cemetery, calling them suckers and losers and then what happened at Arlington in the last week. I mean, he's a guy, this is my view on this. He puts everybody into one of two categories. You're either the con man or you're the person getting conned and he feels people were somehow tricked into serving the military.  When I was flying over Iraq in the first Gulf War and I had a missile blow up next to my airplane on my first combat mission, not for one second did I feel like I was tricked into serving in the military. I mean, we, people go into the military for different reasons, but most of us go there because there is something more important than ourselves.  The safety of our fellow citizens, our country, you know, service, patriotism, and I don't think the former president gets that, but I know who does get that, and that's Kamala Harris. I've talked to her about service. I've talked to her about the military. So, we've just got to make sure that Donald Trump should not be commander-in chief again. That is very clear to me. 

NBA Hall of Fame member Charles Barkley unloaded on WNBA players for being "petty" toward rookie star Caitlin Clark.Appearing on "The Bill Simmons Podcast," the former player said that the WNBA, but mostly the players, have handled Clark's rise to fame about as poorly as possible. "These ladies — and I'm a WNBA fan — they cannot have f***ed this Caitlin Clark thing up any worse if they tried," Barkley said in a clip circulating from the podcast."If you got a bunch of dudes in a room and said, 'Let's f*** up the WNBA,' we couldn't have come up with a massive plan [better than] what these women have done," Barkley hilariously added.Barkley continued, commenting on Clark's wide appeal and ability to bring in ratings for the flailing league."This girl is incredible. The [amount] of attention, eyeballs she's brought to college and the pros ... and for these women to have this petty jealousness ... you're saying to yourself, 'damn, what is going on here?'"'There's been so much negativity, and a lot of it is just petty jealousness.'Clark made headlines in June 2024 when data revealed she had been tripling the league's average viewership when she played and was doubling the average attendance at arenas where she competed.Still, it seems the league has fumbled its opportunities and is still likely to lose upwards of $50 million dollars for the season, Blaze News previously reported."The thing I love about [Clark], she never says a word," Barkley went on. "But these ladies, who I love and respect their game, they couldn't have f***ed this thing up any worse."Barkley's comments come after Clark recorded her second triple-double of the season with 24 points, 10 rebounds, and 10 assists. She was the first WNBA rookie to get a triple-double and only the sixth WNBA player to have multiple. Clark also recently became the first rookie to make 100 three-pointers in a season and the sixth player overall to complete the feat, per CNN."There's been so much negativity, and a lot of it is just petty jealousness," Barkley later commented, noting Clark's snub from the Team USA's Olympic roster."I tell you what was really good that happened to her – not making the Olympic team. Giving her that time off has given her a chance to recharge her batteries."Barkley has called out WNBA players for being "petty" toward Clark before, as well. In May 2024, he insulted the women of the league for not being grateful about getting private jets, which he said was thanks to Clark:"You women out there, y'all petty, man! ... Y'all should be thanking that girl for gettin' y'all ass private charters, all the money and visibility she's bringing to the WNBA."The WNBA playoffs kick off in late September; Clark's Indiana Fever have clinched a playoff spot.Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

A.G. Sulzberger, the chairman and publisher of the New York Times, concern-mongered Wednesday in the pages of the Washington Post about the fate of press freedoms under a second Trump term. The multimillionaire newspaperman suggested that unlike his first go-around, this time Trump might actually come to resemble his caricatures in the Times and other establishmentarian outfits similarly compromised in bygone years by certain three-letter agencies. As part of his mental gymnastics routine, Sulzberger attempted to draw parallels to real and perceived attacks on press freedom abroad — in countries such as India, Hungary, and Brazil — never once mentioning the successful efforts in recent years by the Biden-Harris administration to coerce companies to suppress and censor Americans' speech, including that of journalists such as Jim Hoft of the Gateway Pundit. After insinuating that his paper is neutral and stating he isn't interested in "wading into politics," Sulzberger claimed that "would-be authoritarians" abroad found encouragement for their respective media crackdowns, not in President Barack Obama's war on whistleblowers or his Department of Justice's targeting of Julian Assange, but in Trump's characterization of the mainstream corporate media as "fake news." 'Trust in the news media sits at historic lows in much of the world.' Sulzberger claimed that Trump used the term "as a cudgel to dismiss and attack journalism that challenged him," glossing over various other reasons informing the Republican's use of the term and why the term ultimately found such resonance with the American public. The context that appears to be missing is that among the apparent targets of Trump's branding were those who dutifully suggested British spy Christopher Steele's Democratic-funded dossier was legitimate; falsely suggested that Trump and his team conspired with the Russians to secure victory in the 2016 presidential election; joined spies and the Biden campaign in falsely suggesting the Hunter Biden laptop story was Russian misinformation; and falsely claimed Trump said all Mexicans were rapists. Sulzberger's own publication is not blameless, having been an exponent of the Russian collusion hoax; falsely claimed Trump supporters killed U.S. Capitol Police Officer Brian Sicknick with a fire extinguisher; falsely reported on the basis of terrorist propaganda that Israel blew up a Gazan hospital; and suggested that the Babylon Bee, a satire website, was a "far-right misinformation site." Despite Sulzberger's portrayal of the corporate media as victims of Trump's hostility, he also neglected to mention that this hostility was for them both profitable and reciprocal. According to Pew Research, 20% of stories in the press about Obama in his first 60 days in office were negative and 42% were positive. In Biden's first 60 days, 19% of the stories were negative; 27% were positive. In Trump's first 60 days, 62% of the stories about his presidency were negative and only 5% were positive. A Harvard University study found that 80% of the press coverage of Trump during his first 100 days — including in the Times — was negative. Thomas E. Patterson, professor of government and the press at the Kennedy School, wrote, "Trump's coverage was unsparing. In no week did the coverage drop below 70 percent negative and it reached 90 percent negative at its peak." The only major dip in negativity came when Trump ordered missile attacks on Syria following allegations that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad gassed his own people. The corporate media's attacks on Trump have continued into this election cycle. The Media Research Center revealed last month that on CBS, NBC, and ABC, Kamala Harris was painted in a favorable light in 84% of their coverage, whereas Trump was depicted negatively in 89% of their coverage, reported the New York Sun. Although Sulzberger was willing to acknowledge that "trust in the news media sits at historic lows in much of the world," he did not credit partisan hackery, "fiery but mostly peaceful" reports, or successive media hoaxes along the lines of the costly coverage of former Covington Catholic student Nick Sandmann's innocent smiling near the Lincoln Memorial in 2019. Instead, Sulzberger suggested the decline was "helped along by the flood of misinformation, conspiracy theories, propaganda and clickbait unleashed on social media." Sulzberger's ostensible expression of contempt for the free flow of information online was published the same day that users on social media forced the Associated Press to correct its latest misleading post. According to the Times' publisher, Trump's supposed anti-press action "would likely be informed by his open admiration for the ruthlessly effective playbook of authoritarians such as [Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor] Orban." The playbook, according to Sulzberger, usually involves the following five steps: "Create a climate hospitable to crackdowns on the media by sowing public distrust in independent journalism and normalizing the harassment of the people who produce it." "Manipulate legal and regulatory authority — such as taxation, immigration enforcement and privacy protections — to punish offending journalists and news organizations." "Exploit the courts, most often through civil litigation, to effectively impose additional logistical and financial penalties on disfavored journalism, even in cases without legal merit." "Increase the scale of attacks on journalists and their employers by encouraging powerful supporters in other parts of the public and private sector to adopt versions of these tactics." "Use the levers of power not just to punish independent journalists but also to reward those who demonstrate fealty to their leadership. This includes helping supporters of the ruling party gain control of news organizations financially weakened by all the aforementioned efforts." Sulzberger figures that Trump has proven himself open to the strategies in this playbook, having previously sued companies for defamation; expressed an interest in de-funding NPR; impeded Amazon's defense contracting over his "serial displeasure" with Jeff Bezos' Washington Post; and challenged corporate media companies' licenses. The Times' publisher concluded his essay by recycling platitudes he's leaned on in recent years and with multiple paragraphs characterizing his publication as a bulwark against the imagined threats of a future administration or even state advertising revenue. Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

When Brazilian Superior Electoral Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes wanted to censor his political opponents on X (formerly Twitter), Elon Musk – surprise, surprise – said no. Moraes, angry that his “illegal orders” per the Brazilian Constitution were denied, then retaliated by banning the X platform in Brazil. Tech lawyer Preston Byrne joins Jill Savage and the "Blaze News Tonight" panel to shed light on the situation. - YouTube www.youtube.com “What’s been the reaction to Brazil banning X so far?” asks Jill. “Depends really on who you talk to. If you talk to people on the center-left or European regulators, or Brazilian regulators for that matter, they tend to celebrate this because they think that Elon and X have been problematic for global discourse, and they want people who are speaking on X to be quiet. If you talk to people who are more on the libertarian axis, they’re unhappy with it,” says Byrne. Many of those who are celebrating Brazil’s decree are the same people who are calling for Musk’s arrest. Indeed the suggestion that the modern world’s free speech warrior belongs behind bars has grown from a mere whisper to an ominous roar. “Over the past month, the left-wing Guardian newspaper in England has run no fewer than three op-eds calling for Elon Musk's arrest,” Byrne wrote in a recent Blaze Align article. But despite the outcry, Byrne thinks Musk’s arrest is highly unlikely. “The U.S. is never going to extradite Elon for running X in the manner he chooses in the United States,” says Byrne, “and the Federal Trade Commission is barred by federal statute from imposing civil penalties for what they suggest is the problem here, which is that Elon isn't moderating content appropriately.” However, “there are political forces outside of the United States – particularly in the European Union, United Kingdom, Australia, and New Zealand – which want to exercise greater control of the online information space,” he says, but “an arrest is pretty much out of the question. That's not preventing people from suggesting it, [though].” Jill points to “France arresting the Telegram CEO” and “U.K. citizens being arrested for what they post on social media” as cause for concern. Byrne acknowledges that X is “really the first example of a global company or a company of global scale pushing back on censorship by simply refusing to play ball.” “Regulators in places like Europe and Brazil are not really in a great position because what they're learning is that if an American decides they're going to exercise their free speech rights in the United States, there's not a whole lot they can do about it except one of two options: They can either censor their own people, which is what Brazil has chosen to do, or they could militarily invade the United States and seize the servers in Texas, which obviously is not going to happen,” says Byrne. Blaze Media’s editor in chief, Matthew Peterson, however, isn’t sure how much longer American citizens, like Musk, will be able to exercise their First Amendment rights – especially considering that “America is going into an election" where one party has already been colluding with tech companies to censor free speech. To hear more of the debate, watch the clip above. Want more from Blaze News Tonight?To enjoy more provocative opinions, expert analysis, and breaking stories you won’t see anywhere else, subscribe to BlazeTV — the largest multi-platform network of voices who love America, defend the Constitution, and live the American dream.

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