Dumbest. Argument. Ever.

China's reusable test spacecraft has released an as-yet unidentified object into space, nearly six months after it launched. This is the seventh object released by the plane since December 14, with the previous six found to be transmitting a repeating pattern.The latest object, highlighted by astronomer Jonathan McDowell, appears to have been released by the plane on Friday, performing a maneuver at around the same time.                 IFLScience is not responsible for content shared from external sites."This object could be a subsatellite deployment, or it could be a piece of hardware ejected prior to end of mission and deorbit (the spaceplane's first flight did something similar)," McDowell added. "Will be interesting to see if the plane maneuvers or lands soon."The object is the seventh object discovered to be released by the spaceplane. Shortly after launch, amateur astronomer and satellite tracker Scott Tilley noticed that trailing behind the craft were six "mysterious wingmen", several of which were emitting signals.                                   IFLScience is not responsible for content shared from external sites.The objects, which were tracked by several organizations, emitted different kinds of data. "OBJECT A's or nearby emission is reminiscent of earlier Chinese space plane 'wingman' emissions in the sense the signal is modulated with a limited amount of data," Tilley told Space.com, adding that objects labeled D and E look like they're broadcasting placeholder signals, sending no useful data. Analyzing the data from OBJECT A, amateur radio operator Daniel Estévez found small variations in the transmission, but not much else."One thing is clear," he wrote on his website. "The signal doesn’t have much data in it, as most of the bits show the same repeating pattern."The purpose of the additional satellites, or what the seventh object is, remains unclear, and China hasn't gone into the specifics of what the spaceplane and associated objects are doing. It's not that unusual for governments to be secretive about their activities in space. Right now, for instance, Elon Musk's firm SpaceX is working on a classified contract for the US government. But nor is it unusual for governments to conduct research in space, or for spacecraft to deliver payloads for other companies. Though details are sparse, Chinese state media says that the spaceplane is testing reusable technology."The reusable test spacecraft will operate in orbit for some time before returning to the scheduled landing site in China," the Chinese government-run Xinhua News Agency reported of the launch. "During the in-orbit operation, the spacecraft will conduct verifications for reusable technologies and space science experiments to provide technical support for the peaceful use of space."

The highly pathogenic H5N1 bird flu strain that’s been spreading among poultry, wild birds, and a number of mammal species across the globe has been detected for the first time in beef from a US cow. The meat did not enter the food supply – but after the recent detection of virus fragments in milk, it’s led some to question whether we can be totally confident that the food system will never be a source of transmission to humans.The USDA Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) announced on Friday, May 24, that beef from 96 dairy cows had been tested for flu virus particles. Tissue samples, including muscle, from one cow tested positive. Since this cow had been culled due to showing signs of illness, the Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) stressed that it could not have entered the food supply.“These actions provide further confidence that the food safety system we have in place is working,” the announcement reads, adding, “USDA is confident that the meat supply is safe.”The outbreak has so far been limited to dairy cattle, and no virus has been detected in herds raised for meat. Similar questions were asked about the commercial milk supply when inactive H5N1 fragments were detected in pasteurized samples back in April, but the very fact that the fragments were inactivated shows that our best defense against milk-borne pathogens – pasteurization – was working as intended. Any risk is likely to arise from consuming raw milk, which is a very bad idea at the best of times. With beef, however, it may not be so simple. APHIS says it continues to recommend cooking all meat to the safe internal temperatures that have been determined to kill any microbes that might be lurking, but the fact is that beef is frequently consumed rare, or even raw. This fact, according to food safety and veterinary health expert Dr Gail Hansen, who spoke to the New York Times, could mean the agency’s confidence in the total safety of the meat supply is premature. “So once again the assurances from government agencies, before the science is in to confirm or deny the assumptions, continue to undermine the confidence by the public,” Hansen said. However, there is reason to believe that even rare beef might be safe. In its announcement about the detection of H5N1 in dairy cow tissues, APHIS also details an experiment carried out by the Agricultural Research Service (ARS). Large amounts of H5N1 were added to some burger patties before they were fried up to different temperatures and tested.“There was no virus present in the burgers cooked to 145 (medium) or 160 (well done) degrees, which is FSIS' recommended cooking temperature,” they said. “Even cooking burgers to 120 (rare) degrees, which is well below the recommended temperature, substantially inactivated the virus.”The message from them is clear – meat or milk, even from infected cows, should be safe for human consumption as long as usual precautions around cooking, handling, and pasteurization are followed. It's difficult not to be concerned by news of the continued spread of H5N1 flu. The virus has reached the remotest corners of our planet, affecting species we might not have thought would be vulnerable. While the US dairy cow outbreaks have led to two recorded human cases so far, both individuals have thankfully recovered, after experiencing only mild symptoms. Sustained transmission between humans, which the virus would have to figure out if were to have true pandemic potential, has not been seen. But if we don’t want to sleepwalk into the next health emergency, it’s vital that agencies like the USDA keep a close watch on how the outbreak is progressing, and analyses like this are a big part of that. 

The New York Times Bidenomics apologist Paul Krugman took a detour from regurgitating his usual awful economic takes — AGAIN — to throw another fit over climate change “denial.” Krugman decried the “Stench of Climate Change Denial” in his latest May 27 screed. Krugman drummed up scare-porn over an alleged “emerging sewage crisis” along the Gulf and South Atlantic coasts and claimed it was due to rising sea levels caused by climate change. “In short, it’s not hard to see some terrible outcomes in the not-too-distant future, even before full global catastrophe arrives. Bad stuff is coming, and we’re already starting to smell it,” Krugman decried.  Yes, complaining about overwhelmed, smelly sewers and blaming climate change is what Krugman’s been reduced to, and as usual he plays loose with the facts. As JunkScience.com founder Steve Milloy told MRC Business, “As usual, Paul Krugman gets his facts wrong on climate.” The credibility-challenged economist just can’t seem to quit making himself look more foolish than he already has. After all, this is the same Krugman who absurdly advocated that Americans should “politicize the weather.” Milloy wasn’t having it. “The East Coast is not experiencing sea level rise from ‘climate change,’” Milloy noted. Rather, the coast “ is sinking from natural subsidence as exacerbated by groundwater withdrawal. Sea level rise itself is natural and has been constant for the past 150 years.” Krugman then used his climate change nonsense as a predicate to justify — you guessed it — massive government spending. “Now imagine the collision between that kind of politics and the urgent need for substantial public spending, on everything from sea walls to sewer systems, to limit climate damage.” Krugman perhaps sensed that his proposition was pure idiocy, as he tried to anticipate the incoming backlash as just a right-wing onslaught: Spending on that scale will almost surely require new tax revenue. How quickly do you think right-wing culture warriors will agree to that? Krugman spends most of his time gaslighting readers about how Biden’s supposed economic genius is defeating America’s inflation crisis (Newsflash: it isn’t), but then apparently doesn’t sense the lunacy in shifting gears at a whim to advocate for the very government spending that stimulated that crisis in the first place. Krugman even propagandized about the risk of “tens of millions of climate refugees” if drastic mitigation measures aren’t implemented to stem the tide of climate change. He also warned of an impending eco-Armageddon if former President Donald Trump is reelected in November: “So I’m very worried about the climate future. We probably won’t do enough to limit emissions; President Biden has done far more than any of his predecessors, but it’s still not enough, and Donald Trump has promised oil executives that if he wins, he will reverse much of what Biden has done. Beyond that, we’re unlikely to do enough to limit the damage.” Unimpressed, Milloy ripped Krugman for once again misinforming readers — this time on the cause of rising sea levels. “There is no fingerprint of emissions on sea level rise or anything else,” Milloy stated. “These facts are easily discoverable on the Internet, but Krugman, whose background includes advising the criminal enterprise known as Enron, would rather promote the climate hoax and its totalitarian political agenda than educate his readers.” Conservatives are under attack. Contact The New York Times at 800-698-4637 and demand it distance itself from Krugman’s climate propaganda.

The Oct. 7 Hamas attacks on Israel reverberated throughout the West. Whereas many came out to mourn the dead and condemn the terrorists responsible, anti-Semites alternatively came out of the woodwork to condemn Israel and celebrate Hamas. FBI Director Christopher Wray warned that anti-Semitism in the United States was nearing "historic levels" as student radicals endorsed by the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine and Hamas began massing on college campuses and taking to the streets, chanting genocidal slogans and parroting anti-Israeli talking points. Republican lawmakers uniformly condemned the attacks and the anti-Semitism that followed. While some Democrats sided with Israel and the Jewish people against terrorists, leftists such as Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) and her fellow travelers in the Democratic Party joined the chorus of pro-Hamas protesters calling for Israel's ruin. Having observed this much, Bill Maher was unwilling to accept the argument on the Sunday episode of his "Club Random" podcast that the anti-Semitism now on full display is a product of the American right. Late in their relatively innocuous conversation about relationships, family, and comedy, Sandra Bernhard, a comedian and Democratic booster, told Maher that her Jewish forebears migrated to the U.S. after fleeing a Russian pogrom. "Do you feel that flowing through your veins?" asked Maher. "Yup," said Bernhard. "But I'll tell you something: I am not — you know, everybody's like up in arms now about being Jewish. Suddenly everybody's discovered their Judaism. It's like, I grew up Jewish. I was bat mitzvahed. I went to Hebrew school. I did the whole thing. You know, I like being Jewish." "Everybody's suddenly like, 'I'm Jewish and I'm being persec —.' I don't feel persecuted," said Bernhard. "Well, not persecuted perhaps, but there is an anti-Semitism afoot in this country that we haven't had in a very long time," said Maher. "And I never thought I'd see the day." 'It comes from the right wing.' "I'll tell you where it comes from," said Bernhard. "It comes from the right wing. The right — the extreme." "No, it doesn't," said Maher without missing a beat. "You think it's [the] left?" asked Bernhard. "There's anti-Semitism on both sides," said Maher. "The left wing is even worse. ... That is coming down from elite colleges who see everything only through a racial lens. They are stupid. They don't know history. They think everything is about colonizers and racists and how awful America is." 'None of this jives with the facts.' Maher appeared keen to extend an olive branch to radicals, saying, "And America has done some bad things. But to drag Israel into this as the stand-in for every bad thing white people ever did — this is not any more complicated to most of these college kids than the Palestinians are brown and poor and the Israelis are rich and white, even though half of them are not rich and certainly not white." "So they think they're rich and white so they're the colonizers and the apartheid people and the genocide people. None of this jives with the facts," added the host. Bernhard said, "But can we get on the same page and agree that Benjamin Netanyahu is a s*** disturber and needs to be yanked out of Israel? He is not good for Israel. He is not good for Jews. He has also contributed to the global mistrust. ... He is solidly to blame for everything that is happening right now." "He is so not to blame for everything that's happening," Maher fired back. "That's the fault of the Palestinian people and the religion of Islam, which gets lost in all of this. I mean, we are fighting." "What?" interjected Bernhard. 'Mostly to blame is Hamas.' "Islam," responded Maher. "You've heard of it?" "How is that? What does that have to do with —?" asked Bernhard. "You said Netanyahu was mostly to blame. Mostly to blame is Hamas," added Maher. The host proceeded to suggest that the current predicament is the result of the terrorist group using foreign aid money over the course of years to buy bombs and make tunnels rather than feed the hungry and build adequate health care facilities. Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

Why the former president is likely to be convicted.

AP, Politico Say the Quiet Part Out Loud About Who Sent Robert De Niro to Bash Trump

While Taiwan's new president Lai Ching-te may initially be "more accommodating" when it comes to diplomacy with Beijing, Far East experts largely expect "continuity" when it comes to policy.

The House Majority PAC is starting a $100 million fund that will focus on a nationwide abortion rights outreach campaign while trying to shift attention away from President Joe Biden's low poll numbers and voters' concerns about the border and immigration.

The White House on Wednesday unveiled nearly $900 million in awards to 530 school districts to replace thousands of aging, gas-fueled school buses with cleaner, mainly electric models.