Monday’s Forum
Steven L. Taylor
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Monday, February 16, 2026
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16 comments
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About Steven L. Taylor
Steven L. Taylor is a Professor Emeritus of Political Science and former College of Arts and Sciences Dean. His main areas of expertise include parties, elections, and the institutional design of democracies. His most recent book is the co-authored
A Different Democracy: American Government in a 31-Country Perspective. He earned his Ph.D. from the University of Texas and his BA from the University of California, Irvine. He has been blogging since 2003 (originally at the now defunct Poliblog).
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I will never learn.
“Where did I put my coffee cup?” After wandering and looking around in the usual places (kitchen, bathroom, den). “Oh yeah, the microwave”.
The Mars Emperor of God and Phobos is dead! Long live the Emperor Moon God Consort of Selene!
TL;DR: the government is willing to spend taxpayer money on Moon missions, but not on Mars missions. What’s an Adolf broligarch to do?
Everybody does that.
Interesting.
Newsom signs California-UK clean energy pact
I don’t know if this is just symbolic, both economically and politically, or has real implications. However, I can just see Trump, sputtering and outraged, whining that only he can do foreign policy. I expect an executive order or a DOJ lawsuit soon.
……..
I suspect Trump is about find out about soft power. And throw a fit.
Carney constructs a mega anti-Trump trade alliance
BTW, Artemis 2 will do a free return trajectory to the Moon. Meaning it will overshoot the Moon, swing around it, and be directed straight to Earth. It won’t orbit the Moon,
Overall it’s a test mission for the Orion crew capsule in a long term mission, around 8 days, I think. And of course, the re-entry performance, which will take place at a higher speed than any other re-entry on record.
But why?
Because the two stage Senate Launch System (this joke is getting tiresome) has two stages. This is enough to get the Orion capsule and service module* into orbit, and nothing more. Orion then fires its engine for the free return trajectory insertion.
In contrast Apollo had three stages. The third stage finished putting the Apollo command and service module, along with the lunar module, in orbit. but it had fuel remaining. After doing some checks of the systems, the third stage fired again for the insertion maneuver**.
Which was also a free return trajectory.
Huh?
That was a safety measure. If problems developed along the way which might make a landing impossible, then at least the crew could return to Earth without any further need for maneuvers. If things checked out, there was a mid course correction to change the trajectory to Lunar orbit.
This gives my impression of progress a major setback.
Part of the issue is the SLS wasn’t designed for lunar missions. I’m not sure what it was designed for.
* Said service module was built by the economically backward, in danger of extinction Europeans. More specifically, the European Space Agency.
** Yes, the scene where an Apollo third stage fails to fire in For All Mankind was 100% realistic. So was replacing the guidance component that failed. And so was the misfire that put them into a slightly wrong trajectory afterwards.
I’m less certain they could then throw them a fuel tank.
@Scott:..Newsom signs California-UK clean energy pact
I’m not a constitutional scholar. Maybe there are many agreements between States and foreign countries. I can’t think of any right now.
@Gregory Lawrence Brown:
I think states and even cities sign such pacts, and commercial pacts, all the time. It’s more a commercial than political matter.
Mexican states do this often. also with private companies, either domestic or foreign. This also includes things like sister cities declarations.
Robert Duvall, 95, has died. A great, great actor. RIP.
@Scott:
I think your post jinxed me.
I had to send some VIPs (Very Important Papers) to accounting for Very Important Reasons. I thought I’d scanned them last Friday, and then put them somewhere safe (which usually means giving them back to the supervisor). I sent the email, and they replied one of the VIPs was missing.
So I searched my PC, then the cloud, and couldn’t find it. I asked the supervisor, who didn’t have them. I asked the analysts putting the proposals together, nothing. I looked on my desk, nada. I had discarded some old papers over the weekend, so I searched my trashcan, then the pile of discarded papers, then the one with recycled papers, with help from the leaning lady and a coworker. Nothing.
Just as I was about to concede defeat and beg the supervisor to request them again from the client, which would make him really mad, the coworker asks: “is it this one”? It was.
Where was it? Inside a plastic sleeve hung on my cubicle’s half wall, where I’d left the VIPs on Friday to safeguard them.
@Gregory Lawrence Brown: My sense is that this is a political-first move. It may not be legal, but it kind of dares Trump to bring a lawsuit and argue publicly that clean energy is not something he cares about. We know that, but we pay close attention. Mostly though, he says these things to welcoming audiences, not skeptical ones.
Also, Newsom wants to elevate public awareness of himself. Which this is likely to do. I don’t really care for the guy, but he is good at politics. Remember the whole “I’m legalizing SSM in San Francisco” thing? That wasn’t legal either. But it got a lot of attention.
Boo Radley
To Kill a Mockingbird
@Scott:
Oh, and as is typical, when we found the VIPs, we went down memory lane about other lost VIPs. My most notable one was the payment for admission to submit proposals that we couldn’t find. After tossing the office, pretty much, I just printed out another payment form, went to the bank, and paid out of my own pocket.
When I got back to the office, I needed to make a copy of it. I lifted the copier cover, and there was the original payment on the copier glass.
@Gregory Lawrence Brown: Law enforcement. Most of LE in the US is conducted by the states, so some states have reciprocal enforcement agreements with Canada and Canadian provinces.
“Treaties, alliances, or confederation” it seems, doesn’t cover “agreements” of any kind.
I agree it may be stupid to pelt an actor with fruit, and rush the stage, even if he’s delivering a far-right, hate-filled monologue. It is a play, after all, and it is anti-fascist in tone.
But it’s hard to argue that those pelting the actor and rushing the stage, do not have their hearts in the right place.
Cooking this week featured another iteration of pepper sauce. Why so often (3 of the last 4 weeks)? Partly to play with the consistency and seasoning. I caramelized a whole onion to mix with the sauce this time.
I placed it on top of chicken breast medallions dredged in flour (with oregano and paprika) and then air fried (note to self, flour dredged chicken cooks better on a pan with some oil). Fries on the side.
The other reason is I wanted something quick and simple, after working over 8 hours during the weekend. That worked perfectly well. under 90 minutes including prep, cooking, plating*, and washing all the pots, pans and air fryer. It’s easy to just keep caramelizing the onions while preparing a batch of chicken medallions, if you don’t care whether the onions charr a little (I don’t).
The sauce has enough flavor complexity on its own, though I wonder if it would be very different if I used a higher quality brandy. I don’t think it needs any acidity, which is why I haven’t added mustard to it. I may try a splash of balsamic vinegar next time just to see what it tastes like.
On things I want to try sometime soon, I saw a recipe for chicken stock that uses a whole rotisseries chicken, including the meat, in an instant pot. This makes perfect sense to me, even though I’ve had good results using only bones with whatever meat is left attached on them.
What I’m not sure is what to do with the meat afterwards. The video didn’t say. Online searches say to discard it, which seems wasteful. Further searches say the dark meat can be used in soup or stew, if shredded (which you’d shred before putting in the pot anyway), but that breasts come off terrible.
So, I’ll compromise and use only the dark meat for the stock and save the breasts for another use.
Last, I want to separate the fat from the stock. not so much to make clear stock (who cares), but to try to cook potatoes with it. I’ve some ideas for that.
Damn, it gets boring waiting late at night for the managers to check the proposal and bring in the corrections….
OMFG. El Taco has trademarked his name for use in airports. You know, like “El Taco International Airport.” That’s soon to be a trademark.
This means besides making cities name their airport after him, as he has said Washington Dulles should do, they’ll have to pay him licensing fees and/or royalties.
Trademarking airport names is common, by airport operators. In part to prevent other airports from using their name (there was a kerfuffle about this last year when Oakland airport changed its name to Oakland San Francisco Bay Airport); and to keep others from profiting off their name, say by selling souvenirs with the airport’s brand.
This is not mere greed. It goes beyond that. Financial gluttony or something.