Incredible! A Republican held accountable?

I know it’s hard to believe, but George Santos has been expelled from congress.

By a vote of 311-114, the House voted to expel Santos, with 206 Democrats and 105 Republicans voting for expulsion, and two Democrats and 112 Republicans voting against it. This was just the sixth time in U.S. history that the House has expelled one of its own and the first time the House has done so without a criminal conviction, though Santos doesn’t dispute that he lied about most of his resume. (He does, however, dispute that he broke the law, despite the 23 criminal counts against him and substantial evidence in his indictment—as well as an Ethics report released two weeks ago—that detailed a number of alleged legal violations.)

As members voted on Santos’ removal, the serial fabulist was in and out of the chamber, at one point leaving, and then reappearing with his coat draped over his shoulders to watch the finally tally and shake hands with certain members.

It is revealing, though, that lying on your CV and misappropriating campaign funds can get you expelled, but enabling pedophiles and committing statutory rape, as people like Jordan and Gaetz have done, doesn’t even get you a slap on the wrist, and the ethical standards of the Supreme Court are a joke. It’s the money that matters.

Space Scam

There is a company claiming to be opening a hotel in space — a great big spinning wheel like the space station in 2001: A Space Odyssey. There are a few clues that it’s actually a great big fake.

The first is that they claim that they’ll be opening the first hotel in 2025. You know, sometime within the next two years? Only they don’t have a lick of work done on the project yet.

Then they claim they’ll be opening a second, even larger space hotel in 2027. The first will accommodate 28 guests (or is it 280? The number varies with the source) and the second will house 400.

The rooms will be luxurious. This is far bigger than any cabin on an earthbound cruise ship.

So much room! Such big windows! Such thin walls separating you from the cold vacuum and hard radiation of space!

The founder of the company, John Blincow, is a former airline pilot, lacking any training in the sciences or engineering. He seems to have spent the last 20 years founding companies with big dreams that don’t do anything.

The company seems to have scaled down their promises. Their old ad copy says the goal is to build a space station-shaped hotel near a Disney theme park. That was in 2021. They don’t seem to have done it.

The original company seems to make money, not from engineering, but from computer dating.

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The new company, Orbital Assembly, seems to change their name fairly regularly. There’s nothing on their web page about a space hotel, but they did get a $1.7 million contract from the Space Force to build something. Communications gear? It’s kind of fuzzy.

Somehow, this “space hotel” gets promoted in newspaper articles/ads (hard to tell them apart) every year for the last few years. The latest was just a month ago, still making the same incredible claims every time, and always with the same opening year.

Scammers gotta scam, but it’s still appalling how news media, from CNN to Business Insider to MSN, are falling for it. Maybe they’ll get competent editors someday.

P.S. They’re also suggesting that a weekend stay in a space hotel would cost about $5 million. No mention of funeral costs, cancer treatments after the visit, etc. That’s all extra.

The day is ruined

I got up at 4:30am, went straight to work and hammered out the exam & exam key for my students, and prepped my lecture for today. I was on fire, gettin’ stuff done, and then I made coffee and decided to whip up a breakfast burrito, as one does.

I am out of hot sauce.

What is the point of our existence anyway? Nothing matters. We come from the void, we go into the void. Why did I get out of bed? Why am I here? There is nothingness all around me.