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“You got to pay respect to people that have loved you right from the beginning,” Trump said.

The question the Yankees were set to ask among themselves Friday: Do they, indeed, need him for the AL Division Series? 

It would give the inspector general the purchase authority and job classifications he says he needs to hold the High-Speed Rail Authority accountable.

Five weeks ago, Chris Sale was a problem for the Dodgers. In a 1-0 win for the Braves at Truist Park, Sale pitched a complete-game shutout, striking out 11 batters over nine innings. He allowed only five hits. He didn’t walk a batter. But the Dodgers won’t see Sale on the mound at Dodger Stadium...

A-list attendees included Cynthia Erivo, Zoe Saldana, Emmy Rossum and more.

A-list attendees included Cynthia Erivo, Zoe Saldana, Emmy Rossum and more.

With conditions stacking up, California could soon see its highest sea levels ever recorded.

Lynlee Pollis, on trial for the crash that killed SMU student Honor Wallace, had a BAC of 0.294%, nearly four times the legal limit.

NASA Wants To Resurrect The SR-71 Blackbird

Earlier this month, NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman fueled speculation about the agency's high-speed flight research plans by unveiling a mysterious aircraft silhouette on a slide titled "Rebuilding our X-plane portfolio."

Asked whether the image on the slide depicted the famed SR-71 Blackbird, Isaacman denied it was a Blackbird but signaled renewed ambitions for high-altitude, high-speed flight, saying NASA was getting back into the business of "flying high and fast again."

NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman showed a mysterious aircraft during the portion of his All-In Summit presentation on rebuilding NASA’s X-plane portfolio ✈️

• Isaacman showed a dark silhouette resembling a next-generation SR-71 Blackbird while discussing 'radical airframe and… pic.twitter.com/VNEDExk8K0

— Latest in space (@latestinspace) September 22, 2026

This brings us to an Aviation Week report saying NASA is working to return a Blackbird to flight after nearly three decades in retirement.

The agency has approached retired Blackbird engineers about restoring Tail No. 844, a 59-year-old aircraft removed earlier this year from an outdoor display at NASA's Armstrong Flight Research Center in California.

The aircraft was moved into a former Space Shuttle hangar, where crews have been working on it, former NASA and Air Force test engineer Mike Relja revealed to the aviation news website. 

However, as the outlet shared, there is one major problem:

The Air Force and NASA destroyed a $600 million supply of spare parts for the Blackbird fleet in 2007. The move came long after it seemed unlikely, if not impossible, that an SR-71A would return to operational service.

That decision could lead to significant restart costs. In addition to all of the consumable spares that must be in regular supply, NASA would need to restore access to the Blackbird's unique JP-7 fuel blend, the triethylborane ignition chemical, engine oil and hydraulic fluids, Relja adds. A hodgepodge of bespoke ground equipment also no longer exists, leaving the current effort without vital, if unheralded, pieces of equipment.

"To raise the wing, you need a cart," he says. "To get the engine out, you need a cart. You need equipment to pull the [engine] spikes, pull the [ejection] seat. All that stuff is gone."

When Relja raised all of these issues with Ash, the NASA manager assured him it would not be a problem, without going into details about their solutions.

"Every time I threw one of these things out there, he says, 'Oh, engineering will take care of that [and] engineering will take care of that,'" Relja recalls.

At the same time, he does not dismiss a return to flight as impossible, especially if NASA has enough resources to make it achievable.

"If you got a ton of money, maybe you can make it happen," he says. "They went to the Moon, you know."

Why NASA wants to restore the SR-71 to flightworthy status remains unclear. Reports over the years have pointed to Lockheed Martin's development of the SR-72, dubbed the "Son of Blackbird," for intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance missions. Yet no flight tests have been publicly confirmed. 

Tyler Durden Fri, 10/02/2026 - 22:10

In a New York Times essay, Karine Jean-Pierre warns that Donald Trump is repeating Joe Biden's mistake of ignoring voters' lived economic realities.

Bryce Harper is expecting change in Philadelphia after another disappointing October.

In 23 years in the Highlands in Pacific Palisades, a one-way-in, one-way-out neighborhood, I had a rule: If a fire in the hills burned more than an hour, I left.

Dave Portnoy and Barstool Sports’ partnership with Fox Sports is coming with a shakeup.

And on the Rangers’ third game in four nights, Dylan Garand pitched his first career shutout. 

The lawsuit follows months of fierce opposition from residents.

A new report about Stanford University notes that the number of students making new commitments to faith is skyrocketing.

Keon Ellis came to play for the Nets for one major reason: Jordi Fernández. 

Mystery Gunmen Slaughter Seven People On Bus In Syria's Homs

Via Middle East Eye

Gunmen in Syria killed seven people and wounded four others after opening fire on a civilian bus in western Homs province on Wednesday evening.

The bus was carrying company employees returning home from work when it came under fire as it crossed the Masyaf Bridge in the western Homs countryside, according to the Homs Health Directorate.

Downtown Homs. Wiki Commons

Security units were immediately deployed to the scene to secure the area, while criminal investigators began collecting evidence to identify those responsible and determine the motive, according to Homs Internal Security Forces commander Brig Gen Bassem Mohammad Shaaban.

The injured were taken to hospitals across the governorate, while security forces began an investigation.

Maan Mahmoud Fahd, director of the Homs Grand Hospital, told Sana that four individuals were declared dead upon arrival, after suffering from severe gunshot wounds to the head and chest.

No group has yet claimed responsibility, and authorities have not named any suspects. Shaaban vowed to pursue those responsible, saying the attack would not go unpunished.

"We view this cowardly attack as an attempt to undermine security in Homs and destabilise the stability we have worked to consolidate," Shaaban said.

"We will not allow criminals to threaten the security of our people or undermine the stability the city is experiencing," he added.

The ambush was one of several recent attacks to raise security concerns in Syria since the fall of Bashar al-Assad's government in December 2024.

Brigadier General Munir al-Hariri, a Syrian military analyst, told Syria TV that former Assad loyalists were most likely behind Wednesday's attack, which he said aimed to destabilize security in the country. [ZH: We should note the presence of the literally hundreds if not thousands of jihadist groups, many of them foreign, unleashed on Syria during the height of the CIA/NATO/Gulf-backed proxy war to overthrow Assad].

In August, a bus carrying members of the internal security forces was targeted near Damascus, while an explosive device exploded on a passenger bus in Jaramana, southeast of the capital, wounding 14 people earlier that month.

Gas pipeline blast

The bus attack was one of three major security incidents to hit Syria on Wednesday. A gas pipeline explosion at the Tishreen thermal power plant in Syria's Damascus countryside on Wednesday evening forced three power stations out of service, the Syrian Electricity Company said, warning that the shutdown would cause longer scheduled power cuts.

The blast triggered a large fire and injured two people, according to state broadcaster Alikhbaria. The explosion hit a pressure-reduction station at the plant entrance and damaged the two gas lines that supply it, the Syrian Petroleum Company said.

The loss of gas supplies shut down the Deir Ali and Nasiriyah plants, along with Tishreen, which lies about 36km from the capital.

Abdul Hamid Salat, director of the energy ministry's media department, said the interruption to gas supplies had also affected water-pumping and treatment stations, disrupting services for hundreds of thousands of people across Damascus and its countryside, Daraa, Sweida and Quneitra.

Speaking at the site late on Wednesday, Energy Minister Mohammad al-Bashir said the fire was brought under control overnight. Al-Bashir added specialists would inspect the site once civil defense teams finished cooling it, to determine "the causes and circumstances precisely".

The Homs microbus that was targeted, via SANA

Authorities have not yet established whether the explosion resulted from a technical fault, a deliberate attack or sabotage.

Israeli incursion

Israeli forces fired three artillery shells at the area around al-Mantara Dam in Syria's southern Quneitra province on Wednesday. No immediate casualties or damage were reported.

On Thursday morning, Israeli forces also entered the village of Saida al-Golan in southern Quneitra with around 12 military vehicles as students were making their way to school. The forces later withdrew towards villages in the Yarmouk Basin, with no reports of arrests or house searches.

Reports from Al-Araby News outlet indicate that there was an assassination attempt on a Ministry of Defence officer in the city of Sanamen, situated to the north of Dara.The shelling came amid continued Israeli military activity in southern Syria.

On Tuesday, Israeli forces carried out incursions in Quneitra, including an operation in which soldiers questioned and assaulted shepherds, according to Syrian state media.

The latest developments also come days after Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa said talks with Israel on a security framework had reached nearly 90 percent agreement before Israel withdrew or introduced additional conditions.

Speaking at an Atlantic Council panel in New York last week, al-Sharaa said several rounds of negotiations had taken place over the previous year with US involvement and that the talks were continuing.

Tyler Durden Fri, 10/02/2026 - 21:45

People sometimes might tell you that you need to put your feelings aside.

First Lady Melania Trump devoted her first term to the problem of bullying — and she had a good point.