Good morning! Welcome to Saturday, April 11, 2026. Today is World Parkinson's Day, National Living Donor Day, National Pet Day, and just for fun, I'll mention it is also International Louie Louie Day — dedicated to Richard Berry and his famous song "Louie Louie," observed on his birthday. Today is also the day I breathe a sigh of relief, in recognition of the fact that I'll never win a Pulitzer prize.
1814 Napoléon Bonaparte abdicates unconditionally, and is exiled to the island of Elba in the Mediterranean.
1865 Abraham Lincoln urges a spirit of generous conciliation during Reconstruction.
1890 Ellis Island, New York, is designated as an immigration station.
1933 Hermann Göring becomes Premier of Prussia.
1945 Four soldiers in the Sixth Armored Division of the U.S. Third Army liberate the Nazi concentration camp Buchenwald, freeing thousands, including Elie Wiesel.
1966 Frank Sinatra records "Strangers in the Night."
1976 The Apple I computer, which Steve Wozniak created, is released.
1981 Ronald Reagan arrives home from the hospital after John Hinkley shot him.
Birthdays Today include James Parkinson, English physician (who provided the first description of Parkinson's disease); Masaru Ibuka, Japanese electronics industrialist (Sony corporation); Howard W. Koch, American producer and director (Frankenstein, Airplane II); Hugh Carey, American attorney and Democratic party politician (governor of New York, 1975-82; US representative from New York, 1961-74); Richard Berry, American doo-wop bass vocalist and songwriter ("Louie, Louie"); Ellen Goodman, American political columnist (Pulitzer 1980); and TV presenter Jeremy Clarkson, (Top Gear, Grand Tour, Clarkson's Farm).
If today's your day as well, do it up right today.
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To start today, I want to send a shout-out to the Artemis II folks, who came home from a successful mission last night. It was a real pleasure to watch their mission and particularly their safe return last night. I caught it directly from NASA’s HD feed, at a full 1080P.
I watched, recalling being hustled out of my grade school classroom to the main foyer at 0930, with about every other kid in grades k-4, to watch John Glen taking off and orbiting the earth. Then, four hours later, being hustled back out to see him splashing down. The network feed was all black and white, and below even the quality one might get out of a 525-line screen under better conditions. Even this short newsreel is of better quality than what we saw that day. But I was fascinated.
Our Ed Morrissey over at HotAir made mention of the Artemis flight last night as well. Look toward the bottom of his update. And here’s a clue: China was watching, too. With XI and his happy band of wandering socialists, the military implications of that trip around the moon, trust me, have not been lost on them.
Think: The most recent Chinese-crewed spaceflight is Shenzhou 21, which is currently ongoing, with its three astronauts currently housed at the Tiangong space station. It is the 16th crewed Chinese spaceflight, and the 21st flight overall of the Shenzhou program. China, at last word, was planning on a manned mission to the moon in 2030. Meanwhile Artemis IV is planned for a moon landing by 2028. You do the math.
Oh, and Ed makes some comments about what to expect from the ceasefire talks in Islamabad today, which is what I was originally going to talk about. Actually, I'm glad I thought to add the Artemis thoughts, because they bear on this as well, as you will see. Ed speaks for me here when he says:
If Iran continues to threaten shipping in the Gulf, this conversation will be very, very short. Trump made that clear today. The Iranians keep trying to add conditions to talks as though they have any leverage other than piracy and terrorism, which all but demonstrates the necessity of destroying this regime once and for all.
Spot on. Let’s talk about this.
Honestly, I’ll be amazed if any real progress is made today. Then again, I had an idea that Iran was going to get kicked down the road like a rusty can, and as every other president for the last 47 years has done. Obviously, the Democrats and many of the establishment Republicans thought so as well. That’s why they’re both angry and disorganized now, one day complaining about the attacks on Iran, and then on the next, trying to convince everyone Trump chickened out. Clearly, they’ll complain no matter what he does. Still, they wonder why nobody takes their outrage seriously.
At this point, I’ll certainly be pleased at anything positive that comes out of this. I’m not going to write Iran’s epitaph just yet. But avoiding that scenario requires a change of attitude on Iran’s part that I’m not seeing happening at the moment. Fox Digital is saying this morning:
Iranian parliament speaker and negotiator Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf said Friday that talks with the U.S. would not begin until Iranian assets were unfrozen and Lebanon also sees a ceasefire. Israel has continued strikes against Hezbollah terrorists in Lebanon this week, arguing the ceasefire agreement between the U.S. and Iran did not apply there.
Unfreezing Iranian assets would be a move of insanity. I regard as fantasy any notion that such funds wouldn’t be used for weapons against our people and Iranian citizens as well.
As for Lebenon, I’ve already said yesterday that I take as solid confirmation that Iran’s proxy, Hezbollah, is the issue there. This is a classic move, not unlike the Viet Cong hiding and moving troops and weapons through Laos and Cambodia. We should refuse to even discuss that matter.
We have the Islamic Republic in a box, and giving them any leverage at all is at very least counterproductive. We need to remember the people who have died for speaking out against the Islamic regime.
There is something else we here at home need to remember as well, that bears on all of this:
Our actions in Iran are not just about Iran. Make no mistake; a message is being sent here to China and Russia. Each have expansionist thoughts in its head. China as regards Taiwan, and Russia as regards its western neighbors, such as Ukraine. The message we’re sending so far is clear: Do not question our military power, or our will to use it as needed.
Do not mistake me: both Putin and Xi would like to see Iran’s Islamic crazies tumble into the abyss nearly as much as we do. Thing is, the display we’ve just put on over the last month or so in Iran, and the demonstrations of the weaponry we have at our disposal we’ve been conducting in Ukraine, have, without any doubt, been changing the discussions among both Chinese and Russian military strategists. Up until very recently, they have been acting as if the US military is nothing to be concerned about. That illusion is now gone.
Gone, too, is the illusion that we have no chops in space, and that there is doubt about who will be on the moon first. As a matter of national pride alone, this is seriously troubling China. But more, I think the military implications of our successes in space are becoming somewhat clearer to both Russia and China.
All of this is the very living model of "peace through strength," and we should be wary of frittering that relative strength away at the negotiating table today. It's a mixed message our future can't afford to send, not just to Iran, but to Putin and Xi as well.
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