CHANGE (IT BACK): US Military Academies End Racial Preferences in Admissions.

The policy changes that prompted the request for a pause, the academies said, stem from directives issued by President Donald Trump, whose administration is committed to dismantling diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives across all branches of the U.S. military as part of a broader effort to refocus the military.

To implement the president’s vision for the military, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth has ordered his department to eliminate DEI initiatives and offices, including ceasing the practice of considering race or sex when admitting cadets to military academies.

The U.S. Air Force Academy, based in Colorado Springs, Colorado, stated in its letter that it has already ended race-based admissions practices following a series of White House and Pentagon directives. These include, most recently, a Feb. 6 memorandum issued by acting Assistant Secretary of the Air Force Gwendolyn DeFilippi, who ordered the elimination of “quotas, objectives, and goals based on sex, race, or ethnicity for organizational composition, academic admission, career fields, or class composition.”

Well, good — assuming they don’t just take quotas underground.

HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: Professor: Trump’s demands of universities ‘echo’ Hitler’s and Stalin’s. Heh. Sure they do, champ.

GOODER AND HARDER, LA: Why LA Knows That Karen Bass Can’t Get it Done. “This week we found out that the Los Angeles mayor’s office has only managed to get four building permits pushed through her city’s sausage making machine. Seventy-two are in the queue. The multimillionaire named to be the sherpa by which all things are rebuilt, has been allowed to fade into the sunset.”

SENTIMENT: Most Americans support Trump crackdown on anti-Semitism on campus, new poll shows.

CHANGE: Hong Kong’s biggest pro-democracy party moves to disband as freedoms dwindle.

Pro-democracy protests that paralyzed Hong Kong in 2019 led to a crackdown that has all but silenced dissent through restricted elections, media censorship and a China-imposed national security law that saw some of Yeung’s party members jailed. Dozens of civil society groups closed down.

Former chairperson Yeung said in an interview with The Associated Press that Chinese officials told him the party needed to disband. He urged his members to support the motion to give the leadership mandate to handle the process.

“I’m not very happy about it,” said Yeung. “But I can see if we refuse the call to disband, we may pay a very huge price for it.”

Others received similar messages.

“One country, two systems” lasted longer than I thought it might, honestly.

CLEANUP TIME: The Pentagon Must Go on the Offensive to Defeat Politicized Officers.

WHEN YOU MAKE UNIVERSITIES AN ARM OF THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT, THEY BECOME AN ARM OF THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT: How Obama and Biden Paved the Way for Trump’s Attacks on Universities: “Universities were bending over for federal funds long before Trump,” writes Laura Kipnis. Democrats just assumed that they would always control the federal government, even when it was nominally in Republican hands. Wrong!

KRUISER’S MORNING BRIEFING: Butter, Meet Hot Knife — Trump Keeps Cutting Through Media’s TDS Noise. “The Democrats’ flying monkeys in the mainstream media have been loudly lamenting Trump’s loyalty demands for his second go-round in the Oval Office because the loyalty interferes with their plans. They aren’t having any luck picking off those closest to the president. As I’ve written a couple of times, Trump is now surrounded by people who aren’t eager to rush out and write backstabbing tell-all books.”

THE STRATEGY? LET THEM TALK: Now We Know Why Democrats Are Losing the Messaging War.

WELL, GOOD: Stephen Moore: Big, Beautiful Tax Cuts Should Offset Any Tariff Increases.

THIS IS WHY WE CAN’T HAVE NICE THINGS: First Constellation Frigate Only 10% Complete, Design Still Being Finalized.

The first Constellation class frigate for the U.S. Navy is just 10 percent complete more than two years after construction began and nearly five years after the award of the initial contract for the ship. The work is also continuing despite the continued absence of a firm functional design for the vessel, which is still weeks or even months away from being finalized and approved.

Major changes to the Constellation’s configuration compared to its parent Franco-Italian Fregata Europea Multi-Missione (FREMM) have already led to serious delays and cost increases, and there are growing questions about the program’s future. A key program goal had been to take an in-service design that would only need relatively minor modifications to make it ready for Navy use, which would help keep the work on schedule and budget. The opposite has now happened.

Mark Vandroff, senior vice president of Government Affairs at Fincantieri Marine Group, confirmed the state of progress on the construction of the USS Constellation and provided an update on the program to TWZ‘s Howard Altman on the floor of the Navy League’s Sea Air Space 2025 exhibition earlier this week. 19FortyFive had first reported that the lead ship in the Constellation class was only 10 percent complete last month, citing an anonymous source.

The whole idea of the Constellation was to take the proven FREMM class, customize it just a little for the US Navy’s needs, but otherwise leave the design alone and get it into service quickly.

But the Navy had to go and screw it up.

SCHEDULED FOR 9:30 AM ET TODAY: How to watch Blue Origin launch Katy Perry and crew to space on a historic all-female spaceflight today.

OF COURSE: Taylor Lorenz’s Horrible Take On Suspected Murderer Luigi Mangione Just Got Ten Times Worse.

“FIX THE DAMN RUST:” The SECNAV Received His Direction & Guidance.

NAKED LUNCH: San Francisco Humiliates Itself Further, Erects 45-Foot Tall Statue of Woman—but Leaves Out Key Feature.

San  Francisco was once a shining example of a great American city, but now it is mostly a punchline. The metropolis that gave us epic Mark Twain quotes, Levi’s, an iconic music scene, the Golden Gate Bridge, and so much more is now known more for excrement on the street, crime, mass drug addiction, and homeless people sprawled across the sidewalks. Given that, you’d think they’d figure out what to prioritize to improve the lives of their citizens.

Their answer, though, will make your head spin. They’ve decided to erect a 45-foot statue of a woman in Embarcadero Plaza to “jazz up” downtown.  They might certainly achieve their goal, because the sculptor decided that the woman didn’t need something most of us would want when standing in the center of a city square: clothes.

That’s right, this lady is buck nekkid.

“Quick, darling, pack the bags—let’s take the kids to San Francisco!”*

I’ve decided not to put a photo of this atrocity here because you get the idea, but if you’d like to take a look, here’s the link.

* I’d say “Or raise them there,” but “unexpectedly” that hasn’t been happening very much in SF for decades: In 2013, the San Francisco Chronicle reported that Frisco had the lowest percentage of children of any major American city. In 2005, James Taranto of the Wall Street Journal spotted an AP article that noted, “‘San Francisco has the smallest share of small-fry of any major U.S. city,’ the Associated Press reports. ‘Just 14.5 percent of the city’s population is 18 and under.’”

UPDATE (FROM GLENN): Best comment: “I mean- the biggest shock of all of this is that SF has acknowledged what a woman biologically should look like, and erected it into a 45-foot statue to celebrate.”

JOHN LUCAS: “Our hearts were touched with fire.” The best toast you’ll ever read.

ENJOY YOUR STAY: Bukele Arrives in the U.S. as More Gang Members Are Deported to El Salvador.

WAGES OF NASTINESS: Harvard, Columbia Plunge in Law School Rankings Amid Anti-Semitism Backlash.

RIP: Jean Marsh, Upstairs, Downstairs actress and co-creator, dies, aged 90.