SINCERETALK

“Star Trek” began as a television series but grew into a cultural phenomenon. When it premiered in 1966, no one could have predicted that it would lead to more than a dozen spinoff shows, more than a dozen movies and one of the most enduring fandoms in popular culture. “Star Trek” is also unusual for its close connections to NASA, both in its storylines and in the real world. Decades of “Star Trek” adventures have ignited a love of spaceflight across generations, inspiring many who now work as space professionals. I’m a cultural anthropologist who studies why people work in space exploration. I’ve interviewed astronomers, engineers, flight surgeons and astronauts. Although I focus more on science fact than science fiction, I’ve noticed in my interviews how much the two threads intertwine. Because of this, I found myself at a “Star Trek” convention in early August 2026, just ahead of the show’s 60th anniversary on Sept. 8. The convention participants included people of widely diffe...

President Donald Trump has coveted Greenland since his first term — and according to a new report, he is considering using animal cruelty in order to achieve his goals. "One American businessman has spotted a potential commercial opening [with Greenland]: sealskins," reported The Wall Street Journal's Sune Engel Rasmussen on Monday . "Investor Larry Swets said he last month delivered a 36-page proposal to the White House, through Landry, calling on the president to lift the U.S. ban on seal products as a way to improve relations with Greenlanders, through what he calls sealskin diplomacy." Rasmussen continued, "Greenlanders and other Inuit peoples have hunted seals for their meat and skin for centuries, but international bans have collapsed sealskin markets. Swets’s proposal, which The Wall Street Journal has seen, seeks to generate income for some of Greenland’s remote communities and to serve as a 'confidence-building measure.'" Rasmussen a...

Americans risk exposure to anti-parasite drugs and banned antibiotics in chunks of years-old, potentially rotten meat following a White House meeting involving a controversial friend of Melania Trump’s, according to a recent analysis.In an opinion piece published by The New York Times , Eric Schlosser, the acclaimed author of the book Fast Food Nation , issued a stark warning regarding President Donald Trump’s directive to import 660 million pounds of inexpensive beef trimmings. Schlosser characterized the incoming shipments as the epitome of generic, industrial "mystery meat." He noted that these small frozen chunks are often held in foreign cold storage for years before being mixed into massive commercial grinders alongside cattle pieces from multiple nations—primarily destined for fast-food hamburgers. Schlosser argued that sourcing meat from countries with loose processing standards poses profound public health risks: Uruguay: Shipments have previously been rejected due...

As President Donald Trump struggles with corruption scandals, an unpopular war and a struggling economy, Senate races in solidly Republican states are suddenly viewed as competitive, from Iowa and Alaska to perhaps even South Carolina . Now a pair of conservative commentators are arguing that Trump's Republicans could perform worse in the 2026 midterms than when they lost control of Congress in the 2018 midterms — and the political wounds are primarily self-inflicted. "I think it was — I apologize, whoever it is, one of the data people I saw on social media was putting this out, and they're like, 'Well, what if the electorate in Iowa is actually only a plus-five electorate?'" conservative commentator Tim Miller said on a podcast for The Bulwark in which he was joined by a fellow anti-Trump Republican pundit, Bill Kristol, who replied to Miller by saying, "That's a good way to put it." Miller was not done with his analysis. "If it's a...

In the last weeks of August, a valley in the Himalayas and a post-industrial city in the U.S. Midwest found tragic commonality. In Gary, Indiana, a powerful “derecho,” a fast-moving band of damaging thunderstorms , tore across Lake Michigan producing straight-line winds as high as 110 mph. The widespread destruction left tens of thousands of people without electricity for over two weeks, bringing global relief organizations like World Central Kitchen to the area for the first time. In Nepal, an enormous 2,000 foot wide chunk of glacier ice sheared off a mountain and plunged to the river 7,000 feet below , tearing everyone off the mountainside with it, killing over 1,000 people. Scientists agree that both catastrophes were caused by the rise in global temperatures . Eight thousand miles apart, as historically and culturally distinct as two areas can be, both Nepal and Gary emerged as pawns in the same oligarchs’ game of chicken: Can big oil squeeze another decade of ROI on their s...

President Donald Trump's MAGA die-hards are not taking the ouster of Fox News host Maria Bartiromo quietly, with a new report from The Daily Beast highlighting a brewing "revolt" against her replacement. Bartiromo, best known as a longtime host for the Fox Business channel, was abruptly fired this week after roughly 12 years with the company, with the official statement only wishing her the best in her future endeavors. A report from Status later elaborated on the shocking departure, finding that she had allegedly been let go after disclosing the network's quiet instructions not to promote Trump's election conspiracy theories with the White House . "Effective today, Maria Bartiromo is no longer with FOX News Media," the official statement read. "In making the announcement, FOX News Media said, 'We thank Maria for her work over the last 12 and a half years and wish her all the best in her next chapter." Fox has since replaced Bartiromo on...