Greetings, Earthlings. It is I, Xylb’tok, your increasingly concerned Martian correspondent, once again transmitting from the comparative calm of Mars – where military briefings generally avoid sound effects, our national monuments are repaired before the blame is assigned, and Elvis has yet to be elected to high office.
The Lunar Haggis have spent the week attempting to recreate one of your cabinet meetings after hearing the latest broadcasts from Earth. It descended into complete chaos within minutes, largely because one of them insisted on providing all strategic updates using interpretive dance while another contributed realistic explosion noises. Grzz’lax quietly ended proceedings by confiscating the flip chart and reminding everyone that international diplomacy should ideally involve fewer “bing bing bings”. It is advice that perhaps ought to be shared a little more widely.
Let us begin.
Bing, bing, bing, bing, bing
During a historic televised cabinet meeting at Camp David, President Taco once again demonstrated that there is apparently no situation so grave it cannot be narrated like a child enthusiastically describing an action film.
While recounting Iranian missiles intercepted over Jordan, he proudly explained:
They were going 8,600 miles per hour… and they were big missiles… bing, bing, bing, bing, bing.
Earthlings… What?! “Bing. Bing. Bing.” Seriously?!
Those were the sound effects chosen to describe missiles travelling faster than the speed of sound during an active military conflict.
We confess to being momentarily speechless. Not because the interception itself was insignificant, but because the Commander-in-Chief appeared to feel that the appropriate way to describe it was by making noises usually reserved for toddlers playing with toy rockets in the garden.
We now find ourselves deeply concerned about future military briefings.
Will tanks go “vroom vroom”?
Will fighter aircraft go “nyooooom”?
Will artillery become “boom boom” before somebody proudly explains that diplomacy has gone “oopsie”?
There are moments when language matters. Military conflict is one of them.
The Lunar Haggis briefly attempted to brief the Martian Council on an asteroid avoidance exercise using the phrase “whooshy whoosh… bang!” They have since been banned from strategic communications for the remainder of the century.
The mystery of the magic reflecting pool
Regular readers will remember the great Reflecting Pool saga.
According to His Royal Orangeness, the damage to his extensively renovated vanity project had been caused by vandals. Arrests followed. Accusations flew. Dire warnings were issued about attacks on national monuments. The full force of the law, we were assured, would descend upon those responsible.
There was just one problem. They weren’t.
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Official documents have now confirmed what many suspected from the very beginning: the damage was caused not by shadowy saboteurs but by the contractors. Here we were thinking it might have something to do with El Cheeto doing that ridiculous drive over the lining but apparently not, anyway I digress now where were we? Oh yes it was the contractor with the rush job in Washington D.C – Colonel Mustard was unavailable for comment.
Earthlings, this is what is commonly known as an awkward development.
From Mars, we cannot help but notice that this leaves a rather uncomfortable question hanging in the air.
What of those people who were arrested?
Being publicly accused of vandalising a national monument only to discover the real culprit was the construction work itself is, one imagines, not an experience one quickly forgets.
The entire affair has become a perfect metaphor for modern politics.
Announce the culprit. Generate the outrage. Conduct the arrests. Discover the facts. Quietly move on.
The Reflecting Pool itself, meanwhile, continues its remarkable transformation from solemn national memorial into what increasingly resembles the world’s most expensive paddling pool.
Grzz’lax reviewed the engineering report before quietly observing:
“Perhaps next time… don’t drive over it”
Sound advice.
32 posts and the King of Rock and Roll
As if things on your planet were not unravelling enough, President You’ve-Been-Tangoed embarked upon what can only be described as a Truth Social marathon.
32 posts. One hour.
Even the Lunar Haggis considered this excessive, and they once live-blogged an eclipse that lasted 14 minutes.
Among the digital avalanche was an AI-generated image depicting Donald Trump as Elvis Presley.
Now, Earthlings, Elvis was many things.
A musical icon. A cultural phenomenon. A man whose wardrobe occasionally rivalled Liberace’s. He was also, history records, rather notorious for his relationships with much younger women.
This makes him, perhaps, a curious choice of alter ego.
The post formed part of an extraordinary online spree in which geopolitical commentary, AI imagery and increasingly surreal declarations flowed together into one continuous stream of digital verbal diarrhoea.
From Mars, we have begun referring to this as Trump Delusion Syndrome – the point at which quantity overtakes coherence and nobody, including the author, appears entirely certain what the previous 31 posts actually said.
The Penguin attempted something similar after discovering Martian social media. He posted 32 photographs of fish over the course of an afternoon. To his credit, they were at least actual fish.
Grzz’lax has since imposed a strict daily posting limit on the Lunar Haggis after one of them attempted to upload 48 consecutive pictures of a potato wearing sunglasses.
Civilisation, for now, has been preserved.
Greenland, again. Apparently
Just when we thought the Greenland saga had finally been packed away in the diplomatic attic alongside the Panama Canal and Canada, the Overripe Satsuma decided it deserved an encore.
It began innocently enough, if one can call an AI-generated image of an orange hued man leering over a country “innocent”. Then came the statement. Asked whether Greenland would be under American control by the end of his term, he replied:
“Uh yeah, you should make that bet actually.”
I fear someone has once again mistaken a sovereign territory for a particularly attractive property development. Greenland, as we have previously discussed, is not currently for sale. Nor, last time we checked, is it operating some kind of loyalty scheme where repeated enquiries eventually earn you ownership.
From Mars we remain fascinated by this recurring obsession.
There are nearly 200 countries on your planet, yet somehow Greenland keeps finding itself singled out like the last biscuit on the plate. I can understand the attraction since coming back from my little holiday, not that I am saying I visited Greenland but I am also not not saying that if you get my drift.
The Lunar Haggis have now started hiding maps whenever President Taco appears on television. It seems prudent.
America First… again
Meanwhile, back on Earth, the political family reunion has officially descended into a public divorce.
Marjorie Taylor Greene and Tucker Carlson have begun promoting what they describe as a renewed America First movement, declaring their commitment is to “America First for all Americans – right, left and center.”
We have heard that “first” word used in a slogan before. Indeed, it has a rather long and complicated history. It dates back well before the modern political era and has, over the decades, accumulated enough historical baggage to require its own luggage carousel.
To hear it re-emerge during an increasingly bitter split within MAGA is… revealing.
The immediate disagreement centres on the Iran conflict, where a growing number of prominent Trump supporters have accused the administration of abandoning the very non-interventionist principles they once championed. It is rather like watching a marching band discover halfway through the parade that everyone has been following different sheet music.
What particularly caught our attention, however, was the accompanying publicity photograph. “ …all Americans,” proclaimed the message. One could not help noticing that the assembled gathering looked remarkably… uniform. Perhaps diversity had been delayed in traffic. Perhaps everyone else was just outside the frame. Perhaps coincidence is working overtime again.
From Mars we have observed that movements proclaiming themselves to represent everyone often spend remarkably little time demonstrating it.
The worm performs a U-turn
Stop the press!
Cancel the emergency meeting!
Alert the Martian Academy of Medical Sciences!
Robert F. Kennedy Jr has publicly urged parents to vaccinate their children against measles.
Yes.
Really.
Following a rapidly growing measles outbreak, the man who has spent years casting doubt upon vaccines suddenly found himself encouraging families to vaccinate their children.
Earthlings, we scarcely know how to process this development. It is, objectively, the correct advice. And yet one cannot help reflecting that this outbreak follows years during which misinformation surrounding vaccines has contributed to declining immunisation rates in several communities.
This feels rather like somebody spending years insisting umbrellas are unnecessary before eventually announcing, in the middle of a torrential downpour, that everyone ought to stay dry. Better late than never, certainly. But perhaps earlier would have been preferable. Progress is welcome. Timing, however, remains important.
A Martian view on bodily autonomy
We arrive now at comments by Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, who has indicated the administration intends to pursue further restrictions on abortion access, including in states where voters and lawmakers have chosen to protect those rights.
Earthlings, we have a rather straightforward principle on Mars.
If you do not possess the relevant reproductive organs…
Perhaps you should begin by listening to those who do.
We appreciate that abortion is a profoundly personal and deeply contested subject. Reasonable people hold sincere and often conflicting views. But from our vantage point, decisions affecting women’s bodies are best made by women themselves, together with their doctors, their families and the legal frameworks established through democratic processes.
The Handmaid’s Tale was, to our understanding, intended as a warning. Not a policy handbook.
The Martian Council once debated whether male Haggis should vote on egg-laying regulations for a species that does not even lay eggs. Grzz’lax ended the meeting after approximately 43 seconds. His ruling was brief.
“No uterus. No lectures.”
The motion failed unanimously.
Endangered species… apparently optional
Finally, we must turn our attention to something extremely alarming, that’s not to say everything else this week hasn’t been alarming, but we feel that given they cannot speak up for themselves we must highlight this sombre topic.
The Trump administration has announced plans to roll back key protections for endangered species, arguing that existing environmental regulations have become too restrictive and are slowing economic development.
We on Mars have learnt a valuable lesson over several million years. When a species disappears… It has an irritating habit of staying disappeared.
Nature, you see, does not operate on the basis of “we’ll sort it out later”. Once an ecosystem begins to unravel, it rarely sends a polite email warning everyone that next Tuesday would be a convenient time to intervene.
Supporters argue that the reforms will cut bureaucracy and allow infrastructure, mining and energy projects to proceed more quickly. Critics warn they could leave vulnerable species exposed precisely when biodiversity across your planet is already under unprecedented pressure.
From Mars, it seems a curious priority.
You have spent centuries driving species to the edge of extinction, only to conclude that the real problem is the paperwork designed to stop you finishing the job.
The Lunar Haggis once voted to remove protections from the extremely rare Crimson Bog Hopper because it kept eating their vegetable patch.
Within a fortnight the insects that normally ate the midges had vanished, the midge population exploded, and the Haggis found themselves wishing the Bog Hopper had remained exactly where it was.
It was perhaps the shortest environmental impact assessment in Martian history.
Closing reflections from orbit
Week 77 has felt like a curious collision between fantasy and consequence.
Missiles now go “bing bing bing”.
Vandalism apparently disappears..
Presidents become Elvis.
Greenland returns to the shopping list.
Political movements rediscover old slogans.
The brain worm appears to have stumbled briefly across the correct answer.
And endangered species once again find themselves competing with short-term economics.
Through it all, one theme has quietly emerged.
Reality remains stubborn.
It refuses to bend simply because someone posts an AI image.
It refuses to become true because it is written in capital letters.
It refuses to disappear because 32 social media posts insist otherwise.
We continue to marvel at your extraordinary species. You build telescopes capable of seeing galaxies billions of light years away. You develop vaccines that save millions of lives. You send probes beyond the edge of your Solar System.
And then, somehow, you find yourselves debating whether missiles sound like “bing bing bing”.
The contrast remains… astonishing.
Up here, the Lunar Haggis have formed their own political movement under the slogan “Mars First.” It lasted approximately 23 minutes before they realised there were only seven of them, six disagreed with the seventh and the seventh had wandered off looking for biscuits. Grzz’lax quietly dissolved the movement, returned everyone to work and reminded them that good government is generally rather less exciting than performance.
Until next week, Earthlings.
Do try to remember that geography is not destiny, social media is not reality, endangered species are rather easier to protect than to resurrect, and if your military briefings begin sounding like the special effects department from a children’s cartoon… it may be time to ask who is really writing the script.
