"If you, like me, have been noticing recently that the weather forecast is not as accurate as it used to be, there's a reason for it. And believe it or not, it's politics. So you remember back in early 2025, when Doge came in and started making massive cuts to federal agencies. One of the agencies they made huge cuts to was the NOAA. Doge went in and fired 880 employees right off the bat. Two months after that, the NOAA approved about a thousand deferred resignations or buyouts. Because of these massive cuts to supposedly save money, the National Weather Service, which lives under the NOAA, had to cut weather balloon launches at 11 locations. Weather balloons are a super simple, but very effective technology that's been around for a long time. They carry instruments that measure temperature, humidity, wind, and pressure high up in the atmosphere. Meteorologists feed that data into forecast models so that they can use current conditions to predict future conditions. Obviously, if they don't know what current conditions are, that's kind of a problem. Though before the cuts, the National Weather Service was launching two balloons a day in about a hundred different locations. But now the number of morning launches in the lower 48 has been reduced by half. The result is less data for meteorologists to feed into their models. That means incomplete forecasts. And guess what? That's super dangerous. Because when it comes to predicting severe weather, a lack of data means that the systems meant to keep us safe can't do it effectively. And with climate change increasing the frequency and intensity of extreme weather, it's more important than ever that forecasters have access to accurate, real-time atmospheric measurements. Literally with every canceled weather balloon launch, the danger to the public grows. And here's the simple truth is whether it's screwworms, whether it's measles, whether it's cancer research, whether it's this, cutting funding for scientific research is disastrously stupid. So the takeaway is simple. Please vote for candidates who want to fund science, not gut it. Because one of these days it could be your life on the line or mine. When one simple balloon could make all the difference, it seems really, really stupid to cut corners."