As a subscriber bonus, I'm writing the New York Times and Washington Post articles about Trump's drone order before they can...
In what can only be described as the aviation equivalent of armageddon, President Trump signed an executive order Wednesday unleashing an armada of buzzing drones across America's pristine skies.
"It's time we filled our airspace with even more unidentified flying objects," declared the administration in what critics are calling "The Great Drone Liberation of 2025." The order, titled with characteristic subtlety "UNLEASHING AMERICAN DRONE DOMINANCE," aims to transform the country into a scene straight out of a sci-fi movie where everything from your pizza to your wife boyfriend's birthday present will soon be delivered by what is essentially a flying blender with cameras.
The White House emphasized that drones will create "high-skilled jobs," presumably for people who enjoy spending their days watching tiny aircraft crash into power lines. Emerging technologies like electric Vertical Takeoff and Landing (eVTOL) aircraft promise to "modernize methods" for everything from cargo delivery to passenger transport.
"The time has come to accelerate testing and to enable routine drone operations," the order states with all the caution of someone saying "hold my beer" before attempting a backflip. The administration insists this rapid expansion of autonomous flying machines is vital to "reducing reliance on foreign sources," because if there's one thing Americans hate more than being buzzed by drones while sunbathing, it's being buzzed by foreign drones while sunbathing.
The FAA has been instructed to issue a proposed rule enabling "Beyond Visual Line of Sight operations" within 30 days, which is government speak for "we're going to let these things fly where you can't see them." This should pair nicely with the administration's other initiative to "deploy artificial intelligence tools" to expedite drone approvals, combining two technologies that definitely won't malfunction simultaneously in any concerning way.
Weirdly, ex-Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg appeared particularly excited about the new eVTOL Integration Pilot Program, telling reporters, "Americans have been trapped in two-dimensional transportation for too long. It's time we embrace the third dimension by filling it with thousands of rapidly vibrating phallus-shaped eVTOLs."
Military applications weren't forgotten either. The Department of Defense has been instructed to "identify programs that would be more cost efficient or lethal if replaced by UAS," because apparently some Pentagon official watched "Terminator" and thought, "now THAT'S efficiency!"
UPDATE: A flock of geese have filed an emergency injunction request with Judge James Boasberg of the DC Court.
Personal note: I am in favor of this Executive Order for national security and other reasons. This is a sarcastic take on how legacy media will cover the order. Follow me on X @directorblue and Substack @directorblue
