Welcome to the 288th edition of The Newsletter Leaf Journal, the official newsletter of the perennially virid online writing magazine, The New Leaf Journal (“NLJ”) and its short-form writing sister publication, The Emu Café Social (“ECS”).

Astute readers may note that I did not publish any new articles since mailing a very celebratory Newsletter 287 on July 4, save for sharing my fireworks GIF on ECS and Pixelfed. There are a variety of reasons for this, with the main ones being (1) having to reinstall my workstation operating system after an update mishap; (2) having numerous tight work deadlines; and (3) picking up some bug or another on Tuesday. For whatever it is worth, I did make some progress on a few article projects, but not so much as to actually publish them. I had a mind to give myself the weekend off, but then I started thinking about my growing link backlog, which I had only recently started to make some good progress in reducing. Thus, I present an unusual edition of The Newsletter Leaf Journal.

Leaves from around the web

While I did not personally give you anything new to read this week, I can present 15 links with quotes and commentary from around the world wide web.

The big guys are ready for July

(1) 2026 Nagoya basho predictions! The Isegahama takeover begins (Tim Edwards for Sumo Stomp! July 11, 2026.)

Before the festivities (and my daily tournament updates), it’s time for me to try and predict the win-loss records for every wrestler in the top two divisions. That’s right, I’m doing jūryō predictions, too. That’s a first for me.

I’m not yet competent to predict the win-loss records of every wrestler in a grand sumo tournament, but I too think the two Yokozuna (now, we hope, healthy) will perform well.

(2) Nagoya 2026: Preview (Andy at Tachiai. July 11, 2026.)

‘The biggest storyline is the sudden kyujo of May’s tournament winner, Wakatakakage. He was rushed to hospital after experiencing severe pain in his thigh. He underwent surgery and we hope for a swift recovery.’

That’s a big loss. One of the highlights of May was watching him lift Atamifuji (apx 434 lb) off both of his feet and out of the ring. I’m speculating it was a staph infection based on note and what Mr. Edwards wrote in his preview. In any event, I hope he has a speedy recovery.

(3) Sumo is bigger than ever (Christopher Harding for UnHerd. May 22, 2025.)

Sumo is a sport embedded in its Shintō past. Rice bales are placed around the ring, marking off sacred space. Overhead hangs a grand canopy styled like a Shintō shrine, complete with colored tassels representing the four seasons. And, buried in the center of the ring, is an unglazed earthenware pot containing offerings to the gods, including sacred sake.

I’ll ignore my selected quote and note that they’re not “all” “bigger” than ever. I have Asakōryū down for double-digit wins.

Copyright struggles

(4) Google Opposes Site Blocking in Europe as U.S. Piracy Blocking Plans Gain Momentum (Ernesto Van der Sar for Torrent Freak. July 11, 2026.)

Google’s submission addresses a variety of topics, including the company’s opposition to broad site blocking measures. This includes VPN and third-party DNS blocking, which is seen as disproportionate and ineffective. The same applies to IP-address blocking, which risks targeting infrastructure of legitimate sites and services.

I normally don’t hand it to Google but here, Google is correct.

(5) Pearson’s Anti-Piracy Vendor Takes Down Best-Selling Author’s Own GitHub Repo (Ernest Van der Sar for Torrent Freak. July 10, 2026.)

The author’s personal GitHub account includes a widely referenced repository that hosts the official example code for titles including Java SE 8 for Programmers, C++ How to Program, and Python for Programmers … but for a few weeks they have been unavailable due to a DMCA takedown notice.

I am all for protecting copyright, but there should be consequences (maybe there are?) for filing takedown requests that would be seen as obviously fraudulent if they were being made by an individual.

I warned you

(6) Syria’s Jihadist Crackdown Could Lead to Islamic State Defections (Uran Botobekov for Jamestown. July 8, 2026.)

Amid rising tensions, some Uzbek militants expressed fears that Syrian authorities could transfer them to Türkiye’s National Intelligence Organization (MIT) for possible deportation to Central Asia…

The last place many of the Uzbek Jihadists would want to end up is… Uzbekistan.

(7) Scan Scam: Criminals Redirect China’s Public QR Codes to Porn (Fan Ying for Sixth Tone. July 9, 2026.)

CCTV’s report described an incident in March in which an online user reported scanning a QR code on the windshield of a public park’s shuttle bus in the eastern city of Suzhou, only to be redirected to a pornographic website.

I warned readers about scanning random QR codes in fictional dialogue form.

Way ahead of you

(8) Man loses 200 pounds to enlist in the Air Force (Jeff Schogol for Task & Purpose. June 15, 2026.)

By the time Cobb enlisted in the Air Force, he weighed 197 pounds, and he shed roughly 20 more pounds during training. He said that successfully losing so much weight to become an airman has given him the confidence that he can accomplish difficult tasks.

Very impressive.

(9) Army rolls out rules on waist-to-height body standards (Jeff Schogol for Task & Purpose. July 7, 2026.)

The Marine Corps announced in February that its required waist-to-height ratio would be slightly skinnier than the Pentagon’s requirements, at 0.52. Navy officials confirmed that sailors cannot have a waist–to-height ratio of.0.55 or greater. The Air Force and Space Force also use the 0.55 standard.

I think Mr. Cobb will be in good shape.

I was too late in using my links…

(9) How Buss family infighting drove the $10B sale of the Lakers (Baxter Holmes for ESPN. January 21, 2026.)

[Jeanie Buss] didn’t like that James was considered a savior for a floundering franchise when he arrived in 2018 and that it was he who chose the Lakers rather than the team’s leadership receiving praise for landing him. Team sources have been adamant for years that James’ camp informed the Lakers as early as 2017 that he was coming to join them when he became a free agent the following year.

My original comment drafted back in January: Back when I followed the NBA more closely, I was puzzled that the NBA media insisted on pretending that Jeanie Buss was some kind of genius owner contrary to all real-world evidence. Now that she sold the Lakers while alienating all of her siblings, the journalists apparently have permission to acknowledge that her positive on-court accomplishments as principal owner of the Lakers all flowed from the fact LeBron James and his wife wanted to live in Los Angeles.

(10) Inside the sterile dissolution of the LeBron-Lakers marriage (Ramona Shelburne for ESPN. July 6, 2026.)

Or maybe James was finally ready to act on the writing on the wall that had been there for the past year – when the Lakers declined to offer him an extension on his contract as they’d done twice previously, and started pitching their new face of the franchise, 27-year-old Luka Doncic, on why he should sign an extension with a team built around him.

The parting of the ways makes sense for both sides.

4th of July Leftovers (because many 4th of July articles were published after I drafted Newsletter 287)

(11) ‘We Fight, Get Beat, Rise, and Fight Again’: The Story of How Americans Won Our Freedom (David Stewart for Breitbart. July 4, 2026.)

But men like Nathanael Greene illustrate why the Americans ultimately succeeded, despite repeated failures. He recognized his central weakness—he commanded a small army constantly struggling to supply itself—and turned that weakness into a decisive strength. Greene’s dogged resilience typified the men who won the Revolution, in the process forging the new nation.

Greene, who died in 1786, was one of the most (if not the most) significant figures of the Revolution to die between the culmination of the war and the ratification of the Constitution.

(12) Fair sailing for America as NYC marks 250th anniversary with iconic ships and Blue Eagle flyover (Anthony Blair, Shane Galvin, and Katherine Donlevy for the New York Post. July 5, 2026.)

America celebrated its 250th anniversary Saturday with an epic armada of tall ships in New York Harbor and a parade of fighter jets overhead, as millions lined every inch of shoreline to take in the stunning showcase of military might and international alliances.

I sadly missed our flyover but I do have some (stationary) ship photos for an upcoming article.

(13) The Suicide Charge that Saved America (John Hinderaker at Power Line. July 3, 2026.)

The First Minnesota had suffered the heaviest losses in a single engagement of any unit in the Civil War or, I believe, in American history: 215 of the 262 men who charged the Confederates that day, 82%, were killed or wounded.

They succeeded at unimaginable cost.

(14) DECLINDE 250 (tugster: a waterblog. July 3, 2026.)

DECLINDE 250 is my take on govspeak, expanding to Declaration of Independence 250th anniversary. In 2026, NYC is celebrating with a convergence of events not unlike Fleet Week 2012, when tall ships and active duty naval vessels both assembled prior to and during Memorial Day. Many more photos from that time can be seen here, the last days of May that year. Both for myself and for the boro and its context, 2012 seems a long time ago, a harsher world.

I did go out on July 3 to take a look but I think I had the timing wrong…

(15) 200,000 Veterans Transition Out Each Year. At America’s 250th, a Medal of Honor Recipient Says They Never Stop Serving (Douglas Lindsay for Military.com. July 4, 2026.)

Taking the uniform off gives us the opportunity to continue to serve, [Medal of Honor recipient Clint] Romesha told Military.com.

Most-turned leaves of the newsletter week

I use a privacy-friendly and entirely local tool called Koko Analytics (see my 2025 article) to track page visits. In each issue of the newsletter, I list our five most-visited articles, according to Koko Analytics, for the one-week period beginning with Saturday and ending with Friday. Below, you will find our most-visited articles for the week of July 4-July 10 with notes on their cumulative ranking statistics going back to 2021.

1. Adding noai.duckduckgo.com as Custom Search Engine (NAF. Jan. 21, 2026.) 25 appearances and 9 top placements.

2. Victory Chimes Schooner in Brooklyn Bridge Park (NAF. December 5, 2024.) 2 appearances in 2026; 7 appearances and 1 top placement overall.

3. Catching 151 Pokémon in Google Search (NAF. April 17, 2025.) 28 appearances and 19 top placements in 2026; 55 appearances and 40 top placements overall.

4. Record vs Scoring Margin in NBA Team Analysis (NAF. January 7, 2026.) Debut.

5. Misleading ARRIS Modem Login Instructions (NAF. June 12, 2024.) 4 appearances in 2026; 17 appearances and 1 top placement overall.

Analysis

The 25-week stream of Adding noai.duckduckgo.com as Custom Search Engine and Catching 151 Pokémon in Google Search taking the top two spots in the weekly ranking came to an end. While the former secured its seventh consecutive top-placement, the latter fell to third for the first time since (I will guess) July/early August 2025. Sliding in at two is Victory Chimes Schooner in Brooklyn Bridge Park, which had the best week of any other article in 2026 and its own best week overall. What explains the surge? Unfortunately, the surge in views corresponded to news that the historic schooner sunk while moored in Red Hook. My Victory Chimes article was the week leader as late as Wednesday, but it ran out of steam toward the end of the week. I plan to cover the unfortunate topic of its sinking in the near future. Coming in a distant but solid fourth was Record vs Scoring Margin in NBA Team Analysis, which accrued most of its views last weekend (I have not tracked down the source of its surge). In fifth we have Misleading ARRIS Modem Login Instructions, which currently sits one spot ahead of Victory Chimes in the 2026-to-date ranking in 8th place overall (just two spots off the place of its 6th place finish in 2025).

Taking leaf

Thank you as always for reading The Newsletter Leaf Journal. If you enjoyed this issue and have not done so already, you can follow this newsletter by signing up for our weekly email, adding our RSS feed to your favorite feed reader, or checking in on our archive page.

It goes without saying that last week was not the most exciting week in terms of new articles and posts on NLJ and ECS. While I cannot promise an unusually busy week, I am confident that I will have a few new articles and posts to share on July 18.

Until then,
Cura ut valeas – Nicholas A. Ferrell.