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<title>Daily Smile: Tuesday, Oct. 13, 2026</title>

Gourd vibes only...

Daily Smile: Tuesday, Oct. 13, 2026

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Sterling Higa

Columnists

Palmer Luckey is an inventor who co-founded Anduril, one of the fastest-growing military contractors. He’s a darling of the podcast and panel circuit. He’s well spoken and insightful, and he often says provocative things. He did so on a recent panel, when he 

 using oxytocin as part of marriage counseling to raise America’s birth rate.

Luckey had been asked what he would do if he were starting a company today. “I would try to end the tragedy of divorce with oxytocin doping for marriage counseling,” he said. “We understand mammal pair-bonding pretty well. There’s a lot of people who want to stay together. Most of the people who don’t want to stay together should stay together, especially for their kids.”

 this idea stems from his obsession with natalism and the birth rate in America. For him, natalism is in part a civic duty. The nation survives only if Americans have many children.

Of course, oxytocin is real medicine. Doctors use it to induce labor. The body releases it when a mother nurses her baby. There may be some place for it in marriage counseling. Some people do have health conditions which leave them short of critical hormones.

The problem lies in reducing humans to biology. That is a frequent temptation among technologists like Luckey. These are the types that speak of human behavior only in terms of incentives and chemical reactions. But not all human problems can be reduced to chemistry. Nor are they all subject to better social engineering.

Luckey is not a random crank. He’s intelligent, and he’s behind two major innovations. First, he designed an early virtual reality headset, the Oculus Rift. Second, he helped build a business model that has challenged the grip of the prime contractors at the Department of Defense. It promises to save money for American taxpayers.

His company, Anduril, is at the cutting edge of autonomous weapons systems. This tech is used not only for national defense abroad, but also at home. Luckey has helped design drones that detect and fight wildfires on their own. And Palmer Luckey is only 34 years old.

He’s a self-taught polymath, able to speak well on a range of subjects. He’s affable and funny. But his style is a curious mix of seriousness and flippancy about problems like the birth rate. He can speak plainly about waste in government procurement one moment and comment on meme culture the next.

In his ironic detachment, Luckey is decidedly a millennial. His signature outfit is the aloha shirt. In recent years he’s taken to rocking a mullet and goatee. Anduril makes drones that 

 gear that appeals to the fashion tastes of Gen Z.

Yet for all his charm, intelligence, and success, Luckey is not yet wise about procreation. He has missed the root of America’s birth-rate crisis. We have lost sight of what the human person is and what human life is for.

The birth-rate crisis is especially acute in Hawai‘i. We have doubled our population in the past half century, yet we have fewer school-aged children now than we did 50 years ago.

Luckey is not the only tech natalist. Elon Musk has had at least 14 children with four women. They include the pop musician Grimes and Shivon Zilis, an executive at his brain-implant company, Neuralink. He recently parted with Zilis, with whom he has four children.

 last year that Musk has offered large payments to the mothers of his children in exchange for signed NDAs. Ashley St. Clair, who has a child with Musk, said she was offered $15 million plus $100,000 a month to keep quiet about the baby. She refused the offer. According to the Journal, Musk also asked the influencer Tiffany Fong to have his child.

Natalism is a frequent talking point for Musk. He shows much less regard for traditional institutions like marriage, or for fathers being present in their children’s lives. At a certain point, that requires the commitment of time. It’s hard enough as a working father of four, and I don’t have the burden of running Tesla and SpaceX. Luckey at least wants marriages. Musk seems to have little use for the nuclear family.

Both men represent eccentricity backed by capital. There have always been men with odd ideas on how to reform the world. But rarely have they had the capital and reach that they do today. The industrial titans of a century ago had to build the tools for turning wealth into influence. Today’s billionaires make their fortunes early in life. They find Super PACs, family offices, and foundations already waiting.

The wealthy have long shaped public opinion, but usually through other institutions. In the early days, it was newspapers. Then it was think tanks. Now it’s whole networks of groups, run through family offices. Their job is to translate the will of the billionaire into lasting wealth and influence on the ground.

Think of Bill Gates, MacKenzie Scott, or Pierre Omidyar. They have built or bankrolled such networks to promote their philanthropic and political agendas. Philanthropy and politics are merely two names for the same goal of shaping society. The main thing that separates them is the tax code.

Modern billionaires also have a unique ability to shape public discourse, because they can use social media platforms to appeal directly to their followers. This influence is reinforced by celebrity culture, which lavishes attention on whichever figure captures the public imagination.

Musk is the subject of a new, nearly four-hour 

. He controls X, the social media site once known as Twitter. Luckey is less famous, with a cult following that skews nerdier than Musk’s mainstream audience.

But influence need not be widespread. If Luckey sways other tech billionaires, that’s enough.

How billionaires define problems and deploy capital to solve them matters, because they can build institutions that last. Think of the Ford Foundation, the Rockefeller Foundation, or the Carnegie Corporation. Fast forward a century, and the Musks and Luckeys may still have their thumb on the scale of the national debate.

So it matters that they get to the root. The birth rate is not the problem; it is a symptom of the problem. At the root is a misunderstanding of man’s nature and man’s purpose.

Luckey professes faith in Christ, and he has spoken of man as 

. Man is also marred by sin, and redeemable by Christ. Musk calls himself a cultural Christian, which is to want the fruit without the tree.

Man was commanded from the beginning to be fruitful and multiply. Redeemed man is called to labor on Christ’s behalf to make earth like heaven.

Without belief in God, it’s hard to convince people that children are a blessing and not a burden. Children are not to be sought as a means to national competitiveness. Rather, they are to be prayed for.

Oxytocin may indeed help repair some marriages, but it cannot keep a vow. To treat a husband or wife as a chemical robot with no will — merely controlled by hormones — is to degrade them.

Wanting more children, as a parent, is a good thing. Wanting a nation to be fruitful is also a good thing. But it’s possible to want the right thing for the wrong reason. If we want a fruitful America only to prevail in a contest with China, our labors on behalf of that goal cannot please God. If we want a fruitful America only so we can stop mass immigration, our labors on behalf of that goal cannot please God.

If Luckey wants to lead America to a more fruitful future, he can begin with what he already confesses. Man is made in God’s image. Such creatures can’t be dosed into faithfulness. They have to be called to it, and their children are answers to prayer before they are anything else.

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<title>Palmer Luckey’s oxytocin doping plan won’t fix the birth rate</title>

Asked what company he would start today, Anduril co-founder Palmer Luckey said he would end divorce with “oxytocin doping.” ASD opinion columnist Sterling Higa on why the birth rate is a symptom, and why children are to be prayed for, not engineered.

Palmer Luckey’s oxytocin doping plan won’t fix the birth rate

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Michael Brestovansky

Crime & Courts

The woman charged with fatally shooting a man in Kailua last month pled “not guilty” to second-degree murder Thursday.

Hilinaikailimakualopali Keeno, 24, appeared in court Thursday for her arraignment on murder and firearm charges after she 

 shot and killed 30-year-old Thomas Malone near the Kailua Fall Festival on Sept. 26.

Members of Malone’s family packed the courtroom, with some holding up photos of the deceased throughout the proceedings. Malone’s father, Mike Malone, declined to speak to reporters, but led a prayer circle with other family members after the hearing concluded.

Keeno herself did not speak during the proceedings, with her attorney, Andrew Strand, issued her plea of not guilty on her behalf.

Strand also requested that the District Court’s decision to hold Keeno without bail be reevaluated, and filed a motion late Wednesday requesting that her previous bail of $1 million be reinstated.

However, Judge Ronald Johnson said that, for the time being, Keeno will not be allowed bail. He said that, given the severity of the charges, Keeno represents a danger to the public, and because a conviction could put Keeno in prison for life, she is also a flight risk.

Johnson added that, based on police accounts of the shooting, Keeno allegedly was carrying a firearm at a public festival even before the fatal altercation, which he said was indicative of her potential danger to the public.

Nonetheless, Johnson said Keeno’s trial judge, Rowena Somerville, may decide to restore Keeno’s bail.

Strand also submitted on Wednesday a request for discovery, asking the Honolulu Police Department to provide communications logs and other records pertinent to how they investigated the shooting.

Among those records Strand requested were phone records of a witness who was named in police records as the person who positively identified Keeno as the shooter. He also requested that witness’ financial records between Sept. 26 and Thursday, to look for any transaction of money between the witness and Malone’s family “in exchange for his false statements to law enforcement.”

Strand’s request also sought Malone’s mother’s complete phone records “regarding her threats to ‘take out’” [Keeno] or otherwise harm [Keeno] in retaliation.”

Johnson scheduled Keeno’s trial for December of this year. Keeno remains in custody at the Women’s Community Correction Center.

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<title>Keeno pleads 'not guilty' of Kailua shooting</title>

The 24-year-old alleged murderer remains in custody without bail.

Keeno pleads 'not guilty' of Kailua shooting

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Kelli Shiroma Braiotta

Food & Dining

Located on Waimanu Street — upstairs from 

 recently celebrated its soft opening. The space is home to an apparel line and café, according to business owner Momo Sakauye.

Sakauye, owner of Dear you Honolulu clothing line, says she ran pop-ups for her apparel business, but always wanted to open a café alongside it.

“The clothing line has options for both babies and adults — someone special to you,” she says. “I have a basic menu right now (for the café) because I’m running it myself.”

The new café space features Sakauye’s apparel line along with drinks and pastries. The café’s name is inspired by the concept of a “blank canvas,” according to Sakauye.

“It’s like a white canvas; people can come here and create different memories,” she explains.

[{"type":"text","text":"Limited customer seating is available within the café."}]

The café menu currently features Americanos ($5.50), espresso shots ($5) and lattes ($6). Customers can enhance their lattes by adding caramel or honey ($1 each). Sakauye explains that she wanted to soft open her business with a smaller menu, but plans to expand the drink options. All drinks come in 12-ounce sizes.

Sakauye also recommends trying the café’s Ichigo milk ($6.50), or Japanese strawberry milk, a refreshing beverage that features housemade strawberry jam mixed into cold milk.

The café also offers a rotating selection of pastries. Options during our visit included butter croissants and a lemon yogurt cake.

[{"type":"text","text":"“It’s like a butter cake; it’s not too sweet,” Sakauye says."}]

The café is currently open from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. (closed on Sundays and Wednesdays). Customer parking is available in the building’s lot.

Open 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.; closed Sundays and Wednesdays

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<title>Blanc Nook Café opens in Honolulu</title>

The cozy café recently opened on Waimanu Street; it’s located above Ry’s Poke Shack’s Honolulu location. The space is home to an apparel line and a café, and business owner Momo Sakauye plans to expand the café menu to include more drinks.

Daily Smile: Tuesday, Oct. 13, 2026

ASD Staff

Reporter

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Daily Smile: Tuesday, Oct. 13, 2026

Authors

ASD Staff

Reporter

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