ROBERT STACY MCCAIN: Michael Tracey: Hero for a Crazy Time.

Having flattered Tracey by comparing him to Christopher Hitchens, I’ll further flatter him with another comparison. Like Hunter S. Thompson, Tracey knows the value of using vivid language. In the very first sentence of this piece about Kristy Makuta, we find “the defamatory maelstrom of Epstein hysteria” — a decisive choice of words, an upfront declaration of authorial intent. Promoters of Epstein hysteria are responsible for “a tornado of unrelenting slime … noxious falsities … a tsunami of pure sleaze … loads of demented garbage,” Tracey declares in the space of a single paragraph. Further displaying his penchant for strong and colorful description, Tracey labels Makuta’s claim to Epstein victimhood ”one of the craziest cons in all of Epstein lore,” involving “brazenly faked” evidence in “a whirlwind of unvarnished lunacy.”

To back up these strong phrases, Tracey has the receipts. He knows how to obtain court records and utilize them to debunk the bogus victimhood claims by which these grifters have profited through litigation. You really need to read the whole thing to understand how the “Epstein files” has spiraled completely out of control, with clearly innocent people (including Democratic Party fundraiser Dana Chasin) being smeared as participants in child sex-trafficking. Decent people out to be outraged about these lies, and yet somehow Michael Tracey is the bad guy for telling the truth?

Read the whole thing.

ALLERGY RELIEF: PATADAY Once Daily Extra-Strength Relief Allergy Eye Drops. #CommissionEarned

HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: New Silicon Valley academy offers higher-ed alternative as fewer Americans see college as important.. “Its launch comes as Gallup finds only 31 percent of Americans now consider a college education ‘very important,’ down from 70 percent in 2013.”

IT ISN’T LIKE THEY WEREN’T WARNED:

The look of a leftist discovering reality – this is not how she imagined it – it is called a cognitive dissonance.

The French leftists are going to get a lot of that. https://t.co/K9GEpu5FRU pic.twitter.com/8SRaxw5EEk

— Krzysztof Szczawinski 🇵🇱 (@Kristof_Poland) October 17, 2026

OUR MESSAGE TO CORNELL: BRINGING BACK CAMPUS KANGAROO COURTS IS NOT THE ANSWER. As Robert Shibley explains, abandoning due process won’t deliver justice, and we’ve already seen what happens when colleges try. See this week’s update for the full story.

ASKING THE IMPORTANT QUESTION: What Caliber For Giant Nocturnal Ten-Pound Crabs?

COMMIES HATE THIS:

And, it's actually distributed, since you can't get the profit without the sale. Instead of being used to force the behavior you want.

You just want stuff for free so you can sit around getting fat. pic.twitter.com/MWiE2WHIej

— D.L. Campanile (@DLCampanile) October 17, 2026

LIMITED TIME DEAL: Shark Clean & Empty Cordless Stick Vacuum.

IT’S COME TO THIS:

"Fraternities are raping us women repeatedly! Let us in!" https://t.co/qPEFDjpOh0

— Cadbury Cream James 🐣 (@James_PA10) October 16, 2026

FASCISM:

Sen. Slotkin just openly threatened to persecute anyone who worked for Trump, with the explicit goal of intimidating young conservatives. https://t.co/djptVKQYGP

— Evita Duffy-Alfonso (@evitaduffy_1) October 17, 2026

DAVID MASTIO: Harvard’s Faculty Lead Academia in Record Donations to Democrats in Key Senate Races. With large donations coming in at unprecedented levels, employees at colleges and universities under investigation by the Trump administration are focused on trying to turn the Senate blue.

JOHN LUCAS: The Constitution’s Red-Headed Stepchild — The Second Amendment.

PEEK AT IRANIAN DAILY LIFE: Actually, it would probably be more accurate to say Roger Simon’s latest Substack column is a peek into Iranian daily misery. Without fundamental regime change, the Iranian people, most of whom hate the oppressively cruel Mullahs and their protectors, the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), will continue to suffer.

SIGH.

You have to have a heart of stone not to laugh https://t.co/CP5aar5fYv

— Kurt Schlichter (@KurtSchlichter) October 17, 2026

OPEN THREAD: Party on, dudes and dudettes.

WELL, WE CAN BRING BACK THE NINTH PLANET, PLUTO: It’s time to reassess the size of our solar system, scientists say.

THE ENEMY WITHIN: Sherrod Brown Wanted Our Vietnam POWs Kept Captive to Protect Hanoi From US Bombs.

UPDATE: Eugene Volokh writes: “I was intrigued by the post, and I tracked down the letter.”

He adds: “As I understand it, the argument wasn’t that he wanted POWs kept captive. Rather, he was arguing that Vietnam wouldn’t rationally agree to releasing POWs before peace is negotiated. Am I mistaken on that? I also don’t think it’s terribly relevant what an 18-year-old thought or said 55 years ago, though I of course know that politics routinely stoops to that, as with the Mitt Romney school bullying claims.”

ALIENS: JWST Detected a Mysterious Signal From Empty Space. Nobody Knows What It Is.

EUROPE:

As France is burning, I keep thinking of what the UAE Foreign Minister said a few years ago 👇

He accurately predicted this. pic.twitter.com/EgQClncb2s

— Dr. Eli David (@DrEliDavid) October 17, 2026

FOLLOW THE SCIENCE: Why most published research findings are still false: 94% of medical treatments lack evidence of benefits.

MICROBIOME NEWS: Giant bacteria could be living in your gut. “Our gut microbiome is home to trillions of microbes, but they may not all be microscopic. Giant bacteria, which can reach a centimetre in length, are generally found in niche environments, such as mangroves and fish guts. But now, microbiologists have detected signs of DNA from Epulopiscium, one of the largest known types of bacteria, in human gut microbiomes from around the world. Bacteria are usually around 2 micrometres long, while giant ones are generally defined as being larger than 10 micrometres. But species belonging to the Epulopiscium genus can reach up to 600 micrometres – more than half a millimetre – in length.”

IS PARIS SCUFFLING?

Or to paraphrase CNN in 2020, mostly peaceful but surprisingly fiery scuffles.

Bari Weiss needs to get CBS’s social media team under her control:

@bariweiss still not in control of this beast. https://t.co/bGTEnlecYE

— David Mastio (@DavidMastio) October 17, 2026

UPDATE: Sasha Stone: Riots in France — a Warning for America.

MORE: Hot Takes: Internet Rips CBS News for the Worst Tweet on French Riots Since ‘Mostly Peaceful.’

REMEMBER THIS?

Like it never happened.

Insane. https://t.co/rpKDxWWhwo

— C3 (@C_3C_3) October 17, 2026

GREAT WORKOUT SOCKS: Swiftwick ASPIRE Zero No Show Performance Running Socks. #CommisisonEarned

THERE SHOULD BE THE DEATH PENALTY FOR THIS KIND OF THING: Before COVID, an NIH lab chief proposed making a SARS-like bat virus more infectious: Newly released records show Vincent Munster suggested inserting a furin cleavage site and that his lab obtained unpublished SARS-related sequences. Nothing links the research to SARS-CoV-2.

It’s actually worse if multiple people were wanting to do this.