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Archive for 2025
September 12, 2025
WHAT KILLED CHARLIE KIRK: And, more importantly, can we stop it?
The list of iniquities, sadly, goes on and on. In the name of “criminal justice reform,” for example, hordes of violent criminals were let loose, backed up by progressive attorneys general and activist judges and local legislators who robbed law enforcement officials of any means of meting out justice. Bail, we were told, was modern day Jim Crow. Prison was slavery in other forms. Policing was racist. And when savages like Decarlos Brown Jr., with 14 prior violent convictions to his record, were set loose, it was only a matter of time before they produced a knife and slaughtered Iryna Zarutska, a young Ukrainian refugee, on a train in Charlotte, North Carolina. When brave men like Daniel Penny, who successfully neutralized a deranged violent criminal threatening to harm fellow commuters on the New York subway, intervened, they were dragged through the coals in court and on TV. When a police officer detained a repeated violent felon high on fentanyl and methamphetamines, leading to his death, American cities burned for days, with Democrat politicians taking a knee and corporations paying vast fortunes to a group, Black Lives Matter, that vowed to dismantle the nuclear family and failed to report what it was doing with its vast funds. Put bluntly, then, we have angry, violent, and hopeless people because many of our societal institutions worked assiduously to produce them since at least 2008.
All of this should be entirely coherent to any serious student of politics. What we have here is a group of people assembling an entirely coherent construction for the purpose of holding and maintaining power. And to keep this charade going even when it got patently ridiculous—arguing, say, that there were 57 genders, or that houses of worship had to be closed during COVID but liquor store and nail salons were welcome to do business as usual, or that the race riot that torched up your town was a mostly peaceful protest—the left applied its most trusted weapon, that of the permission structure. When every academic and every late night talk show host and every newspaper editorial told you that Trump was Hitler, good luck wearing your MAGA hat to the neighborhood picnic and not facing severe consequences.
At the NRO Corner, Jeffrey Blehar has a breezy look at Kamala’s campaign memoir, 107 Days, headlined, “America’s Most Famous Female Fredo Speaks,” in which he concludes:
And in the end, I am overwhelmed with the pathetic meaninglessness of it all. Reading the excerpt from 107 Days is like listening to the complaints of America’s most famous female Fredo: a washed-up loser complaining that she failed because she was given only low-stakes assignments and a lack of support from the Biden “family.” With every word, I hear her voice whining that she’s smart — not stupid, not like everyone says. (See what I mean when I say we may be in the presence of a genius ghostwriter?)
She has failed to convince anyone. In fact, she would be wise to observe the opposite of her own sage advice from above: Kamala Harris was given much; she should feel free to give us all a little bit less from now on.
But it’s worth noting that, likely with terrible internal polling data coming in, by the end of her campaign, she too willingly went along with being part of the aforementioned “permission structure” that led to Kirk’s assassination:
Where did Charlie Kirk's murderer learn to call conservatives "fascists"?
"Do you think Donald Trump is a fascist?"
Kamala Harris: "Yes, I do. YES, I DO!" pic.twitter.com/RxDjgOYjKY
— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) September 12, 2025
JAMIE K WILSON: Censorship, Consequences, and the Five Levels of Suppression.
THERE’S SOMETHING IN THE AIR:
🇩🇪🇺🇸 Germans gathered at the US Embassy in Berlin to hold a candlelight vigil for Charlie Kirk.
The event was described by locals as “spontaneous” and not pre-planned.
A political earthquake has occurred across the West. https://t.co/OynBbGENeF pic.twitter.com/ObJ6iPEW6d
— Vince Dao (@VinceDaoTV) September 12, 2025
JOHN PODHORETZ: Here’s the danger of social media.
It allows people to publish their internal monologues. Our internal monologues and fantasies are often incredibly ugly. People go to therapists because they feel so guilty about them, and one of the tasks of a therapist is to explain that thoughts are not actions.
Read the whole thing.
Podhoretz ends with a Seinfeld reference, but we’re also deep into the “Monsters from the Id” territory of Forbidden Planet:
FLORIDA MAN FRIDAY [VIP]: I Can’t Even Put This Week’s Top Story in the Headline. “It’s time for your much-needed break from the serious news, and this week, we’ll learn where foot models draw the line, how not to impersonate a nurse, and what they’re driving in Canada these days.”
COLOR ME UNSURPRISED: Study links high THC levels with egg quality and fertility issues.
UPGRADES: Lockheed CEO says firm in ‘very active’ talks with DoD on ‘Ferrari’ F-35 with sixth-gen tech.
Lockheed Martin is in “very active” conversations with the Pentagon about the concept of a fifth-generation-plus F-35 that would include some of the technologies the company has developed for its sixth-generation fighter concepts, Lockheed’s chief executive said today.
“There’s a very active engagement at an extremely high level with the Department of Defense, and I expect it’ll be taken to the White House sometime soon, hopefully, to consider this kind of concept,” Jim Taiclet told investors at the Morgan Stanley conference. “We’ve gotten encouraging feedback. … There’s significant interest in the government about discussing aircraft modernization writ large, all the way up to the administration level, the White House level, and we’re in the middle of that with them, and we’re getting heard. We’re hearing back, and it’s pretty active.”
Taiclet first announced what he then called a “Ferrari” version of the F-35 in April, just weeks after Lockheed lost out on the Air Force’s Next Generation Air Dominance (NGAD) contract that went to Boeing’s F-47. At the time, he said that the company could take tech developed for NGAD and incorporate it on the F-35, giving the stealth jet “80 percent of six-gen capability at half the price.”
I dunno. I hear “Ferrari” from a defense contractor and I think “Rolls Royce price.”
TRUTH SHOULD ALWAYS BE A DEFENSE: Teacher Disciplined for Saying “Privilege” Training Involved “White-Bashing BS” Can Go Forward with First Amendment Claim.
And you just know it was true.
“WHAT DIFFERENCE DOES IT MAKE IF IT’S TRUE?” The Oral History of Wag the Dog. After I linked to clips from Wag the Dog last night in response to the news of Albania’s AI-powered “minister for public procurement,” I googled around to see if I could find a “making of” article. This 2022 Vanity Fair article is a lot of fun, until of course, the last few paragraphs when the Bad Orange Man inevitably begins to be referenced:
[William H.] Macy: Dave somehow sees into the future. I think the danger—and I think Wag the Dog gets this—is not that we will be manipulated, because ever since Homo sapiens first organized themselves, there’s been manipulation of the events and the message, and there always will be. I think the big danger is if we lose faith in any information, that all the news is fake. That’s a horseshit proposition.
[Dustin] Hoffman: It’s one of those movies that, whether I’m in it or not, I like it more each time I see it. I’ve often said that if a movie makes you cry, it usually makes you cry every time you see it, and if it makes you laugh, it makes you laugh every time you see it. This made me laugh as if it was the first time. Barry called it a satire, and it certainly is. But I also think it’s a farce, which I guess means you go as far as you can and get away with it.
[Co-Producer Jane] Rosenthal: Certainly, talking about it in 2022—we had the same kind of skepticism then, but just so much has come true that it’s not to even be believed. You just sort of wonder sometimes, Is satire dead? Would you ever be able to do a political satire again?
As the title card at the beginning of the movie asks, “Why does the dog wag its tail? Because a dog is smarter than its tail. If the tail were smarter, it would wag the dog.” There’s a tremendous Death of Stalin-level satire that would print money just dying to be made, but there’s no way that anyone in Hollywood would admit their complicity in propping up the self-described Politburo who spent every day in power wagging the dog while occasionally sending out the desiccated husk of Joe Biden to read off the teleprompters. And everyone quoted in the above article knew it at the time of being interviewed.
Exit quote: “Through his attorney, David Mamet declined an interview for this story.”
Charlie Kirk’s alleged assassin Tyler Robinson was “full of hate” in the days before the shooting, according to a family friend, as authorities revealed the 22-year-old had confessed to the assassination and had been turned in by a relative.
Bullets found in the chamber of the rifle reportedly used by Robinson included apparent left-wing slogans such as “Hey fascist! Catch!” and another referencing “Oh, Bella Ciao!” a popular Italian anti-fascist song.
Andy Ngo adds: Charlie Kirk Assassin Suspect Appears to Have Killed for Antifa, Confirmed Rifle Cartridge Messages Show.
According to [Utah Gov. Spencer Cox], one cartridge was inscribed with: “Hey fascist! Catch!” Another read: “Oh bella ciao, bella ciao, bella ciao, ciao, ciao.”
The latter is are lyrics from the World War II-era Italian resistance song that has been adopted by Antifa as an unofficial anthem. It is frequently sung at their rallies and the song’s titled featured on their signs and slogans. In 2019, Washington state Antifa gunman Willem van Spronsen closed his manifesto with “Bella ciao” before attacking an ICE facility in Tacoma with a rifle and incendiary devices. He was shot dead while trying to ignite a propane tank close to the building and has since been glorified by Antifa as a hero and martyr.
Gov. Cox also verbally described (and did not show) arrow inscriptions: up arrow, right arrow, and three down arrow symbols. The three down arrows may be the Antifa “Iron Front” symbol, though this cannot be confirmed until images are released.
Lastly, the governor noted that one casing read: “If you read this you are gay lmao.”
Cox’s clarification narrows the speculation: the casings bear clear Antifa references but, at this stage, do not appear to contain any direct mention of trans ideology.
Stephen Miller tweets that “ANTIFA has enjoyed the luxurious protection of one political party in this country, and has been defended by the mainstream of media, and I suspect those days are coming to an end. Forcefully.”
But alas, don’t expect much introspection from the DNC-MSM for creating the atmosphere that radicalized the alleged suspect:
I FEAR THIS MIGHT BE THE CORRECT TAKE:
Calling it now: Tyler wasn't any more radicalized than your average Redditor.
The temperature on the Left is turned so high up that randos just start popping off without warning. https://t.co/XnGEuxTZJ6
— Reddit Lies (@reddit_lies) September 12, 2025
Today’s previous item was this: Student support for violence, bans on ‘controversial’ speech hits ‘record highs’ in annual survey.
WE HAVE A PROBLEM: Student support for violence, bans on ‘controversial’ speech hits ‘record highs’ in annual survey. “More than a third of students would ‘at least rarely’ accept the use of violence to stop a campus speech (34%), 10 percentage points higher than its 2021 survey, while majorities would block other students from attending such a speech (54% versus 41% in 2021) and shout down a speaker (71% from 66%), all ‘record highs.'”
The problem is that the universities accept and teach these attitudes.
EUROPE COULD USE MORE OF THIS SPIRIT: The New Reconquest: Spain’s Answer to Collapse.
There is a Spanish political leader, however, who has displayed moral clarity about terrorism and the war in Gaza. Santiago Abascal, the leader of the right-wing populist Vox party, visited Israel in 2024, right after Sánchez’s government said it would recognize Palestine as a state. His message to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was clear: “No prizes for terrorism. No state for Palestine.”
Similarly, back home, Abascal opposes Catalonia becoming an independent state. As he said in Israel, “We face a similar thing in Spain — all kinds of groups that claim sovereignty based on nothing and nothing.” Sanchez, meanwhile, spends more time defending the amnesty deal for Catalonia’s separatists that he brokered than advancing policies that preserve Spanish nationhood.
The prime minister’s immigration policy, which The Telegraph describes as “opening the country’s door to illegal immigrants,” also does not promote national cohesion but rather fuels unrest and division. By contrast, Vox this year said it would deport 8 million people who haven’t adapted to Spain’s customs if it wins the next election.
Much more at the link.
READER FAVORITE: Dr. Arthritis Back Brace for Lower Back Pain Relief. #CommissionEarned
FIRE THEM, FIRE THEM ALL:
.@JuntoWealth has released a statement about Norristown, Pa. queer activist Margo Richardson.
She was fired. pic.twitter.com/nvwy3DHnC7
— Andy Ngo (@MrAndyNgo) September 11, 2025
Yesterday my old X acquaintance, Physics Geek, said of another one of these online sociopaths, “Make her radioactively unemployable.”
That absolutely needs to be our MO — not just of conservatives, but all decent people.
SHE DOESN’T EVEN BELONG IN POLITE SOCIETY: Should Rashida Tlaib Even Be in Congress? “In her address at the People’s Conference for Palestine, Tlaib didn’t just express sympathy for the Palestinian Arabs and hatred for Israel. That much would have been expected, and nobody seems to mind it very much these days. But Tlaib also significantly enhanced the reputation she had already amassed for harsh, ugly rhetoric and unashamed anti-Americanism. What has become of us as a nation that there are people in one of our national bodies of elected representatives? What long-term damage might such people do to the strength and unity of our nation?”
Good stuff as always from Robert Spencer.
KEEP YOUR NAILS TRIMMED: Toenail Clippers for Thick Toenails-Angled Head. #CommissionEarned
HOW THE LEFT ENCOURAGES, LEGITIMIZES POLITICAL VIOLENCE: Now-former MSNBC Analyst Matthew Dowd got himself fired but not before providing the public with a concise illustration of how the Left does it.