Author Archive: Ed Driscoll

January 5, 2026

GOTTA PUMP THOSE NUMBERS UP; THOSE ARE ROOKIE NUMBERS IN THIS RACKET: 2,000 federal agents deploying to Minneapolis in immigration crackdown, fraud probe.

Related:

Posted at 9:14 pm by Ed Driscoll on Jan 5th, 2026

GREAT MOMENTS IN CHUTZPAH:

In 2000, when Michael Caine won the Best Supporting Actor Oscar for his role in the pro-abortion film The Cider House Rules, William F. Buckley wrote:

Non-amateur writers avoid industriously the word “Orwellian” because even years ago it became an overused and underdefined cliche.

But try to find another word for what Michael Caine came up with at the Oscar ceremony on Sunday after receiving a prize for his performance in “The Cider House Rules.” That’s the movie that’s a paean to the abortion industry. And what the great actor said, when finally the thunderous ovation let him be heard, was, “I’m basically up here, guys, to represent you as what I hope you will all be, a survivor.”

Well, George Orwell would have pondered that, all right, inasmuch as a survivor, in the context of the theme of that event, turns out to be somebody who was physically present at the Shrine Auditorium on Sunday, i.e., somebody who survived the mother’s temptation to abort the fetus. That makes them survivors, does it not? So they are being applauded for surviving the practices celebrated by the movie … That, ladies and gentlemen, is Orwellian.

Similarly, for Charlie Kirk of course, it wasn’t a “near-death experience.” Kimmel knows it, and he doesn’t give a damn about the assassination of someone on the other side of the aisle.

Posted at 8:30 pm by Ed Driscoll on Jan 5th, 2026

SECSTATE RUBIO SCHOOLS SUNDAY SHOWS OVER CAPTURE AND EXTRADITION OF NICOLAS MADURO:

Finally, Rubio went on CBS’s Face the Nation and dealt with Margaret Brennan’s…confusion.

[Transcript omitted]

Imagine weeks of helping the Democrats pound a “regime change” narrative ahead of any action in Venezuela, only to not have a military action yield instant regime change. This totally ruins any comparisons to the Middle East. Brennan was naturally confused, and Rubio tried to guide her- to no avail.

To her credit, Brennan asked no authorities questions (saving those for a subsequent interview with Senate Intel Chair Tom Cotton (R-AR). Instead, she muddled through questions about oil and the scope of the operation, and on the potential military occupation of Venezuela.

As Ace writes: Retarded Spinster Margaret Brennan Clowns Herself So Hard on Venezuela That No One Will Ever Be Able to Top It (Except Tucker Carlson, One Day Later).

Margaret Brennan says she’s “confused” why Hegseth (and Rubio) just didn’t order Delta Force to not only land inside a military base to capture Maduro, but also order five other helicopter squads to simultaneously capture the other top five leaders of his regime.

Why didn’t we just do five simultaneous Al Qaeda captures when we got OBL?

My guess would be: Because as soon as you do one, the entire country is alerted to your presence, so you have to get the Big One and get out, quick.

But that’s too obvious. Margaret Brennan is “confused” why Delta Force just didn’t execute five other Miracle Operations in perfect coordinated simultaneity.

The Cotton interview was equally, err, interesting: Margaret Brennan Clearly Doesn’t Like Senator Tom Cotton.

To quote Miles Davis, it’s also fun to watch “in a silent way:”

Even individual still frames are remarkable:

Posted at 5:45 pm by Ed Driscoll on Jan 5th, 2026

21st CENTURY RELATIONSHIPS:

Posted at 5:12 pm by Ed Driscoll on Jan 5th, 2026

GREAT MOMENTS IN NEGATIVE PR: Hilton Hotels in Minneapolis Just Asked for the Bud Light Treatment.

More (from Steve):

Hilton’s legal department might have an issue here, depending on what contracts they have with Washington.

Posted at 4:00 pm by Ed Driscoll on Jan 5th, 2026

DISPATCHES FROM THE FORMER MRS. JEFF BEZOS: MacKenzie Scott Sends Millions to Terror-Tied Nonprofit Network.

MacKenzie Scott, the billionaire ex-wife of Jeff Bezos, funneled millions of dollars to a left-wing nonprofit network that supports the nation’s most virulent anti-Israel and anti-Semitic organizations, including some that are under congressional investigation for their ties to terrorist groups, a Washington Free Beacon review found. Scott announced the grant in an essay that cites Hopi prophecy, bird flocks, and sex as inspirations for her latest round of giving.

Read the whole thing.

Posted at 2:22 pm by Ed Driscoll on Jan 5th, 2026

CAPTAIN OF SOMALI PIRATES TAKING PERMANENT SHORE LEAVE: Tim Walz abruptly drops out of Minnesota governor’s race in wake of alleged billion-dollar fraud scandal.

UPDATE: Just think of the media as Democratic Party operatives with bylines, and Walz’s lack of vetting last year makes perfect sense:

Or maybe he was vetted, because the DNC-MSM liked the idea of Somali-style daycare frauds in all 50 states?

Posted at 1:55 pm by Ed Driscoll on Jan 5th, 2026

DISPATCHES FROM WEIMAR AMERICA:

Oceania has never been at war with Maduro:

Posted at 1:22 pm by Ed Driscoll on Jan 5th, 2026

January 4, 2026

SACRE BLEU!

Posted at 2:45 pm by Ed Driscoll on Jan 4th, 2026

PAST PERFORMANCE IS NO GUARANTEE OF FUTURE RESULTS:

Posted at 1:22 pm by Ed Driscoll on Jan 4th, 2026

SOROS COORDINATE! SOROS COORDINATE!

Meanwhile, in Venezuela:

Posted at 12:45 pm by Ed Driscoll on Jan 4th, 2026

PAST PERFORMANCE IS NO GUARANTEE OF FUTURE RESULTS BEING UNBURDENED BY WHAT HAS BEEN: Kamala Harris Humiliates Herself Condemning Capture of Maduro.

“Donald Trump’s actions in Venezuela do not make America safer, stronger, or more affordable,” [Harris] claimed. “That Maduro is a brutal, illegitimate dictator does not change the fact that this action was both unlawful and unwise. We’ve seen this movie before. Wars for regime change or oil that are sold as strength but turn into chaos, and American families pay the price.”

Her post continued:

The American people do not want this, and they are tired of being lied to.

This is not about drugs or democracy. It is about oil and Donald Trump’s desire to play the regional strongman. If he cared about either, he wouldn’t pardon a convicted drug trafficker or sideline Venezuela’s legitimate opposition while pursuing deals with Maduro’s cronies.

The President is putting troops at risk, spending billions, destabilizing a region, and offering no legal authority, no exit plan, and no benefit at home.

America needs leadership whose priorities are lowering costs for working families, enforcing the rule of law, strengthening alliances, and — most importantly — putting the American people first.

As I pointed out yesterday, Trump has not gotten us into another war. This was a surgical strike that accomplished its objective without a hitch. The statement is curiously similar to pretty much every other Democrats’ statement on the successful mission.

But what makes her statement even more absurd and hypocritical than those of other Democrats is that the Biden-Harris administration approved a $25 million bounty for information leading to Maduro’s arrest just days before Joe Biden and Kamala Harris left office.

Oceania has never been at war with Nicolás Maduro:

Posted at 12:00 pm by Ed Driscoll on Jan 4th, 2026

CHRISTIAN TOTO: Nuremberg Should Crush TDS Once and for All.

“Nuremberg” offers a slick, satisfying look at critical trials following the Third Reich’s demise.

Until it doesn’t.

Buried in the middle of this well-packaged drama is shocking footage of the Holocaust’s atrocities. What might seem tonally imbalanced is actually a perfectly deployed smart bomb.

It’s vital to the story in play, while reminding anyone cold enough to compare President Donald Trump to Adolf Hitler that they should be ashamed of themselves.

This may be a bit of a spoiler alert, but then Nuremberg has been in theaters for a couple of months now (and is now available for online streaming), so you’ve probably already read about it in reviews, but Toto is referring to this scene:

The first half is often comic. One fellow prisoner is Rudolf Hess (Andreas Pietschmann) who is feigning amnesia, and whose backstory is a farce. When Göring and other Nazi leaders are subjected to Rorschach tests, it’s done for laughs. But the second half is the trial itself, where real footage from the concentration camps is shown. It’s so horrifying it makes everything else feel phoney. This is the moment when the penny finally drops for Kelley and he sees that Göring is a monster and not his pal. Well done.

By late 1942, the Allies knew the Holocaust was ongoing. Americans have been exposed to newsreel footage of the horrors of the concentration camps since the war’s end in 1945. Hellish shots of the ovens with charred bodies in them were seen midway through Stanley Kramer’s Judgement at Nuremberg in 1961. The soul-wrenching clip of emaciated bodies being pushed into a mass grave by a bulldozer driver, after the Allies liberated the concentration camps, was a centerpiece of the documentary TV series The World At War’s episode titled “Genocide.” Despite all of that, because gnosticism runs so strongly on the left, they’ve been comparing Republican presidents to the man with the tiny toothbrush mustache since 1944. Another Hollywood movie on the evils of National Socialism isn’t going to stop them.

Posted at 10:44 am by Ed Driscoll on Jan 4th, 2026

SCOTT JENNINGS REMINDS AMERICA HOW LUCKY WE ARE WITH A BIDEN MADURO FLASHBACK:

After President Trump ordered the overnight strike in Venezuela, and US Delta Force operators captured and extracted dictator Nicolas Maduro, the social media platform has been a whirlwind of activity. From Venezuelans singing and dancing in celebration to leftists in America crying because one of their favorite world leaders had been taken out, we’ve frantically been trying to keep up with all of the reactions — the good, the bad, and the extremely ugly.

But amid all the furor, our favorite CNN commentator (and Salem Media radio host) Scott Jennings chimed in earlier today with yet another reminder of how much better off America is with Donald Trump, JD Vance, Pete Hegseth, and the rest of the Trump 2.0 administration in charge than what we had gone through for the prior four years.

All it took was one tweet about Maduro from the previous Zombie-in-Chief, Joe Biden:


How angry must Hunter be with the Big Guy right now?

Posted at 10:14 am by Ed Driscoll on Jan 4th, 2026

OH, TO BE IN ENGLAND:

Old and Busted: Rock Against Racism.

The New Hotness? Taxpayers fund festival that won’t let white people run it.

Taxpayers are funding a music festival that bans white people from its leadership, The Telegraph can reveal.

The annual “Decolonise Fest” music event for “punx of colour” aims to undo the harms of colonialism and “dismantle white supremacy” in the punk music scene.

Grant funding from the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) has propped up Decolonise Fest, which informs prospective supporters that “white people cannot join the organising group” that leads it.

Leaders are instead drawn from members who can boast one or two parents descended from the “original inhabitants” of continents outside Europe, or from Roma and Traveller groups.

Arts Council cash has supported the London festival, whose “militant” leadership has pledged to “put the threat back into punk” – while also banning any rhetoric that could stray into “fatphobia”.

The festival has in the past hosted acts including Bob Vylan, whose lead singer led chants of “death to the IDF” during a Glastonbury set, a show that was supported by Decolonise Fest with the social media message: “Free Palestine and up the Vylan.”

Fortunately, American punk rock is a much more welcoming and diverse environment: My Celtic-Jewish Punk Rock History. “In his book The Heebie-Jeebies at CBGB’s: A Secret History of Jewish Punk, Steven Beeber chronicles the Jewish lineage that led to New York punk rock. It goes from Lenny Bruce, ‘the patron saint of punk,’ to Lou Reed, to Jonathan Richman, to Suicide, to Richard Hell to Joey and Tommy Ramone. ‘As it originated in Manhattan’s Lower East Side in the early 1970s,’ Beeber writes, ‘punk rock was the apotheosis of a Jewish cultural tradition that found its ultimate expression in the generation born after the Holocaust.’”

Posted at 8:45 am by Ed Driscoll on Jan 4th, 2026

THE DONROE DOCTRINE: Trump calls Monroe Doctrine the ‘Donroe Doctrine’ after Venezuela raid.

In his hourlong press conference following the early morning capture of Venezuela’s leader and his wife, President Donald Trump justified the operation as one in line with a more than 200-year-old foreign policy agenda, the Monroe Doctrine.

The doctrine, which the president has called the “Donroe Doctrine,” has for years been relegated to foreign policy history, from which recent administrations have sought to distance themselves. But more than a decade after then-U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, under former President Barack Obama, announced the “era of Monroe Doctrine is over,” Trump is now embracing it.

In his remarks on Jan. 3, the president cast the doctrine as a continuing tenet of U.S. foreign policy, and said the operation that ousted Venezuela President Nicolás Maduro not only abides by it, but goes a step further. Trump alleged the country was “hosting foreign adversaries” and “acquiring offensive weapons” and accused Venezuela of seizing and selling American oil assets.

“All of these actions were in gross violation of the core principles of American foreign policy, dating back more than two centuries,” Trump said. “All the way back, dated to the Monroe doctrines. And the Monroe Doctrine is a big deal, but we’ve superseded it by a lot, by a real lot. They now call it the Donroe doctrine.”

At the Washington Free Beacon, Adam Kredo adds: Donroe Doctrine: Trump Nabs Maduro in Daring, Middle-of-the-Night Operation.

Caracas went dark in the early morning hours of January 3 as Operation Absolute Resolve began with “discreet, precise” strikes that marked “the culmination of months of planning and rehearsal,” according to chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Dan Caine. It was an operation “that only the United States could do” through a combination of on-the-ground assets and intelligence capabilities, according to Caine, who said more than 150 aircraft launched from positions across the Western Hemisphere. Within a short amount of time, the United States dropped “an interdiction force” in downtown Caracas to intercept Maduro and his wife at their home.

“We watched, we waited, we prepared, we remained patient and professional,” Caine said. “This mission was meticulously planned, drawing lessons from decades of missions over the last many years, decades, many missions over these last many years. This was an audacious operation that only the United States could do.”

Trump compared Saturday’s successful military operation to those he had overseen in the past, including last year’s strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities, the 2020 assassination of Iranian general Qassem Soleimani, and the 2019 raid that killed ISIS founder Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. As with these operations, not a single U.S. service member was killed during the raid on Maduro’s compound.

Maduro had a $50 million bounty on his head at the time he was captured, prompting Trump to joke, “Don’t let anybody claim it. Nobody deserves it but us.”

Heh, indeed.

At the Spectator, Carlos Flores asks: Can the ‘Donroe doctrine’ really change Venezuela?

Until last night, the daily life of a Venezuelan largely consisted of trying to find food for the day and being careful not to get stopped by police and/or military personnel, or people in plain-clothes who work for the government and operate with impunity. They’ll take your phone and search to see if you’re criticizing the government, and if so, that’s it, you’ll disappear. This has happened to many fellow journalists. They simply vanished. The regime even created an app called Venapp, so you can become a snitch and send information on anyone who supposedly threatens the government. You can’t trust anyone, not even your family. That’s why, for Venezuelans, it was better to get drunk, buy things with money sent by relatives abroad and, for some, hold onto the hope that the regime would end someday.

That day seems to have finally arrived in the early hours of this morning, in a way few could have imagined. Not even Maduro himself, who just a couple of days ago was dancing and cracking jokes on national television.

And just like that, Oceania has never been at war with Venezuela:

 

Posted at 8:14 am by Ed Driscoll on Jan 4th, 2026

January 3, 2026

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