Author Archive: Ed Driscoll

July 6, 2026

EDDIE GLAUDE STRIKES AGAIN: Trump and Vance Are ‘The Devil Who Has Us by the Throat.’

Princeton professor Eddie Glaude is at it again.

Last week on MS NOW, he smeared America as a “white republic” built on “greed and selfishness and grift and hatred.”

On Sunday’s edition of The Weekend, Glaude described JD Vance and Donald Trump as “the devil who has us by the throat” and “white nationalists, for sure.”

“The Devil?” Isn’t he the guy to whom Saul Alinsky dedicated Rules for Radicals? Aren’t all the white nationalists “for sure” being funded by the lefties at the SPLC? Finally, I’m so old, I can remember when Democrats thought presidents going for “the throat” was a good thing: Former CBS Face the Nation host John Dickerson in 2013: “Go for the Throat! Why if he wants to transform American politics, Obama must declare war on the Republican Party.”

Posted at 2:22 pm by Ed Driscoll on Jul 6th, 2026

THE SIMPLEST WAY TO EXPLAIN THE BEHAVIOR OF ANY BUREAUCRATIC ORGANIZATION IS TO ASSUME THAT IT IS CONTROLLED BY A CABAL OF ITS ENEMIES: Odyssey Star Goes Full Woke Promoting Film.

Nolan hasn’t been a woke director by any means. His 2012 movie “The Dark Knight Rises” skewered an Occupy Wall Street-type uprising.

Yet the label has stuck to “The Odyssey,” fairly or unfairly. Now, Nyong’o just poured fuel on the fire.

The following publicity snippet finds the actress answering what she might press Homer about regarding his epic yarn, a revered Greek literary classic.

Her answer is from Woke 101 School.

“So, Homer, how do you feel about this screen time being given to these women, considering how little time you spent with them?” the actress asked with a smile on her face. “Remember us?”

This is Peak Woke, demanding that one of the oldest examples of literature measure up to 2026 social mores. It’s likely tongue in cheek, but she knows how the comment will be received.

It’s not remotely helpful, funny or convincing.

The clip will likely go viral. And, ultimately, the brand Nolan has constructed will be able to withstand another woke-ian stain on the film’s publicity tour.

As Christian Toto concludes, “‘The Odyssey’ will likely shrug off these comments and crush the box office. [But] If the film under-performs at any level, some will point a large, heavy finger at moments like this.”

Tweet concludes, “The entire point of the story is that mortals, in spite of all their pride and greed, are the playthings of the gods and therefore must be humble and behave honorably or they will be punished. The male god Poseidon is the antagonist, and the hero is Athena, who repeatedly leads the otherwise helpless characters to resolution and peace. This knowledge could be yours, if you read the book.”

(Classical reference in headline.)

Posted at 1:35 pm by Ed Driscoll on Jul 6th, 2026

OUT ON A LIMB: Hating Supergirl Doesn’t Make You a Misogynist.

The opening weekend audience for Supergirl was, in fact, more male than female. It was also just very, very small—and for this, I suspect that the fault lies not with the audience but with the movie itself. The action scenes are a mash-up of the same computer-generated effects we’ve seen a million times; the depiction of Supergirl as a reluctant hero, emotionally guarded and frequently inebriated, is territory that was trod first and better by Guardians of the Galaxy and Jessica Jones. The exposition is clunky; the world-building is half-hearted; the characters are paper-thin; and the side plot where Supergirl intercedes to save a bunch of girls from an intergalactic sex-trafficking operation is truly ham-handed pandering—and also, Mad Max: Fury Road did it better. It’s not just that this is weak storytelling, but that it is trite, old, and boring.

And if moviegoers predicted it would be, and decided to stay home—well, blame the cultural apparatus that foisted this movie on us, by deciding 10 years ago that the greatest measure of our moral and political progress was the genital configuration of the person wearing spandex and punching bad guys on a giant screen. It was an ideologically captured cohort of critics, and the film industry that cared about their opinions, who decided that buying tickets to female-led superhero films was the entertainment version of eating your vegetables. Were these movies any good? Who cared, when they were good for you—and more importantly, good for women?

The earliest rumblings of this phenomenon were observable in 2016, in the cult of astroturfed pseudo-fandom that sprang up around the all-female reboot of Ghostbusters. Whatever excitement surrounded that movie had very little to do with the movie itself; instead, it was fueled by the identitarian glee of taking something beloved by Gen X men and putting a “The Future Is Female” T-shirt on it.

Ten years on, it’s very funny to realize how much of the conversation about this allegedly feminist movie failed the Bechdel test, insofar as critics talked less about the movie itself than about how great it was that it made certain men so angry. It also required a certain amount of amnesia as to the prior existence of female-driven franchises that nobody had to be blackmailed into seeing: Aliens, Twilight, The Hunger Games. And yet, this notion of fandom as political obligation did catch on—not necessarily with moviegoers themselves, but definitely among the people who either made the movies or made a living by talking about them. Within these populations, it was an article of faith that you could basically guilt-trip people into liking the “right” movies by strongly implying that failing to like these films made you a Republican.

Alison Bechdel, the author of the aforementioned “test” eventually admitted, “The Bechdel test was a joke… I didn’t intend for it to become a real gauge.”

So, if Supergirl bombed, what is making money? Creepy Pasta, Toxic Masculinity and a Full Theater: My Take on Backrooms.

Since COVID, my in-theater habit mostly died. Patterns were disrupted and I never quite got back to my prior habits. But I still love the idea of seeing a film in the theater. That shared experience with strangers — and movie theater popcorn — beats at home viewing every time, in my opinion. So last night, at my 11-year-old son’s behest, we went to see Backrooms. He knew all about it — something about a video game or viral internet thing pulled him in. I have no idea about this world.

I texted my 25-year-old son that I was going to see this viral hit.

His response: “lol what?”

Then: “oh with O, makes sense now.”

He explained it’s based on an internet “creepy pasta” that went viral on 4chan and spawned a short video series on YouTube. I mean, is this even English?

I replied, “What is creepy pasta?” thinking it was a typo. It wasn’t.

He broke it down: “Creepy pastas are repostable stories, images, memes or text chains that become viral through people reinventing and sharing them across platforms. They’re like internet ‘commodities’ designed to freak you out.”

I still don’t really get it.

He explained further: “It comes from copypasta — those copied text blocks like the shrug emoji ¯_(ツ)_/¯— but these are ghost stories for the online age.”

Still lost. But I did the equivalent of nodding via text.

I figured I wouldn’t fall asleep, but I also wouldn’t get it. Some meme-based, aesthetics-driven thing with no real storyline — a self-referential, internet-culture rabbit hole “vibe” that I’d never fully understand as a Gen Xer. I still don’t get memes, for the most part.

The movie wasn’t awful, just kind of dumb. And not scary.

And if you don’t fancy that, how about some good old-fashioned revenge and mayhem? Citizen Vigilante Strikes Journalism, Too.

Citizen Vigilante provokes discussion that leftist Hollywood media suppress. Sanders victimizes a family harboring the rape gang, telling them, “I think you brought with you your archaic value system and your commitment to religion over democracy and over anything else, including the rule of law.” Harsh words for a cheap film that nonetheless champions free speech — as indicated by Elon Musk when he posted free viewings of Citizen Vigilante for 48 hours to counter the rampant film-festival-circuit programming for open-border globalist propaganda. Despite the movie’s popularity on social media, the media blackout of Citizen Vigilante (the New York Times has not reviewed it) ignores, as always, the populism that Boll has ignited but that Hollywood no longer acknowledges. Citizen Vigilante proves this truth simply by putting up a fight.

Or, why not go fully digital?

 2026 at the movies is feeling very much like the late 1960s, as described in Peter Biskind’s Easy Riders, Raging Bulls. Back then, desperately hoping to make bank one last time, Hollywood studios cranked out musical after musical, trying to replicate the blowout success of 1965’s The Sound of Music. Virtually all of its recombinant clones were rejected by moviegoers for much pulpier stuff, such as Bonnie & Clyde, Easy Rider, and Robert Altman’s M*A*S*H, particularly after Hollywood considered itself no longer bound by the Hays Code. 

UPDATE: Ride the Mobius Movie Doom Loop!

Posted at 1:22 pm by Ed Driscoll on Jul 6th, 2026

HOW THE SAUSAGE GETS MADE: So, That Black Woman on the Metro Surrounded by Patriot Front Being Compared to Rosa Parks? About Her…:

Related: Hundreds of Patriot Front Demonstrators Hit DC’s July 4 Celebration and Minds Are Blown. “How many of these guys are inked? Compare and contrast with the Proud Boys and other known and acknowledged right-wing groups. These guys aren’t ‘street fighting men.’ They aren’t manual laborers or in the building trades. They aren’t ex-combat arms. They are office workers. What office? I don’t know, but they aren’t right-wing shock troops…More to the point, let’s compare and contrast the Patriot Front with Antifa, the George Floyd Memorial Protesters, or any anti-ICE group. The bottom line on this protest is that a few hundred alleged White supremacists and fascists openly protested in one of the most pathetically progressive cities in America, and nothing happened. There were no attacks. There was no need for police escorts. There were no riots or shoplifting rampages.”

Posted at 12:30 pm by Ed Driscoll on Jul 6th, 2026

“MILTON FRIEDMAN ISN’T RUNNING THE SHOW ANYMORE:”

 

Posted at 10:22 am by Ed Driscoll on Jul 6th, 2026

RIOTS FOR THEE, BUT NOT FOR ME:

Related: Walking Around The Walls Of The Vatican City.

(Classical reference in headline.)

Posted at 8:35 am by Ed Driscoll on Jul 6th, 2026

July 5, 2026

POLIMATH DISMANTLES LEFTY PROF AND HIS THREAD CALLING PATRIOT FRONT ‘REPUBLICAN STAFFERS’ IN JUST TWO POSTS:

As John Nolte adds, “if these were actual right wingers, the corporate media would have doxxed them by now:”

(Also safe? The Reuters photographer who carefully composed the above image.)

Feds? SPLC? In any case, can their backers spring for a new pair of duds?

UPDATE:

MORE: Curses — foiled by the Gov. William J. Le Petomane Memorial Thruway!

Posted at 8:14 pm by Ed Driscoll on Jul 5th, 2026

A LITTLE TROUBLE IN BIG CHINA:

From last year: Foreign Investors Trapped in China’s Real Estate Meltdown as $140 Billion Bet Unravels Further.

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

IT’S ALWAYS NICE TO MAKE THE SUNDAY SMILES:

Posted at 2:45 pm by Ed Driscoll on Jul 5th, 2026

NANCY PELOSI’S HUSBAND FACES HIT-AND-RUN CHARGE:

Paul Pelosi, the 86-year-old husband of Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), is facing a hit-and-run investigation in Napa County after allegedly slamming into a parked car and driving off as if nothing happened.

According to the Napa County Sheriff’s Office, an eyewitness in Yountville called 911 around 2:30 p.m. Friday after watching a convertible strike a parked car, pause for a moment, then take off.

Pelosi drove the convertible, which was later found a short distance away, disabled at the exact intersection where Napa County busted him for driving under the influence in 2022.

You can’t make this stuff up.

It’s good to be in the nomenklatura.

Posted at 2:14 pm by Ed Driscoll on Jul 5th, 2026

THE ‘BAM THAT DIDN’T BARK: When Will Obama Say, ‘What’s Happened to My Party?’

Avila Chevalier once retweeted: “I just cannot get over the fact that the universe has foisted upon us the perfect illustration of literally every failing of capitalism and people are still like we can’t be communists cuz there won’t be enough types of soup.” CNN examined her now-deleted X account and reported it contained “repeated sympathetic references to communism, Marxist ideology and Soviet figures, including Vladimir Lenin.” Another post encouraged workers to “seize the means of production.” Another advocated worker control of wealth. She wrote: “You can call that communism, you can call it socialism, you can call it pancakes.” She described Karl Marx’s “Das Kapital” as an “essential must-read.”

Her posts went well beyond economics. In April 2020, she called Joe Biden a “rapist.” After then-Vice President Kamala Harris urged migrants not to cross the southern border illegally, Avila Chevalier responded: “I have no nuance to add. (Expletive) Kamala Harris.”

Avila Chevalier called for abolishing police and prisons, posted about wiping her hands on the American flag, and denounced interracial relationships by accusing Black and Arab men of “fetishizing ugly colonizer women,” one of several posts in which she attacked white women.

Claire Valdez, another Mamdani-endorsed Democratic nominee for the U.S. House, has vowed to “take away buildings” from alleged slumlords and supports nationwide rent control.

Where is Barack Obama?

Tacitly approving their message.

Posted at 1:45 pm by Ed Driscoll on Jul 5th, 2026

SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN SOLD AS PUBLISHER DIVESTS ITSELF OF THE BUD LIGHT OF SCIENCE JOURNALS:

I have been following the antics of Scientific American, the Bud Light of science journals, for quite some time now.

The low-lights from the magazine’s stack of articles include:

Now comes news that Springer Nature, the publisher, announced it is divesting both of its flagship consumer science magazines, Scientific American and Spektrum der Wissenschaft (Spectrum of Science) in Germany. The company says that the sales are part of a strategic pivot to concentrate exclusively on its core academic, health, and education publishing business.

In recent years, particularly when it came to Covid, Scientific American really covered all the bases:

● Why Are People with Obesity More Vulnerable to COVID?

–Scientific American, June 24th, 2021.

● Scientific American looks at the racist stigmatization of black women’s bodies and obesity.

—Twitchy and your humble narrator, December 28th, 2022:

● The Mask Comes Off: Determined to defend face coverings, a Scientific American article dismisses scientific “rigor.”

● Scientific American: “As the daughter of a cancer researcher, Kamala Harris would bring a lifelong familiarity with science to the presidency, experts say.”

● Scientific American Editor-in-Chief Resigns After MAGA Meltdown Went Viral.

● Scientific American attacks Jay Bhattacharya for prioritizing Americans’ autonomy over ‘the science.’

Choose your adventure.

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

July 4, 2026

OH, TO BE IN ENGLAND:

Even the lefties at Merriam-Webster had fun in the run-up to today:

Old Blighty’s clapped out talking points rebutted in style:

 

Posted at 11:30 pm by Ed Driscoll on Jul 4th, 2026

IT’S A SOUTHERN POVERTY SEMIQUINCENTENNIAL!

When Reuters sent out their photographer to shoot this clearly staged photo, couldn’t they have also dispatched a reporter to write up a story as well?

Exit quote:

Do the Patriot Front guys do anything besides marching around in suspiciously clean khakis, masks and baseball caps?  Is there any burning, looting, statue toppling or podium stealing? They seem very much like the Monty Python sketch about would-be bank robbers afraid of breaking the law:

UPDATE:

MORE: Question asked:

Posted at 11:14 pm by Ed Driscoll on Jul 4th, 2026

THE CRITICAL DRINKER:  The Odyssey — Oh, Dear…

As of the time of this post, here’s the ratio of likes to dislikes on its trailer:

In the past, such a ratio foretold of bad things to come from movies such as Snow White. Will The Odyssey endure a similar fate? As the Drinker concludes, “Is it going to reach Oppenheimer levels of success? Probably not, but I do think it’ll turn a healthy profit. And what the hell—maybe [Christopher Nolan will] surprise us all and create a genuine masterpiece with The Odyssey. But I don’t know, man. I’ve got this weird little feeling that he might have gone a bridge too far with this one. Either way, we’ll find out in a couple of weeks.”

UPDATE: There’s still one bold casting choice left for Nolan:

Hey, it worked for Amazon, why not Universal, as well?

 

Posted at 6:55 pm by Ed Driscoll on Jul 4th, 2026

CHRISTIAN TOTO: Woke Supergirl Movie Belly Flops in Theaters.

The semi-sequel to last year’s Superman stars Milly Alcock as the hard-partying Krypton cousin scrambling to find the antidote to her drugged dog Krypto.

Yes, that’s the film’s plot, and the dog in question was obviously CGI. That may partially explain the film’s tepid reception. This failure is far from an orphan, though.

Let’s start with the main character, a minor player in the DC Comics universe. Alcock, a relative unknown, introduced the character via a boozy cameo at the end of Superman.

Since then, Alcock has played the victim card in the media, saying that her work on HBO Max’s House of the Dragon taught her that “simply existing as a woman in that space is something that people comment on. We have become very comfortable having this weird ownership of women’s bodies.”

The online backlash was swift and predictable, and the starlet doubled down by singling out “Christian Dads” in the process. Later, she claimed her Supergirl character was likely bisexual.

Week by week, those Supergirl box office predictions drooped.

Alcock’s woke media interviews didn’t help. The tepid trailer hurt the film’s potential buzz, and the fact that last year’s Superman didn’t crush the box office as some expected also mattered.

At USA Today, Derek Hunter adds: Why the Supergirl movie provides us a cautionary tale.

Asked about negative online reaction, Alcock went further: “And (the backlash) is from a lot of people whose profiles have no photo, who are burner accounts. Or someone’s name and then ‘Dad of four, Christian,’ which is hilarious to me. But I mean, whose opinion do you really care about? If you’re pissing the right kind of people off, you’re doing OK.”

Why take a swipe at Christian dads – or anyone – when your career hinges on how many people you can get to buy a ticket to your movie?

The Hollywood press did the movie no favors, asking questions largely unrelated to the film itself. But Alcock took the bait nearly every time.

Asked about dealing with “House of the Dragon” fans in the context of her new role, she said, “It definitely made me aware that simply existing as a woman in that space is something that people comment on. We have become very comfortable having this weird ownership of women’s bodies. I can’t really stop them.”

It was a clinic in how to irritate half the country.

Milly Alcock is no Bruce Springsteen, ‘The Boss’

If you’re Bruce Springsteen – who punctuates his live shows with anti-Trump political commentary – you can get away with it. If you’re a 26-year-old Australian actress on the cusp of the biggest break of her career, you can’t.

To the baby boomers who grew up on “The Boss,” his politics are baked in. That he’d lecture them about it is almost expected at this point.

It also costs him nothing. The tickets are already sold by the time he opens his mouth, and the loss of future airplay doesn’t touch him ‒ he sold his entire catalog to Sony Music Entertainment for $500 million in 2021. Lost royalties from fewer streams or less radio play are of no consequence to a man whose income now comes from concert tickets, not the catalog.

“Supergirl,” on the other hand, doesn’t come with fond high school memories for millions of baby boomers, or the loyalty that comes from being the soundtrack to someone’s adolescence. In the comic book world, she was always a second-tier character ‒ Superman’s cousin, about as popular as Alfred or Jimmy Olsen.

Springsteen’s far left politics actually do cost him revenue, though. As “Miami” Steve Van Zandt told the London Times in 2024,  “‘When Bruce got vocal behind the Democrats, we probably lost half the audience. There’s nowhere we can’t do business.’ But some places feel like enemy territory now? ‘A little bit, yeah. We’re ten times bigger in Europe. We might play six stadiums in America and sixty in Europe.’”

Besides the strange choice in which story to tell (the making of Nebraska? Really?) Springsteen’s politics also very likely helped to doom his biopic at the movies last year.

Posted at 6:14 pm by Ed Driscoll on Jul 4th, 2026

QUOTE OF THE DAY:

About the Declaration there is a finality that is exceedingly restful. It is often asserted that the world has made a great deal of progress since 1776, that we have had new thoughts and new experiences which have given us a great advance over the people of that day, and that we may therefore very well discard their conclusions for something more modern. But that reasoning can not be applied to this great charter. If all men are created equal, that is final. If they are endowed with inalienable rights, that is final. If governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed, that is final. No advance, no progress can be made beyond these propositions. If anyone wishes to deny their truth or their soundness, the only direction in which he can proceed historically is not forward, but backward toward the time when there was no equality, no rights of the individual, no rule of the people. Those who wish to proceed in that direction can not lay claim to progress. They are reactionary. Their ideas are not more modern, but more ancient, than those of the Revolutionary fathers.

—Calvin Coolidge, Address at the Celebration of the 150th Anniversary of the Declaration of Independence in Philadelphia on July 5, 1926.

Posted at 5:30 pm by Ed Driscoll on Jul 4th, 2026

REDNECK NATION: NY Times Defends Organizer of ‘Muslims Only’ Swim Party.

Happy 4th everyone. I’m celebrating like everyone else with family, friends and fireworks. However, I wanted to say something about this story from the NY Times which bends over backwards to defend Aminah Knight, the woman to posted a flyer for a “Muslims only” swim event in Texas.

Ms. Knight, a former public-school teacher from New York City, was determined. She wanted something for families — and especially for young women and girls who, like her, enjoyed swimming but disliked the attention that full-body swimwear, common in the Middle East, often drew at American pools.

“We swim too,” Ms. Knight thought. She refused to settle for another bounce house party.
She traveled from mosque to mosque across North Texas’ booming Muslim community, talking up her event. She made her own website and flyer. And her efforts worked. Hundreds attended.

That was the first year. She held the event again last year and it was even more popular. This year she planned to host it again but things didn’t go as planned.

She had a flyer ready, which she shared widely on social media last year, when more than 500 people turned out. She changed a few words, adding that the event would be “family-friendly.”

And she kept the part that said: “Muslims Only.”

She didn’t think twice about it. After all, the event celebrated a Muslim holiday. There would be halal meat, Islamic music, a private prayer area and a dress code of modest swimwear.

She wanted observant families to feel comfortable. She never thought anyone would mind.

But this year people noticed the flyer and in particular the part that read “Muslims only.” First it attracted the attention of a local podcaster and then the NY Post. Eventually she removed that wording from the flyer but it was too late. The governor stepped in.

Read the whole thing. I guess as long as the event was separate, but entirely equal to other pool parties, the Gray Lady would be fine with it. Straight out of Redneck Nation, and more recently, Ryan Long’s “When Wokes and Racists Actually Agree on Everything” video:

And speaking of Redneck Nation:

Earlier: Darializa Avila Chevalier’s Hostility to Interracial Romances and ‘Ugly Colonizer Women’ Earns Praise From Ex-KKK Grand Wizard David Duke.

Posted at 5:14 pm by Ed Driscoll on Jul 4th, 2026

SOMEBODY SET UP US THE BOMB: Native Americans corralled Spanish horses decades before Europeans arrived.

There’s just one problem here:

Perhaps it’s a geographical issue:

Posted at 4:30 pm by Ed Driscoll on Jul 4th, 2026

OLD AND BUSTED: Moscow on the Hudson.

The New Coldness? Siberia at Gracie Mansion!

Posted at 1:17 pm by Ed Driscoll on Jul 4th, 2026
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