Author Archive: Glenn Reynolds

THIS: The Volvo EX30 Shows Why Cars Still Need Buttons: The EX30 in the outlet’s long-term test fleet is described as an “absolute tech nightmare.”

FLASHBACK: Bring Back Our Knobs: Analog vs. Digital. “Not so long ago, if I wanted to adjust the heat in my car, or the volume on my car radio, I could grab a nice, simple knob. Turn it to the right, and the car got warmer, or the radio got louder. Turn it the other way, and the opposite occurred. I could always sense how far I was adjusting things—without ever taking my eyes off the road—because millions of years of evolution have produced a neurological feedback mechanism that lets me know just how much I’m turning my wrist. Easy, effective, intuitive. That’s simply good design, right? You’d think. But in most late-model cars, making those kinds of adjustments requires pushing buttons multiple times, or navigating menus within menus, and—almost always—taking your eyes off the road.”

This is a column I wrote for Popular Mechanics in 2009. But if you follow the original URL, instead of the archived one above, you get a new column on the same theme by someone else, from 2025. Why?

I NEVER THOUGHT OF NICK SEARCY AS FLUENT IN THE LANGUAGE OF DIPLOMACY, BUT HE HAS THIS ONE RIGHT:

PALESTINIANS ARE ENTITLED LOSERS AND SHOULD BE TREATED AS SUCH:

THIS MONTH, FREE IRAN. NEXT MONTH, FREE CUBA:

Related:

GEOENGINEERING: The audacious plan to refill the Great Salt Lake. “No terminal saline lake — the term for a lake in which water flows to a basin with no exit and accumulates salt and other minerals — has ever been fully restored. And right now, the region has a dismal snowpack, which could again drive the water level to near record lows in the fall.”

Pipeline to the Pacific, baby.

TRIBAL SOCIETIES UNDERSTAND TRIBAL WARS BETTER THAN “CIVILIZED” ONES DO:

IT’S NOT A JOKE, IT’S OPEN, DELIBERATE PROPAGANDA:

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IT’S GOOD TO SINK THE ENEMY DURING A WAR:

LIFE AMONG THE LAPTOP CLASS:

ROGER KIMBALL: Unconditional Surrender: When Wars Are Fought to Win.

Within just four or five days, virtually all of Iran’s senior leadership has been eliminated. Then its replacements were eliminated. “Their army is gone,” President Trump said a few days ago. “Their navy is gone. Their communications are gone. Their leaders are gone. . . . Their Air Force is wiped out. . . . They have 32 ships. All 32 are at the bottom of the ocean. Other than that,” he quipped, “they’re doing very well!”

The assault is not just continuing; it is ramping up. Just a few days ago, Israel destroyed a massive underground complex in the center of Tehran from which the (late) Supreme Leader Khamenei had planned to conduct the war. As retired Lt. General Keith Kellogg told Fox News, President Trump is “going after everything. . . . There’s a huge target list out there, and there’s no restrictions.” Kellogg, noting that he had never seen an operation like this, said that it’s not “whack a mole” but “whack a mullah. . . . This is a massive win for the United States.”

It’s also a massive win for the Iranian people. Just a week ago, the populace was cowed by the mullahs, their immoral “morality” police, and the murderous Basij thugs who terrorized the population. Remember, in January, they maimed and murdered tens of thousands of protesters. Tens of thousands. Now, a popular game in Iran is sneaking up behind Islamic regime clerics and knocking off their turbans. I like to see it. Around the world, exiled Iranians—often alongside Israelis and other Jews—are demonstrating in favor of President Trump. In London, a group of Iranians held a vigil, replete with candles and singing of the American national anthem, to honor the six American troops killed in Kuwait by an Iranian drone strike.

It helps to be the strong horse.

WELL, PEOPLE PROFIT BY NOT HAVING THE SWITCH PRESSED:

Related:

WHAT CHANGE LOOKS LIKE:

They can both be right, you know.

#JOURNALISM:

SO TRUE:

THEY WANT SO BADLY FOR TRUMP TO FAIL:

OPEN THREAD: Party on.