Author Archive: Glenn Reynolds
January 26, 2026
NOT THEIR BEST WORK: After a Bad Weekend, the Trump Administration Cleans Up Its Messaging on Gun Rights.
BRIAN TRANSEAU, CALL YOUR OFFICE: South African San rock art reveals trance dances and initiation ceremonies.
MY LATEST SUBSTACK ESSAY: On Weather Forecasts and “Trusting the Science.” Notes from a blizzard that didn’t happen. Plus a few thoughts on the current political situation.
As always, if you enjoy these essays, please take out a — preferably paid — subscription. Thanks!
I’VE SEEN THE LOCKDOWNS AND THE DAMAGE DONE: The pandemic’s hidden toll: Millions of chronic conditions left undiagnosed.
THE TRUMP ADMINISTRATION HASN’T COVERED ITSELF WITH GLORY IN ITS GUN-RELATED STATEMENTS ON THE PRETTI SHOOTING: This piece from Bearing Arms parses things pretty well.
UPDATE: Larry Correia has thoughts, too. Excerpt that captures his inimitable style:
That whole Noem/Patel narrative is bunk. Lots of Americans exercise their 2nd Amendment rights in public, even when there’s some dumb ass “protest” going on.
What law abiding gun carriers DON’T DO however is fuck around with cops while armed, and if they do willfully fuck around with cops, getting arrested or shot shouldn’t come as a huge surprise to anyone.
A big part of every CCW class is about what to do when dealing with law enforcement, and none of that involves following them around, tailing their cars, honking horns in their ears, throwing shit, breaking shit, meddling in their arrests, “directing traffic”, obstructing traffic, biting people’s fingers off, or just being general fucking weirdo nuisance temper tantrum throwers to provide cover for illegal alien rapists as a diversion because your democrat governor just got caught giving billions of tax dollars to imaginary Somali children and the democrats really want to win the midterms so they can get back to destroying America forever.
That was a run on sentence, but these people are really fucking stupid. And it appears that they’ve had a Signal chat for MN government officials to coordinate this fuckery with the useful idiots too.
Did this particular dude do all that? No. Did he do some of that? Yes. So again, getting shot is a bummer, but not at all shocking.If you want to see who is honest and who is a lying partisan hack dipshit in situations like this, watch for the people who ignore all the context, history, and events which set the stage for a particular incident, who then focus instead on minutia and playing back video frame by frame in ultra slow mo.
Like I said yesterday, just off math and basic probability, if you provoke chaotic encounters against the same bunch of feds, day in and day out, over and over, hoping for a violent altercation, eventually you’re going to get a violent altercation. Duh.
Yes. Indeed, getting that altercation may or may not have been Pretti’s plan, but it’s definitely what the organizers of these riots wanted to happen.
INSURRECTION AND FOREIGN COLLUSION: Anti-ICE Signal Chats: Walz Administration Implicated, Foreign Funding Revealed.
THE EASIEST TIME TO CRUSH AN INSURGENCY IS IN THE BEGINNING: What’s unfolding in Minneapolis right now isn’t “protest.” It’s low-level insurgency infrastructure, built by people who’ve clearly studied the playbook.
And they generally collapse when you cut off the external support and funding.
FOLLOW THE SCIENCE: Exercise is great but exercise studies…not so much. “It’s easy to believe that exercise or physical activity is beneficial over a lifetime, it’s hard to believe that 5 min/day (the equivalent of walking 400 meters) reduces death by 30%.”
Well, to be fair, if you can’t walk 400 meters you probably won’t live as long.
UTAH IS NOT WHAT IT USED TO BE: University of Utah class explores ‘Black Trans Lesbian Marxists’ and radical literature.
YES:
Two things can be true at the same time.
🕯️ Alex Pretti’s death is a real and devastating tragedy, and there are several investigations appropriately occurring into the circumstances behind his killing
🎯 A far-left organizing network put Pretti in harm's way and then turned him… pic.twitter.com/lOSv3bDo6Y— Asra Nomani (@AsraNomani) January 26, 2026
BLUE STATE UPDATE: Minneapolis Police Chief: Yes, the Mob Should Rule.
NEWS FROM MY BACKYARD:
— @instapundit (@instapundit) January 26, 2026
THE NEW SPACE RACE: The Arctic Space Race Heats Up.
OUR PROFESSIONAL CLASS IS A DISGRACE:
If you are surprised to see such a large volume of professional class leftists acting in psychotic fashion in response to routine immigration enforcement, remember the conduct of this same group during covid: masking babies, terrifying children, boycotting family, shuttering…
— Stephen Miller (@StephenM) January 18, 2026
WELL, GOOD: Xi’s Top-Rank Purge Strengthens Chinese Leader, Weakens PLA.
Related:
Here's what I don't understand. According to Russiagate, Donald Trump is working for Putin. According to China, the Chinese military is working for Donald Trump. Who's on first?
— wretchardthecat (@wretchardthecat) January 25, 2026
I don’t know if these claims are true — I hope that they are! — but they won’t build confidence among the Chinese military.
Related:
Mao had a prolonged and horrible death, with all his teeth rotted, without the use of his limbs able to breathe only if he lay on one side. As he declined he struck down Liu Shaoqi, Lin Biao both legends in their own right. Hovering, like evil spirits round the Great Helmsman…
— wretchardthecat (@wretchardthecat) January 24, 2026
It’s the “Belisarius Dilemma,” a problem as old as empires.
I MEAN, HE’S NOT WRONG:
A 1st sentence for the ages. https://t.co/dOI6PfJDqr
— Wilfred Reilly (@wil_da_beast630) January 23, 2026
Though if TR ever engaged with French hookers, I never heard of it.
YES.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) January 24, 2026