THE YOUNGER DAUGHTER IN LAW’S AD FOR HER BUSINESS WAS TAKEN DOWN BY AMAZON BECAUSE KNIVES ARE WEAPONS:  Honestly! She was showing pocket knives. not even swords. in my day we got our first pocket knife at eight. And yet most of us left childhood with all our fingers and both eyes. This nerfed world is annoying. Anyway, she has new stuff out, and is very upset at the loss of the ad.  Shiny, Sharp, and Stylish… Welcome! To Morrigan’s Mercantile!

ABOUT TIME:  Education Department scraps Biden-era race-based rules for doctoral degree grants.

DATA IS MORE ELUSIVE THAN YOU THINK:  Echo Chambers.

OPEN THREAD: Hump Day.

EVERYBODY’S WORKING FOR THE WEEKEND: U.S. military prepared to strike Iran as early as this weekend, but Trump has yet to make a final call, sources say.

I REALLY ENJOY THE LACK OF RESPECT FOR PUFFED-UP ESTABLISHMENT FIGURES:

Hi dickweed, remember when your boss launched a year long unilateral war in Libya? https://t.co/xPAVxUwizq

— Oilfield Rando (@Oilfield_Rando) February 18, 2026

DID THEY SPRAY ENOUGH OF THAT FLEX-SEAL STUFF ON IT? NASA will fuel up its Artemis 2 moon rocket for the 2nd time on Feb. 19. Will it leak again?

No joke, in our old house we had a leaky skylight. Roofing guys couldn’t fix it. Finally I got on the roof and sprayed two cans of that flex-seal stuff that’s advertised on late-night TV all around it. No more leaks. Granted, there were no cryogenics involved, but still. If there are more problems tomorrow, maybe it’s worth a try. I mean, it can turn a screen door into a boat . . . .

TEACH WOMEN NOT TO RAPE! (CONT’D): School secretary, 31, accused of having sex with two students after husband catches her with one of them. “Hughes was transported to Randolph County Jail, where she is being held on a $25,000 cash-only bond.”

PROBLEM?

The problem is that a class action lawsuit of this kind that encompassed even a small fraction of those for whom this is true would create sufficient liability to end public schooling in America https://t.co/rzdvMWikC8

— Wesley Yang (@wesyang) February 18, 2026

Toniiq Liposomal NAD+ and Resveratrol Supplement. #CommissionEarned

LIFE IN THE 21ST CENTURY:

So many people in the comments are pointing out flaws and completely missing the point, which is the rate of change here.

2 years ago AI couldn’t generate a simple video of Will Smith eating spaghetti without it looking like a horrific DMT trip. Now it’s on the verge of… pic.twitter.com/z4C8TGxZSB

— Cognitive Dissident (@STP48315) February 17, 2026

Flashback: Backyard Filmmakers Are Hollywood’s Greatest Fear.

Backyards now optional. (I thought I’d posted this yesterday, but I was wrong.)

NEWS YOU CAN USE: The Best Cars That Still Offer a Manual Transmission in 2026, Ranked.

ISN’T THIS HOW “THE THING” STARTED? Pink rocks found in Antarctica lead to the discovery of an enormous structure under the ice.

WHY SO MANY NASTY BIGOTS IN HEALTHCARE? California Botox Nurse says Jews Pray at “Synagogue of Satan”, Claims “Nazis didn’t execute real Jews.” “Not only are Jews unsafe in her care, but it calls into question the judgment of those who employ her” says Physicans Against Antisemitsm (PAA).

FROM BAUHAUS TO BARRY’S HOUSE: Here’s What the Outside of Barack Obama’s Presidential Library Should Look Like.

https://t.co/GgGqNO7m9p pic.twitter.com/2uDDMl8kPr

— jimtreacher.substack.com (@jtLOL) February 18, 2026

ICYMI: Fingers Crossed! NASA Is About to Try Fueling the World’s Leakiest Rocket (Again).

OLANLY Toilet Rugs U-Shaped 20×20. #CommissionEarned

GREAT MOMENTS IN PRIORITIES:

The Key Bridge has not been rebuilt.

There’s raw sewage flooding the Potomac River.

Democrat Wes Moore signs emergency legislation…

To ban local authorities from aiding ICE in removing illegals from Maryland.

Democrats are trying to destroy America.pic.twitter.com/khowHcvqXW

— C3 (@C_3C_3) February 18, 2026

MEN AREN’T WOMEN, WOMEN AREN’T MEN, ANIMALS AREN’T PEOPLE: Annals of Animal Rights Lawfare: Judge – Again – Rejects Claim That Elephants Are People. “This was not a criminal animal-cruelty case or an agency enforcement action. It was an attempt to rewrite personhood through the courts.”

AYFKM? Palestinian activist accused of expressing desire to ‘kill Jews’ wins deportation case.

Judge Nina Froes determined on Feb. 13 that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) did not provide sufficient admissible evidence to establish that Mohsen Mahdawi was removable, Reuters reported.

Froes said DHS relied in part on a memorandum purportedly signed by Secretary of State Marco Rubio but failed to authenticate the document.

As a result, the government was unable to “meet its burden of proving removability,” according to Reuters.

Froes was appointed during the final year of the Biden cabal.

STAY SAFE: DUCO Night Driving Glasses for Night Vision. #CommissionEarned

COWARDS: Gutfeld Defends ‘Silence of the Lambs’ While Actors Stay Silent.

Earlier this month, actor Ted Levine apologized for playing serial killer Buffalo Bill in the film.

Levine argued the role was insensitively portrayed, suggesting it caricatured the trans movement. Never mind that the character wasn’t trans, or that the actor took more than 30 years to utter his apology.

He wasn’t alone.

“Lambs” producer Edward Saxon also apologized for Buffalo Bill, the film’s human skin-wearing ghoul.

“From my point of view, we weren’t sensitive enough to the legacy of a lot of stereotypes and their ability to harm.”

Naturally, late-night comedians didn’t defend the film classic. They were too busy pushing Democratic party talking points and misleading viewers about candidate interviews.

Not Greg Gutfeld.

Much more at the link.

FROM BAUHAUS TO TOM’S HOUSE: James Lileks on architect Louis Kahn.

While browsing through an Architectural Record from 1977, there was a gushing review of the incredibly brilliant Yale Center for British Art by the incredibly brilliant Louis Kahn.

* * * * * * * * *

The British Center’s special site and function surely had something to do with these surprising developments. Directly across the street from it stands the earliest of Kahn’s mature buildings: the first in his great sequence of inventive designs. It is Yale’s Art Gallery of 1953.

 

Ah yes. That one. The building that gave us one of the best examples of life before and after the Second World War.

Hint: Kahn’s building is on the left.

You know how many years separate those two structures?

Nineteen.

The building on the right was completed in 1928. The building on the left was begun in 1947.

In From Bauhaus To Our House, Yale man Tom Wolfe wrote:

Yale’s administrators were shocked. Kahn had been an architect for twenty years but had done little more than work as assistant architect, under Howe, among others, on some housing projects. He was not much to look at, either. He was short. He had wispy reddish-white hair that stuck out this way and that. His face was badly scarred as the result of a childhood accident. He wore wrinkled shirts and black suits. The backs of his sleeves were shiny. He always had a little cigar of unfortunate hue in his mouth. His tie was always loose. He was nearsighted, and in the classrooms where he served as visiting critic, you would see Kahn holding some student’s yard-long blueprint three inches from his face and moving his head over it like a scanner.

But that was merely the exterior. Somewhere deep within this shambles there seemed to be a molten core of confidence … and architectural destiny … Kahn would walk into a classroom, stare blearily at the students, open his mouth … and from the depths would come a remarkable voice:

“Every building must have … its own soul.”

One day he walked into a classroom and began a lecture with the words: “Light … is.” There followed a pause that seemed seven days long, just long enough to re-create the world.

His unlikely physical appearance only made these moments more striking. The visionary passion of the man was irresistible. Everybody was wiped out.

Kahn stared at the administrators in the same fashion, and the voice said: What do you mean, “It has nothing to do with the existing building”? You don’t understand? You don’t see it? You don’t see the string courses? They express the floor lines of the existing building. They reveal the structure. For a quarter of a century, those floors have been hidden behind masonry, completely concealed. Now they will be unconcealed. Now the entire structure will be unconcealed. Honest form—beauty, as you choose to call it—can only result from unconcealed structure!

Unconcealed structure? Did he say unconcealed structure? Baffled but somehow intimidated, as if by Cagliostro or a Jacmel hoongan, the Yale administration yielded to the destiny of architecture and took it like a man.

As Wolfe concluded his chapter, “Administrators, directors, boards of trustees, municipal committees, and executive officers have been taking it like men ever since.”

SAY ANYTHING THING:

Hillary Clinton on Hungary:

“If I were an average Hungarian… I want to be electing somebody who’s for Hungary, not somebody who’s a puppet of Trump.”

Reminder: Orbán entered politics in 1988 and has served as PM since 2010.pic.twitter.com/KJ9m66PW4T

— Brandon Straka #WalkAway (@BrandonStraka) February 18, 2026

She’s always been nasty and bitter, and has only gotten more so with age.

HOWARD WOLOWITZ SMILES: Robot hand approaches human-like dexterity with new visual-tactile training.