February 5, 2026

RESPECTS, REALLY? It’s Time to Pay Our Last Respects to The Washington Post.

The body count is over 300 employees, a third of the Post’s workforce. Its books section is gone. Its international reporting will wither and likely die. And, as a point of personal privilege, the Post’s legendary sports section will evaporate. In my daily sportswriting days, there was no better or more talented crew to hang with at various events. I remember at the 1988 Olympics in Seoul, I decided one day to write a column on water polo, of which I knew nothing. About five minutes after I sat down, the late Ken Denlinger of the Post sat down next to me. “So,” he said, “what’s going on in the game?” How in the hell do I know, I answered. “Well,” he said, “you’ve been here longer than me. You’re the veteran.” If there’s anything about those days that I miss, it’s the camaraderie of the press box, and it was always a party when the Post gang was there—Tom Boswell at the baseball games, Mike Wilbon and the late John Feinstein at some basketball arena or another, the great Sally Jenkins anywhere.

Ominously, and vaguely, Murray said that the revamped Post will consist of efforts that “will be focused on covering politics and government, and the paper will also prioritize coverage of nationals news and features topics like science, health, medicine, technology, climate, and business.”

Instead of respects, how about a little more mockery?

Plus: “I just gotta say it’s truly amazing how journalists can grovel for their jobs while effortlessly maintaining their condescension.”

Update: RB nailed it, too. I’m usually sympathetic to people getting laid off, but not this crew.

Posted at 9:39 am by Stephen Green

TAPS’ WPOST OBIT: Jeff Bezos warned the Washington Post newsroom two years ago that reality is an undefeated champion. Yesterday, one of every three newsroomers were let go as reality struck home. My Substack obit of what was once a great newspaper.

Posted at 8:51 am by Mark Tapscott

POLITICS IN THE WEST;

Posted at 8:42 am by Glenn Reynolds

CIVIL RIGHTS UPDATE: CA ended non-resident carry ban, now will pay challengers’ lawyers $128K.

The deal comes four months after Gov. Gavin Newsom signed into law a new gun law, known as AB 1078, which explicitly granted non-Californians the right to apply for a license to conceal and carry firearms in California, formally ending a longstanding ban.

However, the passage of that law only came after Bonta spent nearly two years in court attempting to defend the ban against legal challenges – a defense that continued up until the moment California lawmakers formally changed the law.

Those challenges were launched in 2023 by a coalition of Second Amendment rights groups and other organizations representing gun owners in California and elsewhere in the U.S.

Winning.

Posted at 8:37 am by Stephen Green

PREFERENCE CASCADE: AMA Now Says ‘Evidence Is Insufficient’ for Trans Surgeries.

And don’t just ask me, ask the originator of the term:

Posted at 8:09 am by Glenn Reynolds

PAST PERFORMANCE IS NO GUARANTEE OF FUTURE RESULTS:

Posted at 7:45 am by Ed Driscoll

INCENTIVES WORK: DHS Touts Half-Century Low in Migrant Crossings

The Border Patrol recorded 237,538 encounters with migrants at the border with Mexico in the 2025 fiscal year, which began in October 2024 and ended in September 2025.

That was down from more than 1.5 million encounters in fiscal 2024, more than 2 million in fiscal 2023 and a record of more than 2.2 million in fiscal 2022.

The 2025 total was the lowest in any fiscal year since 1970, according to data covering the past half century from the Border Patrol.

Since February 2025, the first full month of Trump’s current term, the Border Patrol has recorded fewer than 10,000 encounters a month at the southwestern border, according to an analysis by the Pew Research Center.

Those are the lowest totals in more than 25 years of available monthly data. Recent totals have been even lower than the 16,182 encounters in April 2020, when international migration fell sharply in the early months of the coronavirus pandemic.

Impressive.

Posted at 7:35 am by Stephen Green

WHEN GET WOKE, GO BROKE MEETS FAFO:

You know, I’d like to feel bad for these people, but most of them would cheer if I lost my job so never mind.

UPDATE:

Posted at 7:30 am by Glenn Reynolds

HUGE FRAUD, MISMANAGEMENT EXPOSED IN RED AND BLUE STATES: State and local governments are required by federal law to permit outside auditors to conduct comprehensive “Single Audits” of how officials are administering federally funded social welfare benefit programs. Media coverage of these audits is typically meager at best.

So Truth-In-Accounting (TIA) is digging deep into the most recent such audits (2024) and uncovering all kinds of costly, long-running waste, fraud and corruption. And the garbage is showing up in both Blue and Red states. Check it out here. 

PROMOTED FROM LAST EVENING

Posted at 7:23 am by Mark Tapscott

IF ONLY SHE HAD DIRECTED WATERING DOWN THE FIRE AS WELL: Bass directed watering down of Palisades fire after-action report, sources say.

  • Sources told The Times that Mayor Karen Bass was concerned about legal liabilities for failures in combating the Palisades fire.
  • Bass wanted key findings about the Los Angeles Fire Department’s shortcomings removed or softened, the sources said.
  • The most significant changes to the report involved a failure not to fully staff up and pre-deploy all available engines ahead of dangerously high winds.

For nearly two months, Mayor Karen Bass has repeatedly denied that she was involved in altering an after-action report on the Palisades fire to downplay failures by the city and the Los Angeles Fire Department in combating the catastrophic blaze.

But two sources with knowledge of Bass’ office said that after receiving an early draft, the mayor told then-interim Fire Chief Ronnie Villanueva that the report could expose the city to legal liabilities for those failures. Bass wanted key findings about the LAFD’s actions removed or softened before the report was made public, the sources said — and that is what happened.

The changes to the report, which was released on Oct. 8, came to light through a Times investigation published in December.

The sources told The Times that two people close to Bass informed them of the mayor’s behind-the-scenes role in watering down the report. One source spoke to both of the people; the other spoke to one of them. The sources requested anonymity to speak frankly about the mayor’s private conversations with Villanueva and others.

One Bass confidant told one of the sources that “the mayor didn’t tell the truth when she said she had nothing to do with changing the report.” The source said the confidant advised Bass that altering the report “was a bad idea” because it would hurt her politically.

Altering the fire department itself was a bad idea as well: LA Mayor Karen Bass cut fire department funding by $17.6M, focused on homeless spending — months before wildfires turned city into hellscape.

“Charlie Peters’ ‘Fireman First’ principle says you always threaten to cut firemen in order to create a public outcry against budget cuts. You’re not supposed to actually do it,” Mickey Kaus tweeted a year ago, as a reminder of just how incompetent Bass is.

In November Cal Matters reported: In L.A. mayor’s race, Karen Bass is vulnerable but she’ll be tough to topple.

Good and hard, L.A., good and hard. This 2015 City Journal piece by VDH titled “The Scorching of California” is a reminder that wealthy Californians seem to have little desire to fix their state’s myriad woes.

Posted at 7:14 am by Ed Driscoll

HOW IT’S DONE:

Example from the master:

Posted at 7:06 am by Glenn Reynolds