October 14, 2026

ALEX BERENSON: A funny thing’s happening now that (almost) nobody gets mRNA jabs anymore. “Because so many Covid deaths occurred in people who were very old and sick and would likely have died in a year or two from their underlying illnesses, epidemiologists predicted as Covid began in 2020 that deaths would fall below normal when it ended. They called that potential future mortality lull the ‘pull-forward effect.'”

Posted at 6:00 pm by Glenn Reynolds

HE’S BEEN BUSY:

Posted at 5:18 pm by Stephen Green

CHEATER: Runner Switches to Girls’ Track Midseason — School Says the Real Problem Is the Parent Who Noticed. “On September 5, the cross-country athlete finished 76th in a boys’ JV cross-country race, but on September 29, he magically finished first in a varsity girls’ meet against Union High. This could be the moment that this whole drama officially jumped the shark, because it’s almost impossible to argue that ‘changing genders’ right smack in the middle of the season is normal or reasonable.”

Posted at 4:52 pm by Stephen Green

CAPTAIN SLOW VERSUS THE SERIES 3 LAND ROVER (Video):

Posted at 4:45 pm by Ed Driscoll

ABE GREENWALD: The Joke’s on Everyone.

The left knows only how to take offense, and Shane Gillis doesn’t owe anyone an apology. But it’s hard to say that a joke is “just a joke,” if it’s also something else: a deliberate taunt. This kind of dual-use comedy is standard on the left—and it’s ruined many great talents. Why look to make the problem total?  I don’t want to wind up with a comedy culture that forces me to choose between Bill Burrs and anti-Bill Burrs.

Anyway, what can the left possibly accomplish with its social media finger-wagging these days? We are post–cancel culture (except, of course, when it comes to Jews and Israel, which is its own category). A few years ago, Gillis’s joke and the reaction to it would have sidelined him for quite a while. In fact, that already happened to him. SNL fired Gillis in 2019 after discovering that he had previously made gay and ethnic jokes on his own podcast. His appearance on SNL last Saturday—the third time he’s hosted the show since then—demonstrates how thoroughly the culture has shifted since peak woke.

Donald Trump is back in the White House, and AOC is distancing herself from “woke 1” because she knows how most Americans feel about identity-driven leftism. A lot of conservatives don’t want to admit it, but the right came through Woke War I (mostly) triumphant. You don’t have to lob grenades from the stage. It’s safe just to do comedy again.

Okay, Gillis’ joke wasn’t a home run. But it was definitely a triple:

Posted at 4:14 pm by Ed Driscoll

IT’S AMAZING HOW MANY PEOPLE DON’T REALIZE THIS IS SATIRE: “I know it was about me, because everything is.”

Related:

Jenna Bush is a weird spokesperson for propriety.

Posted at 4:02 pm by Glenn Reynolds

AFTER ALL, THEY DID NAME IT PERSEVERANCE: NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover breaks interplanetary driving record — and it’s far from done.

In a milestone achievement, NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover has broken the record for most miles driven on a world beyond Earth.

On Oct. 11, Perseverance hit 28.10 miles (45.22 kilometers) traveled on Mars, breaking the record previously held by NASA’s Opportunity rover which went 28.06 miles (45.16 km). It took Oppy 14 years to cover all that ground; Perseverance, by contrast, has been on Mars for just 5.5 years.

The new record is far from the end of Perseverance’s journey, however; the mission team thinks the rover could eventually more than double the distance it’s already traveled.

“Our original design was only planned to last for [about] 20 kilometers of driving,” Mark Maimone, a rover driver at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Southern California, told Space.com.

Impressive.

Posted at 3:50 pm by Stephen Green

HIS SUPERVILLAIN POWERS INCLUDE THE ABILITY TO BE IN TWO PLACES AT ONCE:

Posted at 3:33 pm by Stephen Green

HMM: Tesla’s ‘Security Protocols’ Stopped DHS From Installing a Tracking Device.

“Case agents believed that Stair is using the Tesla to assist with drug trafficking and traveling to locations associated with the DTO [drug trafficking organization] and DTO members,” the application said. “Case agents are still attempting to identify other locations used by the DTO, other members of the DTO, and the source of supply for narcotics and believe that the court order would be beneficial for the investigation.”

A judge issued the warrant the same day the application was filed, but agents never got the tracking device on the car. “Search warrant not executed due to security protocols active on Tesla,” the agent said in a court filing about the warrant.

The court documents don’t elaborate on the specific “security protocols” that stopped them from placing a tracking device on the car, but the Tesla may have been in “Sentry Mode.” Teslas have eight external cameras that provide a 360 degree view of the car’s surroundings. This makes the car’s self-driving features possible but also allows owners to keep track of what’s going on around the car.

If a stranger approaches a Tesla while it’s in Sentry Mode, the car will flash its lights, sound an alarm, and start recording through its exterior cameras.

Not a big fan of police being unable to execute a warrant, but that’s a great ad for anyone concerned about stalkers.

Posted at 2:48 pm by Stephen Green

AMERICA’S NEWSPAPER OF RECORD:

Bangin’ soundtrack though: Why Led Zeppelin said yes to Netflix’s $280m Narnia nightmare.

Like Christopher Nolan’s Odyssey this past summer, Netflix is presuming that the right will go absolutely insane over the stunt casting of Meryl Streep portraying the voice of Aslan, propelling them to box office fortune – and they’re likely correct:

Posted at 2:35 pm by Ed Driscoll

DEAR BLACK AMERICANS…:

…today’s Dems just aren’t that into you.

Posted at 2:32 pm by Stephen Green

OUT: “LEARN TO CODE.”

IN: An End To The Software Industry? “A whole lot of companies seem to have decided they don’t need to own their own software if they can simply have it in ‘the cloud’ and pay a subscription that means they have lower startup costs and can offload the support headcount to a vendor. And it seems that increasingly, that software will be written by AI, tested by AI, probed for security holes by AI, documented by AI, and supported by AI. I wonder if companies will give their AI tech support Indian accents to make them more believable?”

Posted at 1:46 pm by Stephen Green

JUST WAIT UNTIL STARBASE LOUISIANA COMES ONLINE:

Posted at 1:32 pm by Stephen Green