July 20, 2026

COFFEE, IS THERE ANYTHING IT CAN’T DO?

Posted at 3:02 pm by Stephen Green

JAMES LILEKS: You don’t have to drink so much water, you know.

You look back on your life and you find the moments that mattered, the instances of joy and despair, the the triumphs, the cruel losses and reversals, and you can gauge the depth and breadth of your story by these zenith and troughs. If they flash before your eyes when the time comes, I hope my final recollections includes the memory of leaning against an old Coke machine at a gas station somewhere in the South, taking the first draught of that Grape Nehi, pausing to marvel at this miraculous ichor, then draining it in two ecstatic gulps. It was a strange, lonely summer, but I was glad to be alive and on the road in America, infused again with glorious grape.

I’ve never had it since. Perhaps the rivers of heaven flow with grape Nehi. I’m no theologian, but I’m certain it’s not Lemon-Lime Shasta.

Heh, indeed. Read the whole thing.™

Posted at 2:35 pm by Ed Driscoll

DISPATCHES FROM THE BLUE ZONES:

Spencer Pratt adds, “5 in a week? Just wait til the earthquake.”

Posted at 2:29 pm by Stephen Green

THIS IS WAS CNN:

“Without the Holocaust and all that stuff.” In 2001, Jonah Goldberg wrote, “Aside from the murder and genocide, what exactly don’t you like about National Socialism?” He concluded, “I’ve never met a real social-welfare state leftist who could answer [that] question without having to think real hard.”

To be fair, “thinking real hard” has never been Lemon’s strong suit: CNN’s Don Lemon Asks If a Black Hole Could’ve Swallowed the Missing Plane.

Posted at 2:22 pm by Ed Driscoll

I’M SIMPLY SAYING THAT LLMs, UH… FIND A WAY:

Posted at 1:59 pm by Stephen Green

THEY NEED GUNS: How Important Are Gun Rights? Ask an Average Iranian Citizen These Days. “The numbers of Iranian citizens murdered by Iran’s rulers are still being counted, but President Trump identified the central truth that courage alone cannot overcome a government willing to use overwhelming force against a defenseless population.”

Posted at 1:44 pm by Stephen Green

AND THE LEFT NEVER FORGAVE HIM FOR IT:

UPDATE (From Ed):

Earlier: Young conservatives have an unlikely new icon: Richard Nixon. “‘Nixonmaxxing’ swag and TikTok videos have helped trigger a rethinking of the former president’s legacy among some conservatives.”

Posted at 1:40 pm by Stephen Green

DAVID LAMMY SACKED BY NEW PM ANDY BURNHAM: Lammy and Reeves among first senior ministers to leave after Burnham takes power.

What will happen to Lammy’s scheme to abolish most jury trials in the UK?

Flashbacks:

● Trump inflamed George Floyd row to ‘distract from Covid,’ Lammy claimed.

● ‘Key moment’ David Lammy ridiculed for not knowing when Churchill became Prime Minister.

● Climate a more fundamental threat than terror – Lammy.

Posted at 1:35 pm by Ed Driscoll

MAKE PILLORIES GREAT AGAIN:

Posted at 1:28 pm by Stephen Green

JOHN PODHORETZ REVIEWS THE ODYSSEY: 

Christopher Nolan does something extraordinarily nervy in his overwhelming new film, The Odyssey. He has made as faithful a version of Homer’s poem as could possibly be made in the course of a three-hour running time—all while turning its worldview inside out.

The thing is, detail by detail, The Odyssey is not just faithful, it’s absolutely inspired. It’s possible that this is the single-greatest cinematic adaptation of a great work of literature in the 113-year history of the motion picture as a popular art form.

Nolan hits every story beat, makes staggering visual poetry out of Homer’s oracular poetry, and even finds a way to evoke the twisty-turny narrative through which Homer reveals the story of Odysseus’ 10-year journey home from the Trojan War and the crisis his absence has created in his home kingdom of Ithaca.

In 2006, when the pro-gay movie Brokeback Mountain didn’t go over the magical 100 million mark in domestic grosses, before Twitter existed and Facebook was just getting started, Mark Steyn noted that “The more artful leftie websites have taken to complaining that the religious right deliberately killed [Brokeback] at the box-office by declining to get mad about it.”

In contrast, a year of freakouts on the right over Nolan’s casting choices likely helped The Odyssey’s opening box office enormously:

And whatever his stylistic excesses as a director, Christopher Nolan is no dummy: The Odyssey’s Christopher Nolan Just Did the Unthinkable.

Nolan’s “The Odyssey” earned a whopping $264 million globally in its opening weekend. The film is an adaptation of Homer’s ancient poem, a beloved part of world literature that hardly screams “box office catnip!”

And, if any other director had helmed it, the ticket sales would be dramatically lower. It’s undeniable.

What’s almost as newsworthy? Nolan sat down with the folks at Fox News’ “Fox & Friends Weekend” for an extended chat about “The Odyssey.”

What’s important about that? Sadly, everything.

Hollywood stars rarely grace Fox News in any capacity. The ones that do are the usual right-leaning suspects – Dean Cain, Kelsey Grammer and Jon Voight.

Would Mark Ruffalo drop by to discuss his latest project? Scarlett Johansson? Madonna?

Steven Spielberg? Quentin Tarantino?

Not a chance to very, very unlikely.

Yet Nolan, who isn’t a conservative nor does he broach politics in his promotional chats, graciously dropped by the show to promote his film.

As this Vanity Fair headline suggests, Hollywood is using The Odyssey’s success to take a victory lap: The Odyssey’s Epic Box Office Haul Breaks The “Go Woke, Go Broke” Myth.

Tweet continues, ” that always emboldens the Left. Because of that, I expect to see studios trying to poke the bear in a similar way in the coming year.”

Thus continuing the post-Covid cycle of audiences conditioning themselves to see one or two blockbuster movies a year, rather than old days (i.e. the 1980s through the mid-2010s) when they went to the movies almost every week, particularly in the summer. Good luck, I want you to know we’re all counting on you.

Posted at 1:22 pm by Ed Driscoll

EVERY RECORD HAS BEEN FALSIFIED:

Posted at 1:14 pm by Glenn Reynolds

IF YOU GO CARRYING PICTURES OF CHAIRMAN MAO, YOU AIN’T GONNA MAKE IT WITH ANYONE ANYHOW:

Particularly if you cosplay in his togs: Hasan Piker Calls For an Ideological Purge of the Democratic Party—Dressed Like Mao—in Fiery Speech.

UPDATE: Omelettes, eggs, etc.:

Posted at 12:30 pm by Ed Driscoll

HARDER THAN THEY THINK: Could China and Russia really destroy Starlink? Only with a boomerang. Though the lawfare is already underway.

So, how might China and Russia go about countering Starlink? The Chinese team proposed three possible actions in an “escalation ladder,” starting with legal and diplomatic measures aimed at whipping up international pressure against further expansions of Starlink on the grounds of collision risks in LEO.

The next step is more technical, with coordinated filings with international regulatory bodies for frequency bands and orbital slots to limit SpaceX’s ability to grow Starlink. At the same time, the escalation ladder proposes using electromagnetic jamming of Starlink to block it in certain regions.

Finally, the coup de grâce would be the “physical destruction” of Starlink through a cyber war and anti-satellite weapons. Reporters at The Insider, Der Spiegel, and Le Monde suggested this might involve a cloud of high-density projectiles that could destroy Starlink satellites upon collision. The presentation by the Chinese CASC researchers didn’t specify the means of such an attack.

The problem is that there are over 10,000 Starlink satellites, and SpaceX can literally launch them faster than Russia and China can shoot them down with conventional antisatellite weapons. A nuke, or a huge space-junk-creating kinetic-shrapnel weapon might work, but at the cost of making Low Earth Orbit inaccessible for everyone.

I should also note that it’s been the US position since the Carter Administration that an attack on a US satellite is an attack on the United States.

Posted at 12:28 pm by Glenn Reynolds

THAT’S NOT WHAT THE ODYSSEY IS ABOUT, CHRIS:

“Even as warped and subverted Nolan’s version is from the original, his movie doesn’t at all communicate the need to be hospitable and kind to strangers. That doesn’t actually come through in his telling at all.”

Posted at 12:26 pm by Stephen Green