August 28, 2026

August 27, 2026

OPEN THREAD: Hang on baby, Friday’s coming.

Posted at 9:30 pm by Glenn Reynolds

GOOD LUCK WITH THAT: For Midterms, Democrats Will Make an Extreme Effort to Sound Like Normal People.

If you’re walking around a city like Seattle or Portland, you’ve got to watch where you step. If you’re not careful, you might step on an “unhoused person,” who may be a “Criminal justice-impacted individual,” who could become violent due to a “substance abuse disorder.”

It’s worse if it’s a “birthing person.”

If you watch a congressional hearing, these terms are bandied about as if they’re normal language that all Americans use in their daily lives. I imagine overhearing a conversation at Starbucks or Whole Foods would sound similarly disconnected from reality.

After a decade of trying to strong-arm Americans into accepting terms like “Latinx” and “intersectionality,” some Democrats have decided that their nomenclature needs a new coat of paint. As 2028 looms in the background, some contenders, real and would-be, are trying to lead the charge to renormalize the Democratic Party.

“Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear has been the most vocal about the need for Democrats to ‘talk like a normal human being,’ as he’s put it in speeches and interviews,” reports Axios. “Sometimes these terms make it feel like we’re talking down to people, like we’re talking at them, instead of to them,” he said.

When even Van Jones notices how crazy the lefty lexicon has gotten over the past decade, and how off-putting it feels to those not in the cult, it may be too difficult to temporarily reel the smugness back in: ‘I’ve Never Met A LatinX:’ CNN’s Van Jones Tears Into Left-Wing Rhetoric.

Posted at 9:14 pm by Ed Driscoll

GOODER AND HARDER, LA: Los Angeles Socialist Nithya Raman Brags About Getting Crosswalk Done, There’s Just ONE Big Problem.

Fresh paint (that took almost a year to finally apply) on crumbling infrastructure is the perfect metaphor for L.A. in the 21st century.

UPDATE: “Councilmember Ramam [sic] will almost certainly lose the mayoral race and fade into obscurity, but with this post, she has achieved Online Immortality, and for that, we should all be grateful.”

Posted at 8:45 pm by Ed Driscoll

DISPATCHES FROM THE EDUCATION APOCALYPSE: The Jason Arday Truthers.

In death, Jason Arday has become two people. To many readers of legacy newspapers, the late Cambridge University academic is a proven fabulist. The life story on which he built his career, of being nonverbal until 11 because of autism, and then learning to read at 18 and becoming a professor, has “no precedent in medical literature,” as The New York Times delicately put it. Among many other extraordinary claims, his tale of being menaced by a knife-wielding man at Cambridge could not be corroborated, and neither could the story that his family had received a pig’s head as an act of racist intimidation. “To be honest with you, I thought you’d just believe me,” he told a Guardian reporter who challenged him.

That is one reality. However, another one dominates left-wing new media, activist nonprofits, and visual social networks such as Instagram and TikTok. There, the prevailing narrative is that Arday did nothing seriously wrong and Britain’s right-wing media hounded an exceptional Black scholar to his death on August 14 for no reason except racism. Well-wishers have raised more than $300,000 for his family, and made his upcoming memoir a best seller in Britain. At a rally in central London held in his memory, attendees carried placards reading rest in power professor jason arday, even though he had resigned the title days before his death. They wanted to make clear their belief that he was unfairly deprived of his academic status.

For some of Arday’s supporters, acknowledging that any of the media scrutiny was justified has become tantamount to siding with his “killers.” He is instead a martyr—the victim of a “lynching”—and the inconvenient fact of his fabulism must be tidied away from the virtual shrine. This is an emotional position rather than a rational one, and its very indefensibility makes it a greater demonstration of tribal loyalty. Insisting that the academic was completely innocent, in the face of all the evidence, sends a strong social signal that you hate the right-wing media and care about racism.

It’s far easier to attack “right wing media” (despite the fact that the reporting on Arday was very much a bipartisan affair, as the above link to an Atlantic article, which references the Grauniad’s skepticism of Arday’s story illustrates), than do the hard work of even attempting to reform a completely ideologically captured academia.

Related: It’s good to have friends in high places:

Cofnas’ tweet concludes, “I wish to personally thank Ambassador @BillWhiteUSA. It was beyond my imagination that such a person would take an interest in the fate of a postdoc. The Ambassador responded with great support which helped to bring about a just outcome. Thank you, @USAmbToBelgium and @StateDept for defending American values. I am proud of my country.”

Posted at 8:30 pm by Ed Driscoll

TROLL LEVEL: POTUS DJT.

The obvious lack of Reagan anywhere on the chart and the inclusion of Woodrow Wilson as a “great” president are sure signs that The Donald, or whoever assembled this chart wants to do some serious trolling.

But just as a reminder: The Hater’s Guide to Woodrow Wilson. “I come now not to explain Wilson, but to hate him. A national consensus on hating Wilson is long overdue. It is the patriotic duty of every decent American. While conservatives have particular reasons to detest Wilson, and all his works, and all his empty promises, there is more than enough in his record for moderates, liberals, progressives, libertarians, and socialists to join us in this great and unifying cause.”

UPDATE:

MORE:

Overall, I’m not a huge fan of Truman, but that’s undoubtedly true: For Decades, Recipients Were Honored with Purple Hearts Made During WWII. This Company Now Forges New Medals.

 

Posted at 8:21 pm by Ed Driscoll

SHOOTING NEWS: Not That You Needed Another Reason to Love Dolly Parton, But… “A .38 pistol. I have a permit for it in Nashville. I just carry it for protection. I feel safer when I’ve got it. I just don’t like the idea of knowin’ I’m totally helpless. I’m always scared in a big city and New York was totally foreign to us.”

Posted at 4:53 pm by Stephen Green

BUT PLENTY OF CHUTZPAH: Obama Figures Chastising Trump on Iran Have Zero Self-Awareness.

[It] seems that Washington has fought Tehran to a stalemate. We may have hammered their military, but their willingness to fight an asymmetric war that depletes our munitions and squeezes global energy cannot be ignored.

The stalemate can still be broken, however. The president can heap more financial pressure on the regime and maintain the maritime blockade. Our military also continues to ferry vessels through the Strait of Hormuz, easing the energy crunch.

Iran’s currency, the rial, just hit another historic low — trading now at 2 million to a single U.S. dollar. The regime’s inability to pay salaries or provide basic services could portend domestic upheaval. The president must now do more to support the Iranian people, who are pro-America and truly loathe their regime. They have been brutalized and slaughtered, but they have not given up. Intelligence, financial support, secure communications, and arms are what they need.

The president now understands that, just as the 2015 nuclear deal defined Obama’s foreign policy, the war with the regime will define his. He was right to conclude, “This situation has been going on for 47 years and should have been handled long before I arrived in office.” Seen in this light, Team Obama’s efforts to snipe him should be ignored. Whereas they never derailed Iran’s nuclear and regional ambitions, Donald Trump still can.

Read the whole thing.

Posted at 4:30 pm by Ed Driscoll

DARK MONEY: Exposing the Gun Control Industry’s Financiers: The Joyce Foundation. “Gun Rights Insights pulls back the curtain to show that the gun control agenda is nothing more than an astroturf agenda living off the funding and the backing of a few billionaires and progressive activist foundations flooding the field with waves of cash, up to $400 million annually.”

Posted at 4:00 pm by Glenn Reynolds

‘MURICA:

UPDATE (FROM GLENN): More on privateers here.

Posted at 3:35 pm by Stephen Green