Prefatory note: I’m currently working on the final leg of Sheriff Roy’s latest adventure. This plus my kids being swamped with homework gets you a movie review this week. Enjoy—CLS

The biggest issue I have with most horror films is the overuse of the jumpscare.

Everything’s all copacetic until a dead body falls out of a closet/the killer appears in a window/something truly grisly happens. Then the music and sound effects jumps in volume, everyone viewing it is supposed to scream, and that’s that. The device is hackneyed at this point, overplayed, and generally stupid.

What if we had something different in horror? Is there room for something that just instills a feeling of dread in you, leaves you uneasy, and invites you on for a general two hour feeling of creepiness that won’t go away? Continue reading →

We were told it would be big. Huge. But seeing it makes it brutally real. Trump’s ballroom, whether necessary or not, has dwarfed the White House and forever changed the nature of the iconic structure in a way that can only be described as Trumpian.

Put aside the plans for the interior to be gaudy enough to make a sheik blush, resplendent in Trump’s beloved goldish doodads. Put aside that it sits next to Trump’s marble helipad, which had to incorporate the presidential seal lest anyone be confused about who gets to park his ‘copter there. The ballroom is an architectural travesty in itself for what it has done to the White House proper. Continue reading →

There’s a phenomenon among the sick and pathetic randos of both the right and left that they not only take measures to damage their hated targets of cancel culture, but that they take matters a step too far. It’s one thing to blame the person who did whatever it is that outrages the rando mob, but it’s quite another to inflict harm on their employers, businesses, family and friends. In Couture v. Noshirvan, Middle District of Florida Judge Kyle Dudek found that it crossed the line.

[T]he story begins with a viral video of a parking-lot argument. Convinced that one of the women [Couture] had broken the law, Noshirvan set out to uncover her identity. He deployed a “sock puppet” social media account, posing as a concerned bystander to gain her trust. The ruse worked, and Couture unwittingly confirmed her involvement. Armed with that info, Noshirvan published a TikTok video broadcasting both Couture’s name and her employer—Garramone Plastic Surgery. Continue reading →

A telltale of the Trump Department of Justice was who would be willing to sign off, to appear in court, to assert and argue some of the most specious and absurd positions taken by the Trump administration to circumvent the law and make Trump’s wildest dreams come true. One such guy was senior adviser to the Attorney General, Henry Whitaker.

Back in November 2025, in an effort to resuscitate the failed prosecutions of James Comey and Letitia James, Whitaker told Judge Cameron McGowan Currie that Comey and James were trying to “elevate what is at best a paperwork error,” when they flagged the fact that they were being prosecuted by a random insurance lawyer with a MAGA hat. At the time, he called it “fanciful” to suggest that the DOJ sought to evade Senate confirmation by continuing to treat Lindsey Halligan as the U.S. Attorney. Currie tossed both indictments anyway.

As no dead horse goes unbeaten by this administration, Whitaker took the matter to the Fourth Circuit, opening his September argument thusly: Continue reading →

Acting United States Attorney for the Western District of Washington Charles Floyd reached the breaking point. He sent a letter to the district’s chief judge saying his office lacks the manpower to defend the United States against the avalanche of habeas corpus actions brought by immigrants held in ICE custody.

(Here is the letter sent, page 1 and page 2.)

There are severe personnel problems throughout the Department of Justice, as experienced career AUSAs have either been fired for doing their job when the targets of their prosecutions were Trump or Trump-adjacent actors, or fled the department as its focus changed from enforcement of law to persecution of Trump’s enemies or scapegoats. But never before has a United States Attorney openly asserted that he neither can nor will perform the functions of the office because it has become overwhelmed by the sheer volume of cases. Continue reading →

Republican pariah Sen. Thomas Massie will reintroduce his resolution of impeachment against the macho show pony, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, and it would appear from soon-to-be Speaker of the House Hakeem Jeffries that the Democrats are all in this time. Is it accountability or revenge? Regardless, Trump is having none of it and has threatened to use the Department of Justice to go after Democrats for going after Republicans.

Amidst all that mess, there are signs that the president is deeply concerned about anyone getting a window into how his administration has been operating. Yesterday he insisted that the Democrats are “threatening a lot of people…just because they happen to be Republicans, or Republican supporters.” He said that the Democrats’ promises to investigate the administration are themselves crimes and that he is ordering the Department of Justice (DOJ) to investigate. The post is convoluted, but Trump insists that “there have been no impeachable acts committed, or even thought of, by the victims of this illegal process.”

Shortly after, he posted, “These SLEAZEBAGS should go to jail for what they are doing”, “The Senate must act, and stop being pushed around to the point of the Republican Party losing Elections, and worse!” he insisted.

Continue reading →

With the Iron Maiden canned, Trump has made “the odious Stephen Miller” his new chief of staff. The Democrats could not have asked for a better political gift, Miller being the architect and head cheerleader of the worst and most despised Trump initiatives, from the rounding up and removal to random countries of anyone with skin of a hue less white than his to the murder by the military of people in boats on the open seas.

The 41-year-old Miller embodies much of what America voted against, and Trump’s elevating him to COS, the position closest to Trump and most likely to be the last voice he hears before he indulges in his most unseemly whims, is a declaration of war against America. Continue reading →

TO: College Football Playoff Committee
FROM: Me
RE: Tuesday’s bullshit

Dear Learned Persons of the CFP Committee:

Like every good SEC Football fan I watched the initial rankings you posted on Tuesday, November 3, 2026. After viewing the rankings on ESPN and listening to the ensuing discussion, I have two questions.

1. With all due respect, what the fuck is wrong with you people?
2. With all due respect, are you high and what are you smoking?

You ranked Alabama at #5 in the initial Playoff Rankings. Tennessee is at #13. I humbly invite all of your moronic asses to make this shit make sense. Continue reading →

More than 100 people wasted their time showing up and expressing their outrage and opposition to Trump’s glorious triumphal arch before the Trump-controlled National Capital Planning Commission. The meeting went late into the night, but the outcome was never in doubt, as the chair of the commission made clear beforehand.

“President Trump’s historic vision for a monumental arch at Memorial Circle would complete a project over a century in the making, and honor our nation and her veterans, and provide the sacred ground of Arlington National Cemetery with the monumental gateway it deserves,” Mr. Paoletta said. “It would also represent a generational security opportunity to protect our nation’s capital.”

Continue reading →

Hakeem Jeffries, expected to be the next Speaker of the House of Representatives, made it clear that it was not his intention to use his majority over the next two years to seek retribution on Trump and his sycophantic enablers. Rather, he said his focus would be on “getting things done” by making life more affordable. Radley Balko makes a compelling argument about why that won’t work, and why that ignores the mandate given the Democrats by this overwhelming rejection of Trump, MAGA and the long list of people who enjoyed the fruits of corruption.

Sure, the Democrats should work with whatever sane Republicans remain in Congress to end Trump’s tariffs, get us out of the war in Iran, and do whatever else is within Congress’s power to stop this administration’s assault on the economy. Continue reading →