Was it "remarkable"? I'd like to think it's totally normal — the part about the grand jury.

I'm reading "Grand Jury Rebuffs Justice Dept. Attempt to Indict 6 Democrats in Congress The rejection was a remarkable rebuke, suggesting that ordinary citizens did not believe that the lawmakers had committed any crimes" (NYT).

Federal prosecutors in Washington sought and failed on Tuesday to secure an indictment against six Democratic lawmakers who posted a video this fall that enraged President Trump by reminding active-duty members of the military and intelligence community that they were obligated to refuse illegal orders, four people familiar with the matter said. It was remarkable that the U.S. attorney’s office in Washington — led by Jeanine Pirro, a longtime ally of Mr. Trump’s — authorized prosecutors to go into a grand jury and ask for an indictment of the six members of Congress, all of whom had served in the military or the nation’s spy agencies. But it was even more remarkable that a group of ordinary citizens sitting on the grand jury in Federal District Court in Washington forcefully rejected Mr. Trump’s bid to label their expression of dissent as a criminal act warranting prosecution.

I agree that it was remarkable (and awful) to seek this indictment. It was an ugly abnormality that needs to be rejected. But what the grand jury did was — or should be — the norm. 

You know what this made me think of? This post from 2010:

Someone in the comments questioned my use of quotation marks around "heroic father," but I absolutely meant to do that. I said the father "behaved instinctively and even if he thought about [it, he did] pretty much all the only thing he could do to avoid a life of terrible pain and shame if the girl had died after he let her fall in.."

The grand jury was like the father. Not remarkable. Normal.

The sun and the harder to find moon.

Meade's video from this morning:

An early effort in the 2028 presidential fight: it's George Will in the Washington Post against J.D. Vance.

I haven't read this piece yet. I decided to blog it based on the headline and the photograph, which I find ludicrously unsubtle:

Let's read it:

Spurning the rich subtleties of the English language, JD Vance has a penchant for words that he perhaps thinks display manly vigor, and express a populist’s rejection of refinement. In a recent social media post, he called someone whose posts annoyed him a “dipshit.” He recently told an interviewer that anyone who criticizes his wife can “eat shit.”...

Maybe, because of Trump, "Americans are inured to such pungent language," Will muses, deploying the rich subtleties "inured" and "pungent." George Will's father was a philosophy professor. You can imagine the language he grew up with and that is second nature to him. We know Vance's story.

Here's an excerpt from page 132 of "Hillbilly Elegy":

"The Pima County sheriff said last week that investigators were unable to retrieve any footage from Guthrie’s surveillance cameras..."

"... because she did not pay for a subscription that would have stored the video. But the sheriff’s department and F.B.I. said that investigators recovered the video today by accessing 'residual data.'"

I'm reading "New Video Shows a Masked Figure at Nancy Guthrie’s Door" (NYT).

My 3 questions: 1. You can't maintain your privacy by declining to pay for the subscriptions? 2. Why pay for the subscription now? and 3. Did Google withhold this video because it didn't want customers to realize they didn't need to pay for the subscription?

Meanwhile, in case you think the video of the masked man led to his speedy arrest: "Man Detained for Questioning in Nancy Guthrie Case Is Released/The development came after investigators released chilling video showing a masked figure on Ms. Guthrie’s front porch the morning of her disappearance" (NYT).

So the ski-mask method, now even more widely known, seems to still look effective. 

"A shooter described as a 'female in a dress' killed nine people in a remote part of Canada on Tuesday."

"Seven people died after being shot at Tumbler Ridge Secondary School in British Columbia, while two more people were found dead at a nearby home. Another 27 people were hurt.... An alert was issued about an active shooter at the school.... The suspect was described in the alert as a 'female in a dress.' The local police superintendent later described the suspect as a 'gunperson' in a press briefing, without giving further details about their identity.... 'An individual believed to be the shooter was also found deceased with what appears to be a self-inflicted injury'.... Supt Ken Floyd, of the RCMP, later confirmed to reporters that the description of the subject in the police alert was accurate and that they had identified the suspect...."

From "'Female in dress' kills nine in school shooting/Suspect in Canada’s worst school massacre for 30 years described as 'gunperson'" (The Telegraph).

I'm seeing some commentary about the seeming oddity of saying "female in a dress" and "gunperson." Why not say "woman"? "Female in a dress" was the language of the alert, and it looks like typical police talk to say "male" or "female" instead of "man" or "woman." And police reports tend to have very brief factual statement about the suspect's clothing. That's enough to get you to "female in a dress." What about "gunperson"? Why not "gunwoman"? Who says "gunwoman"? It just doesn't feel colloquial. So let's not be too quick to put this terrible murder into the conventional mockery of wokesters who can't define "woman."

I'm not saying "gunwoman" isn't a word. It's in the OED. And here it is in a New York Times headline from 1923:

Sunrise — 6:55, 7:07, 7:30.

Write about whatever you like in the comments.

The new Olympic sport of ski mountaineering is impressive.

Running uphill on skis at a sub six minute pace is ridiculous. pic.twitter.com/foUaDNAO1K

— Clay Travis (@ClayTravis) February 10, 2026

UPDATE: The video is just old-time cross-country skiing. We're still waiting on the new ski mountaineering. Maybe it will be "impressive," maybe it won't. But don't be pre-impressed by what is new. For now, just be newly impressed by what is old.

"He won an Emmy for most outstanding personality in 1953, besting nominees including Edward R. Murrow and Lucille Ball."

That year, he memorably condemned Joseph Stalin on a broadcast and gave a dramatic reading of the burial scene in Shakespeare’s 'Julius Caesar' with the names of prominent Soviet leaders substituting for Caesar and his circle. 'Stalin must one day meet his judgment,' the archbishop intoned. Stalin died after a stroke the next month...."

From "U.S. Archbishop Will Be Beatified, One Step Away From Sainthood/The move involving Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen, who hosted a popular midcentury radio and TV show and died in 1979, ends a six-year delay" (NYT).

"The case for Archbishop Sheen’s canonization had been delayed by two hurdles. Most serious was a request by the diocese of Rochester, N.Y., where Archbishop Sheen served as a bishop for several years in the 1960s, for a review of 'his role in priests’ assignments.' That stemmed from a concern that he may have overlooked sexual abuse by at least one priest in the diocese....  The other obstacle was an unusual dispute over the archbishop’s remains between the archdiocese of New York and the much smaller diocese of Peoria...."

"The urge to bring back old words is evergreen..."

"... general interest articles on the subject abound, and the political landscape inspires regular pleas on social media to restore potent pejoratives such as 'lummox,' 'bloviate,' 'bumptious' and 'hoodwink.' Some requests are whimsical, too, like that of a user on Bluesky who suggested, 'We should bring back the word "spake," e.g. "Thus spake my friend Jeff."'... Whether these campaigns are sincere or silly, we may be closer to a wordy renaissance than we think.... Henry David Thoreau’s 19th-century coinage, 'brain-rot,' is now the ruin of modern minds. Calling someone a 'goon' is no longer just a 1920s habit. We’re saying 'sheesh' again, apparently, and even the president has spoken of skedaddling. Is there a science to this kind of resurgence?"

I'm reading "Why Kids Are Starting to Sound Like Their Grandparents/The strange resurgence of words like 'yap' and 'skedaddle'" (NYT).

1. I'm all for reaching out to more unusual and interesting words and fighting the tendency to withdraw into a smaller and smaller vocabulary. I hope these kids today are doing it because it's fun, it's mind-sharpening, and it's aesthetically pleasing. We're not talking here about showing off or making other people feel dumb, I don't think. This isn't a William F. Buckley move.

2. "Bloviate" — just a few days ago, I had a post titled "Bloviate." It's a Warren G. Harding word. Harding was born in 1865, so he's hardly at the grandparent level for today's "kids." More like great-great grandparent or even great-great-great grandparent. As for Henry David Thoreau, he was born in 1817, so that would put him at the great-great-great or great-great-great-great level. But he's no one's great-great-etc. grandfather. Like so many of these kids today, he was childless.

3. Did Thoreau ever opine about kids? Yes: "Children appear to me as raw as the fresh fungi on a fence rail." More aptly, on the subject of whether one ought to have children: "The only excuse for reproduction is improvement. Nature abhors repetition. Beasts merely propagate their kind, but the offspring of noble men & women will be superior to themselves, as their aspirations are."

4. I didn't remember that "brain-rot" — 2024's Word of the Year — came from Thoreau.

Meet Jeffrey Epstein.

wild find, how the media first introduced Jeffrey Epstein 25 years ago https://t.co/RZLXdHQvKr

— Mike Benz (@MikeBenzCyber) February 10, 2026

AND: As long as I'm embedding things from Mike Benz this morning:

Sunrise — 6:56, 7:04, 7:07, 7:10

Write about whatever you want in the comments.

"You are skeptical that A.I. can achieve consciousness. Why?"

That's a question asked of Michael Pollan, in "The Interview/Michael Pollan Says Humanity Is About to Undergo a Revolutionary Change" (NYT).

Pollan answers: "I’m convinced by some of the researchers, including Antonio Damasio and Mark Solms, who made a really compelling case that the origin of consciousness is with feelings, not thoughts. Feelings are the language in which the body talks to the brain. We forget that brains exist to keep bodies alive, and the way the body gets the brain’s attention is with feelings. So if you think feelings are at the center of consciousness, it’s very hard to imagine how a machine could rise to that level to have feelings. The other reason I think we’re not close to it is that everything that machines know, the data set on which they’re trained, is information on the internet. They don’t have friction with nature. They don’t have friction with us. Some of the most important things we know are about person-to-person contact, about contact with nature — this friction that really makes us human."

Pollan's new book is "A World Appears: A Journey Into Consciousness" (commission earned).

"Benjamin Robinson, an Indiana University professor, is one of those under the new microscope. In his class on the history of German thought..."

"... he touches on Kant, Hegel, Arendt and Nietzsche, connecting the thinkers’ big insights — 'the aha moments' — to real-life experiences and contemporary politics. In late 2024, a student anonymously complained, saying that Dr. Robinson — who has been vocal about his pro-Palestinian views — had spoken negatively about Israel, mentioned personal experiences like being arrested at a protest at the Israeli consulate in Chicago and 'repeatedly spoke against Indiana University' during his classes. The university found in favor of the student and reprimanded the professor, citing a recent state law meant to improve 'intellectual diversity' and prevent students from being subjected to political views unrelated to the course...."

From "Professors Are Being Watched: 'We’ve Never Seen This Much Surveillance'/Scrutiny of university classrooms is being formalized, with new laws requiring professors to post syllabuses and tip lines for students to complain" (NYT).

"Dr. Robinson, who is Jewish, acknowledged that he referred to Israel’s conduct as a genocide in class but he insisted that he never asked students to agree with him. He said he brought up his personal experiences of activism during a discussion of Kant and the philosopher’s distinction between private and public stances. 'If I can’t appeal to people’s intuitions, what it’s like to publicly use reason versus to have a private feeling of conscience,' he said, 'if I can’t evoke what that feels like, I can’t possibly teach Kant.'"

"If you use chopsticks to pick up apple slices, begin the day with hot water and goji berries before meandering down to a nearby park for a dose of t’ai chi..."

"... there’s a chance that this is a 'very Chinese' time in your life. If you’re under 30, you won’t be the only one. One of the more unusual cultural trends to sweep Gen Z recently has been among TikTok users who share wellness tips typically associated with China.... Chinamaxxing, as the social media trend is known, is all the rage in the US...."

From "I taught America how to be Chinese, says 23-year-old TikTok star/Gen Z is mastering chopsticks and t’ai chi, thanks to Sherry Zhu from New Jersey" (London Times).

You can sample the TikToks of Sherry Zhu here. I'll embed 2 of them:

1. "You didn't know it, but you are Chinese."

Sunrise.

Meade's point of view:

A woman holding a baby is trending on X.

The report on the trend is title "Woman Who Didn't Want Kids Melts Holding Baby for First Time." And: "The TikTok video from @daniela.brkic shows the friend who swore off kids sobbing with joy...."

Sample response:

We all laugh, but what’s happening here is holy.

An instinct no ideology can suppress forever. Holding a baby rewires everything: your politics, your priorities, your purpose.

We’ve spent decades teaching women to resist this. Imagine a world where we stopped. pic.twitter.com/Kevz1N7hy4

— Josh Wood (@J_K_Wood) February 8, 2026

If that's true, it should also be true that men who observe that woman also experience rewiring. They see her as the beautiful ideal and long to center their life on a woman like that. If men don't respond like that, it is no wonder that women have put effort into resisting that and warning other women to resist.

I hit the Grok button over there and asked: "is the video a genuine response from a real woman or is this a setup with acting?" Grok says it seems genuine, and I'll assume that it is, but I won't assume that woman's reaction represents something inside all women that is pure and uncomplicated. It's hard to take care of a baby, a toddler, a school kid, a teenager, and many other emotions will well up — suddenly or chronically — and mother will need to soldier on, usually without anything close to the emotional high seen in that viral video. 

ADDED: I'm reminded of the time I held a little dog: "I love this little dog. I think this is the first time I ever held a dog on my lap." Yes, holding the dog released a distinctive feeling in me, 12 years ago. That might be seen as a reason to immediately acquire a dog (which is much easier to do than to have a baby). The instinct to possess a dog required fulfillment. No, it did not! I see other people's dogs every day. Sometimes I even interact with them. But I am quite happy not to have pre-committed so much of my time to a canine creature.