'Consequences of this alleged mismanagement are significant'

'fucking ICE could be outside'

'Following the lead of Donald Trump'

These warriors didn't hesitate when America needed them after 9/11.

'That will conclude your opening remarks'

Column Mark as Read (It’s Not) The Death of Criticism (Again) Every old argument is new again — but it is sometimes necessary to reconsider the hows and whys of criticism. By Molly Templeton | Published on September 11, 2025 “The Reader” by Ferdinand Hodler (c. 1885) Comment 0 Share New Share “The Reader” by Ferdinand Hodler (c. 1885) There are times when being very online makes me feel very old. In the past few weeks we have been through new rounds of “Is X genre dying?” and “litfic vs SFF,” two arguments that go in circles, always shifting a little bit in one direction or another, always making me want to ask questions like Okay, define “dying” and Okay, but what are genres, anyway? But we are also in the middle of another ongoing discourse, one that’s been hovering in the margins—and occasionally charging into the middle—of conversations about art and life and media for a very long time. It’s the one that’s part “What is criticism for?” and part “Why should anyone get paid to have opinions?” and part “Oh god the online media ecosystem is in trouble,” all wound up in a fraught little ball labeled The Death of Criticism (Again) or Everyone Is Doing it Wrong (Again) or Say Goodbye to Your Little Critic Friends (Again). It’s exhausting, and yet it’s necessary, I think, for all of these topics to come up sometimes; for makers of and enjoyers of art to consider and reconsider what we love, what we do, and the whys of it all. Some context: Earlier this year, the Associated Press announced that it would no longer run book reviews. The AP is its own news source, but it also feeds reviews and other journalistic works out to smaller outlets that don’t necessarily have their own dedicated arts writers. There are fewer of those outlets than there used to be. (The slow demise of local journalism is a much bigger topic than I can tackle right now.) Before that, the New York Times reassigned four of its regular critics, with culture editor Sia Michel writing in a memo, “Our readers are hungry for trusted guides to help them make sense of this complicated landscape, not only through traditional reviews but also with essays, new story forms, videos and experimentation with other platforms.” This all sounds very familiar to anyone who has lived through what feels like an endless series of pivots. Pivot to video. Pivot to podcast. Pivot to anything that is not words on a page or screen. Pivot until you are dizzy and want to lie down. (To be fair, the NYT also said it would be hiring new critics. But one certainly notices the “reassigning” of those who have been very good on their beats for some time.) “the decline of criticism, part two billion,” is the title of just one Substack post on the topic (and a title I deeply appreciate). A 2019 piece at the TLS begins with a series of quotes about the death of criticism, noting, “These statements were made by major critics in 1952, 1972 and 1994, respectively.” Everything old is new again, but it feels, somehow, especially existential lately. (“Boss, it’s the fascism.”)  It is pretty easy to attribute at least part of that to the techbros’ insistence that what they call “AI” is going to do everything for us, absolutely everything! And then to fear—reasonably—that it is going to erase cultural criticism, too, because if someone can just ask the robots what the deal is with any given work of art, why would they pay an actual human to have thoughts about it? I don’t think I’m alone in much preferring the thoughts of actual humans to the delusional musings of jumped-up chatbots. I’m being a little loose with “criticism” here because while I mostly write about books, I first wrote about music, and then I wrote weekly movie reviews for well over a decade. I find it hard to pull the threads apart. But literary criticism, specifically, has been in some degree of proclaimed crisis for years too. Elizabeth Hardwick in Harper’s, 1959: “The condition of popular reviewing has become so listless, the effect of its agreeable judgments so enervating to the general reading public that the sly publishers of Lolita have tried to stimulate sales by quoting bad reviews along with, to be sure, the usual, repetitive good ones.” The unintentionally funniest thing about Hardwick’s piece is that it begins, “There used to be the notion that Keats was killed by a bad review, that in despair and hopelessness he turned his back to the wall and gave up the struggle against tuberculosis. Later evidence has shown that Keats took his hostile reviews with a considerably more manly calm than we were taught in school, and yet the image of the young, rare talent cut down by venomous reviewers remains firmly fixed in the public mind.” Imagine being taught in school about how well or poorly an author took his reviews! If this was in fact your experience, I envy you. It was not mine. I don’t point out any of the history of this crisis in order to belittle the present moment, but to put it in yet more context. We’ve been here before, but differently. It feels noticeable to me, when I look at previous eras’ criticism crises, that the existential aspect feels like less of a factor. Critics are and have been regularly upset with the state of criticism; they wish for more negative reviews, they wish for more outlets, they wish for smarter takes and editors who have more time to edit; they wish for more opportunities to review; they have a lot of points. But in the last few decades, the “criticism of the state of criticism” pieces have run alongside all the “death of the media” pieces. We are not just stressed about criticism. We are stressed about the papers that printed the criticism ceasing to exist, the local news outlets not having the funds to cover their communities, the jobs all drying up. We are worried about everything. (This “we” is specifically those in, around, affected by the state of the media, but I think it’s bigger than that. You can count yourself in it or not; I leave that up to you.) I write this column as a reader but also as a writer. The two things are inextricable for me: I read in order to write, and then I write in order to figure out what I think about what I’ve read. To be a critic, in any of the various and sundry ways in which one can now exist in that role, is to engage with art. That’s really all I think criticism is: sustained, considered engagement with art. It can be, but does not have to be, an ultimate judgement: read this, not that. Thumbs up or thumbs down. I’ve had people ask me before, “Was that a negative or positive review?” Both? Neither? It was a review. Like a book, you read it and make your own decisions about it. But then you have the New York Times, saying “readers are hungry for trusted guides.” Sure, sometimes. Is that the only thing we’re hungry for? Do you just want to be told what’s good—in the opinion of the writer—or do you want to know how and why and what a book does? Do you want an instruction or a conversation? I know, I know: “Por qué no los dos?” I want it all, too. Crunchy and soft. Negative and glowing. A simple recommendation from someone whose taste I trust, and a deep dive about a work of art of which I’m skeptical.  Mostly, I want people to understand and value criticism—for what it is in itself, yes, but also for what it has to offer: more ways to appreciate, or understand, or love art; more perspectives than just our own. When someone says that criticism is an art form, that is at least part of what they mean: Art lets us see the world in other ways, and criticism can help us see art and the world in other ways, too. It is not a contest of ego, a question of who’s smartest or can make the most references. It is, at its best, a door opening where you thought there was a wall. These cyclical, repeating conversations are interesting, and instructive, and also, sometimes, hopeful. I followed a link on Bluesky to Patrick Nathan’s newsletter to read a post with the subheadline “Let people judge things.” (I usually say “Let people not like things,” but I love this version, too.) Nathan writes: Critics write with the faith that there will be varying reactions to specific works of literature, and that one of the many pleasures of reading a book is to discuss it with others who’ve read it, and for that discussion to perhaps change or enrich each reader’s experience with the book. What’s more, as anyone who’s ever argued about anything can tell you, part of all of this pleasure is the argument itself, in trying to persuade someone that your way of reading the book is the way they should read it too — which is another way of saying that you crave recognition for the work you’ve done in reading the book reverentially. All criticism, by the way, is reverential; not with regard to specific books, necessarily, but reverential to each book’s potential aspiration toward literature. He ends by talking about Roger Ebert, and writes of Ebert’s work, “That is the kind of power a critic can have: not to make or break a film, not to laud or pan a book, but to hand that power to you so you can judge for yourself.” Nathan is in large part responding to another post, this one by Celine Nguyen, which is a take on criticism so optimistic that it made me feel briefly buoyant. Nguyen details what criticism is, and what it does, and writes: Criticism, to me, is not a specialized form of writing that is only relevant to a disappearing minority of people. Criticism is not a specialized form of writing that can only be appreciated if you have a certain education or background. … To put it somewhat frivolously, somewhat seriously: The total addressable market for criticism is everyone who has a Goodreads or Letterboxd account. Maybe criticism isn’t dying. Maybe it just has an image problem. (Along with the fascism problem, and the anti-intellectualism problem, and the distrust of experts problem. Those are really quite large problems.) Nguyen’s piece led me to an essay by the author Christine Smallwood, who writes: Criticism is an act of autobiography. The work of making an argu­ment, coming to a judgment, or simply choosing which books or objects to give time and attention to is inevitably, helplessly, an expression of values—and an expression of self. Our tastes tell on us as much as our syntax and tone; that mysterious compound called sensibility is formed by some strange alchemy of innate tendencies, life experiences, and material circumstances. In the pursuit of explicating a text, observing its patterns and structure, how it works, what it means, I also explicate myself—revealing what catches my interest, where my attention lingers. I might do this more, or less, intentionally, but I always do it. Criticism is inherently deeply personal, but it’s also a reaching outward, a conversation, a communication, a way of saying I experienced this; did you? Where do we connect or disagree about it? Is it foolish to say that maybe we need more criticism about criticism? More conversations about what it is and who it’s for—that whole potential audience of everyone who goes online to see what someone else thought about something? People seem to get it in their heads that criticism is a lot of things it isn’t (most of the time): a tearing-down, an act of jealousy, an act of ego. The criticism I love best is an act of curiosity. An investigation, an exploration. And an open door. [end-mark] The post (It’s Not) The Death of Criticism (Again) appeared first on Reactor.

President Donald Trump will posthumously award Charlie Kirk with the Presidential Medal of Freedom.  The president made the announcement Thursday, one day after Kirk, founder of Turning Point USA, pundit, and conservative political activist, was murdered on the campus of Utah Valley University. Trump made the announcement when speaking at the Pentagon, commemorating the 24th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attack.  “Before we begin, let me express the horror and grief so many Americans have at the heinous assassination of Charlie Kirk,” Trump said. “Charlie was a giant of his generation, a champion of liberty and an inspiration to millions and millions of people.” "Charlie was a giant of his generation."While speaking at the 9/11 memorial ceremony at the Pentagon, President Trump announced that he will posthumously award Charlie Kirk the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation's highest civilian honor.https://t.co/3BUR91NtTk pic.twitter.com/5u8CITS6lN— ABC News (@ABC) September 11, 2025 “I’m pleased to announce that I will soon be awarding Charlie Kirk, posthumously, the Presidential Medal of Freedom,” Trump said. “The date of the ceremony will be announced. I can only guarantee you one thing, we will have a big crowd, very, very, big.” Trump also paid tribute to Kirk’s wife Erika and two young children.  “We miss him greatly, and yet I have no doubt that Charlie’s voice and the courage he put into the hearts of countless people, especially young people, will live on,” the president said. Vice President JD Vance traveled to Salt Lake City, Utah on Thursday to meet with the Kirk family, The Hill reported.  The post Trump to Posthumously Award Charlie Kirk Presidential Medal of Freedom appeared first on The Daily Signal.

The former chief White House spokeswoman repeatedly told the press President Joe Biden was mentally fit to be president. On Friday, she’ll answer some of those same questions before a House panel. The question is whether Karine Jean-Pierre, who was White House press secretary from May 2022 to the end of Biden’s single term in office, will have the same answers. Though she won’t be sworn in, lying to Congress is a crime under federal statute 18 U.S.C. Section 1001. She is the latest former Biden official to sit for a transcribed interview with the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.  “The House Oversight Committee has uncovered how the Biden autopen presidency ranks among the greatest scandals in U.S. history,” House Oversight and Government Reform Chairman James Comer, R-Ky., told The Daily Signal in a statement. “As President Biden declined, his staff abused the autopen to carry out unauthorized executive actions. We are concluding interviews with key Biden aides and will soon report our findings to the American people.” Here are six examples of what Jean-Pierre told the press and the public about Biden.  1. ‘Can’t Keep Up’ Appearing for a CNN interview in June 2022, Jean-Pierre suggested the questions about Biden’s fitness for office shouldn’t even be asked.  “Don, you’re asking me this question. Oh, my gosh, he’s the president of the United States. You know, he—I can’t even keep up with him,” Jean-Pierre told then-CNN host Don Lemon. “We just got back from New Mexico, we just got back from California … just look at the work that he does, and look what he’s, how he’s delivering for the American public.” She added, “That is not a question that we should be even asking.” 2. Special Counsel Report ‘Does Not Live in Reality’ Special counsel Robert Hur was charged with investigating Biden’s alleged mishandling of classified documents. He issued a report in February 2024 that said Biden had “diminished faculties” and “a poor memory” and decided not to pursue charges against the then-president because of it. “The reality is, that report, that part of the report does not live in reality. It just doesn’t, it is gratuitous,” Jean-Pierre said to reporters at the time. “It is unacceptable and it does not live in reality.” Later that same month, she said Biden passed cognitive tests each day by doing his job.  “He passes a cognitive test every day, every day as he moves from one topic to another topic, understanding the granular level of these topics,” Jean-Pierre said.  3. ‘Cheap Fake’ Jean-Pierre argued that videos that seemed to show Biden looking confused were doctored clips or artificial intelligence.  “It’s also very insulting to the folks, the viewers who are watching it. And so, we believe we have to call that out. We’ve been calling it ‘cheap fakes.’ That is something that came directly from the media outlets in calling it that, the fact-checkers and calling it that,” she said in an MSNBC interview in June 2024.  “We’re certainly going to be really, really clear about that as well. And calling it out from where we are, from where we stand,” Jean-Pierre continued. “I think there is so much misinformation, disinformation as we’ve been talking about. You talked about the video of the president wandering. And it’s not true. Right? The president wasn’t wandering. … And what you saw is the Republican Party really manipulating what was being said and what was being seen by the American people.” 4. ‘No Cover-up’ In early July 2024, before Biden exited the presidential race for a second term, Jean-Pierre said no one was hiding anything.  A reporter asked, “Is anyone in the White House hiding information about the president’s health or his ability to do the job day-to-day?”  Jean-Pierre answered, “Absolutely not.” Asked if the White House would provide a more thorough health report, she answered, “We have provided—have been very transparent.” She added, “February was this year. It wasn’t too long ago. … It was indeed this year, and we were—we were—we provided a transparent report, a thorough report.”  In late July 2024, after Biden dropped out of the presidential race, a reporter asked, “Who ordered White House officials to cover up a declining president?” Jean-Pierre replied, “First of all, there’s been no cover-up. I want to be very clear about that. I know that that is a narrative that you love.” Also, at a press briefing in July, a reporter asked, “Why is it in the country’s best interest for him to step aside? Does it have to do with his health?”  She replied, “It has nothing to do with his health.” 5. ‘Ridiculous Assumption’ In August 2023, Jean-Pierre tackled questions about a book, “The Last Politician: Inside Joe Biden’s White House and the Struggle for America’s Future,” by journalist Franklin Foer.  A reporter said, “The book is suggesting the president tells aides he’s tired.” She responded, “I mean, that’s a ridiculous assumption to make. I mean, that’s a ridiculous notion to make.” 6. ‘Continues to Prevail’ During a September 2023 press briefing, she took more questions on the Foer book.  “Look, here’s what I know. Here’s what I can speak to. I can speak to that—a president who has wisdom. I can speak to a president who has experience,” Jean-Pierre said. “I can speak to a president who has done historic—has taken historic action and has delivered in historic pieces of legislation. And that’s important.”  She added, “The president continues to prevail.” The post 6 Instances Karine Jean-Pierre Insisted Biden Was Sharp. Will She Tell Congress the Same? appeared first on The Daily Signal.

The Supreme Court moved Wednesday to allow a female identifying as male to use a male restroom while her case is heard. The one-page unsigned order keeps South Carolina from enforcing a law requiring public school students to use restrooms aligning with their sex.  The law, enacted as part of South Carolina’s 2024-2025 budget bill and reincorporated into its 2025-2026 bill, says sex is “determined by anatomy and genetics existing at the time of birth.” That definition keeps students who identify as “transgender” from using restrooms aligning with their “gender identity.” Under that law, in 2024, a female student identifying as “transgender” was suspended from a South Carolina school for using a male restroom. Her parents pulled her out of school for that year but then opted to have her return in-person for the 2025-2026 school year. Then, in August, the student, known as John Doe, took South Carolina to court, arguing the law was unconstitutional and violated federal civil rights law.  The federal district court paused her case, saying it wanted to wait for the Supreme Court’s decision in West Virginia v. B.P.J., a case on males participating in girls’ sports.  But on appeal, the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals decided to resume Doe’s case and blocked South Carolina from enforcing its law. The court agreed with Doe that the law likely violated civil rights law and the Constitution’s equal protection clause, and it said Doe would suffer “irreparable harm” if South Carolina enforced the law. On Aug. 26, South Carolina appealed that enforcement block to the Supreme Court in an application totaling over 400 pages, including 347 pages of supplemental information, some of which was redacted. “This case implicates a question fraught with emotions and differing perspectives,” South Carolina wrote. “That is all the more reason to defer to state lawmakers pending appeal.” But in its Wednesday order, the Supreme Court rejected that appeal, ruling to uphold the block on enforcement while the 4th Circuit considers Doe’s case. The high court said its decision is “not a ruling on the merits of the legal issues,” but is “based on the standards applicable for obtaining emergency relief from this Court.” Justices Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch, and Clarence Thomas would have granted South Carolina’s request to enforce the law, the order said. The post Supreme Court Lets Girl Use Boys’ Restroom appeared first on The Daily Signal.

When Charlie Kirk was shot Wednesday, there was no mistaking his condition was dire. Like so many across the nation, I prayed for a miracle. We had a miracle in Butler. We had a miracle at President Donald Trump’s Florida golf course. We had a miracle when Majority Leader Steve Scalise, R-La., somehow survived getting shot while practicing for the annual congressional baseball game. Lord, please give us another one. Given the persistent, venomous rhetoric from the Left, given a survey out just two days ago indicating 34% of college students believed using violence to stop a campus speech is acceptable, given the majority of self-described liberals admit they find political violence acceptable, given what Mollie Hemingway calls the incessant “assassination prep” by the media and Democrat leaders, Wednesday’s outcome on a Utah college campus was inevitable. At some point we were going to lose a national figure.When the president confirmed the awful news that Kirk has passed, my first thought was “We’ve run out of miracles.”However, as the sun rose, and stories mounted of Kirk’s deep and abiding faith in Christ, that soft, still voice spoke out: “No, you haven’t.” Jesus Christ did more than defeat death. He changed the math in life. He broke a couple pieces of bread and fed the multitudes. He told his disciples “Whoever believes in me will do the works I have been doing, and they will do even greater things than these.” (John 14:12) But for a brief time in Egypt as a child, He never left the Promised Land, but His followers, measuring in the hundreds of millions, live and serve to the corners of the earth. Walking in the garden shortly after Kirk’s assassination, out of nowhere came a line: “a thousand will rise.” It’s the math of the Kingdom. Kirk has been struck down, but because of his tireless work and inspirational life, countless who caught Kirk’s vision will step up into the gap. Brave and cheerful warriors who will bring the conservative message to students in high schools and universities and beyond. A “thousand will rise” may be too low. Turning Point USA has over 3,500 chapters at high school and college campuses. If only one person at each—and that’s no stretch—steps up into local or national leadership, that’s 3,500 “Charlie Kirks” impacting the nation. 3,500 may be too low. As one user on X noted, in the past two years, there’s been a 44-point swing in support among young men for the Republican Party. This is why they killed Charlie Kirk…Gen Z men shifted R+44 in just 2 years.Men: 18-29 years old2023: ?Democrats +262025: ?Republicans +18 pic.twitter.com/oaoRh7Kl6q— C3 (@C_3C_3) September 10, 2025 Is that all the work of Charlie Kirk? No, but enough of it is to safely say that because of Kirk millions more now stand for conservative values, stand up for America. Stand up for family. Which gets to another point: His generational impact isn’t just on politics and policy. It’ll also be felt on marriage and children. Kirk, himself the joyously married father of two, pressed equally hard on those he spoke to the importance of getting married and having kids. Again, we’re talking about the miraculous math of the Kingdom. How many young men will follow his lead, not to serve a political movement, but to start a traditional family? The societal and national benefits of healthy, two-parent households loaded with children outweigh any law or policy. Those decisions will multiply through the generations. All through the day Wednesday, leftists on social media and certain cable channels mocked and celebrated the execution of Charlie Kirk. The display was sickening and infuriating, and I confess the worst angels of my nature are happy that some of those in positions of authority find themselves out of work this morning. Learn to code, Matthew Dowd, formerly of MSNBC.But I can’t go there. We can’t go there. Instead, we must turn to our better angels on this easy-to-be-bitter morning. We must with grace recall that the devil also celebrated on Good Friday. And then came Sunday. And we can smile, knowing Charlie Kirk is with his Lord, and that by the miraculous math of the Kingdom his work will multiply many, many, many times over to the great blessing of this nation. We publish a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of The Daily Signal. The post We’ve Run Out of Miracles … or Have We? appeared first on The Daily Signal.