June 17, 2025

FASTER, PLEASE: ‘America’s Hypercar:’ The New Chevy Corvette ZR1X Aims to Take Down Ferrari.

The 2025 Corvette ZR1 may already be the fastest rear-wheel-drive car to touch down on our planet: A record-stomping track monster that crushes 60 miles per hour in 2.2 seconds, and whose 233-mph top speed reads like an AI hallucination.

Bucket-list ZR1 laps in May at Circuit of the Americas—the kind of Texas-sized corral this raging bull needs to properly fling itself about—find me chasing the very Corvette engineers who’ve been setting production-car lap records in their spare time; smoking a $1.2-million McLaren Senna, shaming a Porsche 911 GT3 RS.

Stretching its jacked legs on COTA’s back straight, my ZR1 reaches 175 mph, then 178 the next lap. 180 mph feels tantalizingly within reach. The 5.5-liter LT7 screams its titanium-hardened lungs out, flexing more turbo horsepower than the F1 cars that fly past and fill these grandstands. This ‘Vette grips harder than Schwarzenegger on the campaign trail, and it’s not the Terminator you might imagine: It’s communicative, (reasonably) accommodating, and daily drivable, still a Corvette at heart.

And it all costs $178,195 to start, including a $3,000 gas-guzzler tax for a ZR1 that can inhale two gallons of premium unleaded per minute at full power. The drinking problem is real, but you can barely buy a 911 GTS for this much cash; the 532-hp Porsche, with precisely half the ZR1’s 1,064 horses, starts from $167,000.

It certainly looks sharp:

Posted at 2:35 pm by Ed Driscoll

ISRAEL KILLS IRAN’S NEW WAR CHIEF DAYS AFTER TAKING OUT PREDECESSOR, AS STRIKES CONTINUE:

Israel killed a senior Iranian general overnight, just days after eliminating his predecessor, the Israel Defense Forces said Tuesday morning, as the campaign against Iran’s nuclear program and Iran’s retaliatory missile barrages at Israel entered its fifth day.

Israel launched its campaign early Friday, saying it was acting against an imminent existential threat from the regime’s nuclear and ballistic missile programs.

Explosions and air defense fire were reported Tuesday in Tehran, as Defense Minister Israel Katz warned that there were significant strikes in store for the Iranian capital.

Air defenses were reportedly also activated in Natanz, home to a major uranium enrichment plant that was seriously damaged in Israel’s opening attack, and satellite images showed extensive damage at a missile base.

An airstrike Monday night killed Maj. Gen. Ali Shadmani, the new head of the Khatam-al Anbiya Central Headquarters, also known as Iran’s military emergency command. He had only been on the job for some four days, having replaced Maj. Gen. Gholam Ali Rashid, who was killed on Friday in Israel’s opening strikes against Iran.

Exclusive video of Shadmani taking office last week:

Posted at 2:22 pm by Ed Driscoll

WILL TRUMP’S VILLAINY STOP AT NOTHING?

Posted at 1:52 pm by Glenn Reynolds

IRONIC THAT JUST DAYS AFTER THE “NO KINGS” MARCHES, A KING IS THE FACE OF DECENCY AND GOOD GOVERNMENT:

Posted at 1:39 pm by Glenn Reynolds

DAVID THOMPSON: Scenes From The Zombie Apocalypse.

“By the responses, I’d say that yes, pretty much everyone is.”

And the activists’ power lies in an assumption that their victims will not risk injuring their assailants.

But to insist that the victims should remain trapped, inert, and at the mercy of their aggressors, indefinitely, and while risking greater danger to themselves or their property, does not strike me as a morally persuasive position. And note that the activists typically rush from all sides, rapidly surrounding the car and its occupants, intensifying the alarm, the likelihood of panic, and drastically reducing the driver’s options. This is not accidental.

There’s an implied dare. The game being, “You won’t do what’s needed, despite our alarming and menacing behaviour, because you’re nicer than us, less vain, and not unhinged, and so we can dominate you and terrorise you, and break your stuff, for as long as we want, for shits and giggles.”

Well. I would suggest that the activists’ own actions render their wellbeing of very low importance.

Not to mention being the only Angelenos who’ve apparently never heard of Reginald Denny.

Posted at 1:35 pm by Ed Driscoll

I WAS GOING TO DO SOMETHING ELSE ON THEIR GRAVE, BUT SURE, DANCE TOO:

Posted at 1:28 pm by Glenn Reynolds

WHOA NELLIE! NYT Rips Zohran Mamdani a New One in Brutal Non-Endorsement and We are Here for It.

“Unfortunately, Mr. Mamdani is running on an agenda uniquely unsuited to the city’s challenges. He is a democratic socialist who too often ignores the unavoidable trade-offs of governance. He favors rent freezes that could restrict housing supply and make it harder for younger New Yorkers and new arrivals to afford housing. He wants the government to operate grocery stores, as if customer service and retail sales were strengths of the public sector. He minimizes the importance of policing.” “Most worrisome, he shows little concern about the disorder of the past decade, even though its costs have fallen hardest on the city’s working-class and poor residents. Mr. Mamdani, who has called Mr. de Blasio the best New York mayor of his lifetime, offers an agenda that remains alluring among elite progressives but has proved damaging to city life.”

Mr. Mamdani would also bring less relevant experience than perhaps any mayor in New York history. He has never run a government department or private organization of any size. As a state legislator, he has struggled to execute his own agenda.”

“…We do not believe that Mr. Mamdani deserves a spot on New Yorkers’ ballots.”

Exit question: “Who wrote this editorial and what have you done with the real NYT editors?”

Well, yes: NYT endorses de Blasio for mayor.

—The Politico, October 26th, 2013.

Related: Do New York’s mayoral candidates know that despite that whole “Gotham City” nickname, they’re not supposed to act like supervillains in a Batman movie?

 

Posted at 1:22 pm by Ed Driscoll