Greetings, puny earthlings. Today is Monday, Dec. 15, 2025. 10 days until Christmas.
Today in History:
2009: The 787 Dreamliner flies for the first time.
1978: The US officially recognizes China
1939: Gone With The Wind premeres
1933: The end of Prohibition
1791: The Bill of Rights becomes law
Birthdays today: Oscar Niemeyer, who designed the UN Headquarters, Roman Emperor Nero, Gustave Eiffel, who designed the Eiffel Tower, Stan Kenton, Disk Jockey Alan Freed, whose story was dramatized here. (Great movie, particularly for music buffs like me.)
Today has caught me a little off kilter. Current events force me to do something I don't often do: address two huge news stories in one column. First:
The death of Rob Reiner and his wife.
Reportedly, these deaths occurred at the hands of their son. Sarah does an excellent job with the story. However, in looking at this happening, I feel compelled to comment.
I most certainly had my problems with Reiner's position on politics, make no mistake. But credit where it is due: There were times when humanity overrode his politics.
Rob Reiner responded with grace and compassion to Charlie's assassination. This video makes it all the more painful to hear of he and his wife's tragic end. May God be close to the broken hearted in this terrible story. pic.twitter.com/07g2EFu8Ha
— Andrew Kolvet (@AndrewKolvet) December 15, 2025
According to Fox News:
The couple’s 32-year-old son, screenwriter Nick Reiner, is being looked at as a person of interest in the case, law enforcement sources told the New York Post. Nick has struggled with homelessness and mental health issues in recent years.
“I was homeless in Maine. I was homeless in New Jersey. I was homeless in Texas I spent nights on the street. I spent weeks on the street. It was not fun,” he told People in an interview in 2016.
Page Six digs a little deeper, suggesting that the reason he was homeless in those places was due to his refusal to go back into rehab for his addiction. They've got him in custody. My own view is that the way this thing is stacking up, he was still struggling with those demons last night.
I say that, for this reason: There’s been quite a bit of chatter from the left (and in this case, I include the libertarian crowd) about the validity of attacking the boats of the drug cartels, and indeed, the idea of making some drugs illegal at all: personal freedoms and all that. The argument on the surface sounds like a principled stand. But is it, really?
If my assumption about Reiner’s son still battling his demons and that being behind these horrible murders is correct (and though I might later, I have no reason at the moment to believe otherwise), I wonder greatly what their thought processes are on these matters this morning. Do those making that “personal freedoms” argument who want to make drugs legal have the courage to admit that very attitude, accommodating drug use, is why Rob Reiner and his wife are dead today? Somehow, I tend to doubt it.
I'm sure we'll be discussing this again as the story develops. High-profile murders often have mental stability issues at their heart, and this aspect, too, seems worthy of a level of exploration we've not seen yet.
Let’s move on to another matter in the news this morning:
Bondi Beach in Australia.
We have all heard about this by now. Dave Manney, Aaron Hanscom, Catherine Salgado, Matt Margolis, and Rick Moran have all covered the known facts as the story developed. Just in what is available here in PJ Media, you have pretty much the whole picture.
One thing I've noticed, though, that I want to bring to your attention: Here's a video of one of the attackers getting neutralized. (Note, it was recorded before the local police identified the attackers, so don't let the narration throw you.)
The guy tackling the shooter is a hero, no question, and should be generously praised for being so. But notice that he pulled the rifle out of the guy's hands and held him at bay with it. In other words, the axiom that it takes a good guy with a gun to neutralize a bad guy with a gun. In this case, I note with some irony, it was the same gun.
Now, of course, the prime minister there is warning about "Right Wing Extremist Groups", and the government there is vowing for even tougher gun laws. I suspect you can imagine in your mind's eye the incredulous look on my face with that one. The New York Post carries on from here:
Australia vowed stricter gun laws on Monday as it began mourning victims of its worst mass shooting in almost 30 years, in which police accused a father-and-son duo of killing 15 people at a Jewish celebration at Sydney’s famed Bondi Beach.
The incident has raised questions whether Australia’s gun laws, among the toughest in the world, need overhaul, with police saying the older suspect had held a firearms license since 2015, along with six registered weapons.
I suggest, as I have so often in the past, that when the toughest gun laws in the world don't work, perhaps it's time to suggest another, more logical course. As David Manney suggests in his piece, History can be a harsh teacher.
And here's the link between these two events, and why I took the most unusual step of putting them in the same column today:
There's a good deal of history behind both events. I suggest people are dead this morning in both cases as a direct result of people choosing to ignore that history and the obvious conclusions that history teaches. Those understandings garnered from that history are sacrificed on the altar of a more comfortable ideology.
Well, it was comfortable, anyway.
Hope your day is a peaceful one. See you here tomorrow. Bring a friend.
Honest journalism, honest opinion, and straight-up analysis. That's what you support when you become a PJ Media VIP. Use the code FIGHT to save 60% off your membership. VIP memberships make a great Christmas gift, too.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member