and now the ICEholes are killing white people

and O' beautiful, for spacious skies
Now those skies are threatening
They're beating plowshares into swords
For this tired old man that we elected king...
- Don Henley, The End of the Innocence

The woman murdered by the ICEgoons a couple of weeks ago was Minnesotan Renee Nicole Good, 37. She was the mother of a 6-year-old, had a loving partner, and by all reports, was a compassionate and giving person. And of course her name was Good. Because Trump kills everything that is Good. I don't mean that as snark, but the non-irony irony is too great.

But Noem's flying monkeys outfitted in their Walmart Kevlar like they were ready to assault Venezuela, made the one unforgivable error that could be their undoing. They killed a white lady. Yeah, that's a big no-no, isn't it? Reverse racist as #@%&*, but everyone knows the rules. Hell yah, it's unfair. When has fair or actual justice entered into a Trump policy?

Wait... excuse me. My producer is telling me something in my ear. Uh... sure... oh... is that right? Well.

This just in, the white lady in question was a LESBIAN. And now the judges will have to make a ruling. It appears that the MAGA contingent insists that this alone justifies pulling the trigger and that there will be no repercussions or change of policy.

We were close to turning this thing around, but rules are rules.

In preparation for another whyte girl taking a bullet, the MAGA comms team has got you covered. Apparently, some whyte ladies are completely shootable.

From Heather Cox Richardson's newsletter, "...David Marcus of Fox News warned that “organized gangs of wine moms” are using “Antifa tactics to harass and impede Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents.”...He complained of “self-important White women” protesting “with a weird and disturbing glee.” He seemed to threaten them by warning: “if we simply allow these cosplaying would-be revolutionaries to do whatever they want…, Renee Good will not be the last to needlessly die.”
On Monday, Will Cain of the Fox News Channel echoed Marcus, saying: “There's a weird kind of smugness...in the way that some of these liberal white women interact with authority.”
That idea that anyone challenging MAGA government is anti-American—even, perhaps, white women—helps to explain the Department of Justice’s decision not to investigate the shooting as an attack on Good’s civil rights, but instead to consider it as an assault on a federal officer. It is investigating not the shooting but the ties of Good and her widow to local activists. This continued attempt to blame Good for her own murder has led to the resignations of at least six career prosecutors from the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division.

That's right, ladies. The age of chivalry is quite dead. And you may be too if you're one of those woke, wine moms and decide to wave a sign or scream at our fine protectors of freedom (and pedophiles).

Since then, we have had small children held by ICE to bait their parents to come out of their homes (only to be arrested). There have been several cases of witnesses and protestors being tear gassed directly in the face. A family in Minneapolis found themselves in the middle of a group of ICEholes and had flash bang and tear gas grenades launched around and into their mini-van. The family (including 6 kids) was tear-gassed and struggled to escape after the airbags deployed after the explosions. The mom had to perform mouth-to-mouth resuscitation on her infant, who had been trapped in the van. The family was black; there was not near the media coverage of some of these other incidents. (To be fair, the family all survived.)

And Saturday: another shooting. This one would result in the death of a man who had courageously stepped up between a woman and an agent to protect her from pepper-spraying her, and then was sprayed himself. He was holding a phone in one hand and nothing in the other. Of course, the goon squad tackled him, and shot him multiple times in a matter of seconds. They would claim that he was brandishing a gun at them (video clearly shows he only had a phone in his hand.) He DID have a pistol in a holster, which he had a legal permit for. There is no indication that he pulled it. In fact, video shows that an agent ripped it from him, still holstered, as he shouted "GUN." At which point they executed him.
Alex Pretti was 37. He was an ICU nurse. At a veterans hospital. He had no criminal record. He was white.

You start unaliving the innocent white people, and you're liable to (for once) galvanize anti-Trump/GOP resistance if you're not careful.

You will pardon my admiration for the photos that come out of great tragedy and conflict. There is a discussion to be had about photographers/videographers and their role in the midst of crisis, but you will admit that images like this are one of the most powerful movers of public opinion. It is extraordinarily difficult and dangerous work. (Just this last week, three photojournalists were killed in an airstrike in Gaza.)

Video and photos from these current violent encounters are rivaling both the 60s Civil Rights era images, and those of the Vietnam War protests that influenced (some say completely changed) pubic opinion of that era.

Mistakes Were Made

“You know, they’re going to make mistakes sometimes. ICE is going to be too rough with somebody or – you know, they’re dealing with rough people – or they’re going to make a mistake sometimes. It can happen. We feel terribly.” -Trump, last Tuesday at the White House.

The last time His Royal Orangeness felt terribly about anything was the night that the Nobel Committee said, "Quiet, Piggy," when he wanted to trade Venezuela, 'Iceland,' and a "shithole country to be named later" for just one little Peace Prize.

“Of course, there have been mistakes made, because you’re always going to have mistakes made in law enforcement.” -JD Vance in Ohio on Thursday. He quickly redirected, “You can acknowledge that mistakes sometimes happen while also acknowledging that 99% of our ICE officers are doing the right thing."

Man, it's that 1% Murdered-by-ICE that really spoils it for everybody, Hillbilly.

Isn't it amazing to hear a president and his little manservant explaining street-executions on their own law-abiding citizens as if they were coaches for a losing sports team talking about another crappy loss? "You know, these boys give 100% every day, and I gotta say, I'm proud of these gentlemen - the way they put themselves out there. Sure, there were plays that could have gone differently, and we fumbled the ball a couple times. But you gotta expect that when you're playing a tough game like this with refs that are working against you. But we're sticking with this lineup. We're about winning, and this is a winning team."

It is telling that they felt the need to speak at all. But again, decent, law-abiding white people were slain. As grotesque as that distinction is, it will matter. George Floyd was executed only a mile or so from where Renee Good was murdered. Floyd's death resulted in a rise in the "Black Lives Matter" movement... a movement that would galvanize white nationalists and racists of all stripes FOR the MAGA movement and against civil rights progress on all levels. It's not lost on anyone that the 'dark ones' in Minneapolis all seem to be cute kids and decent, hard-working Hispanic families. The images of them being dragged out of their homes or off the street and whisked off to concentration camps are having an effect.

Trump's poll numbers are dropping faster than ICE can drop protestors. Will it be enough?

Strange Gunfellows

I had dinner this week with a young, mixed-race couple that I'm close to. They have a couple of kids. They're slightly to the left of Zohran Mamdani. They know the sting of racism. There was casual conversation about how they spent the afternoon doing a little gun shopping at Academy. The salesman spent quite a bit of time with them comparing the pros and cons of various types of guns, manufacturers, calibers, etc. They mentioned that they were ordering a small gun safe and had already looked at gun safety courses offered in the neighborhood. There was no discussion about gun ownership in general, no wringing of hands or moralizing about individuals owning guns, no worry about Second Amendment issues. Just a fear-driven reaction to modern times.

And who would have thought that Trump and his merry band of ICEtroopers would have united the NRA and a growing chunk of the political middle and left who for decades have advocated for strict gun control. OK, it's not a perfect, swipe-right match, but there are growing numbers of middle Americans considering arming themselves in the face of their own militarized government threatening to break into their homes.

Alex Pretti, the recent ICE murder victim, was allegedly carrying a gun (with a permit). Bill Essayli, the first assistant U.S. attorney for the Central District of California, wrote on social media that “If you approach law enforcement with a gun, there is a high likelihood that they will be legally justified in shooting you.” Hmmmmm. Doesn't really sound like something a good right-winger would say, does it? In fact, the National Rifle Association proclaimed his statement "dangerous and wrong." They know that, agree or not with the particulars of what's happening in Minneapolis, their take on the Second Amendment is all about having guns to defend oneself against that whole tyranny thing.

In one of her recent newsletters, Heather Cox Richardson quoted an exchange that another group had published. "Status Coup News interviewed a protester walking down the street holding a sign that said: “CLASSIC NAZI BLUNDER: INVADING IN WINTER.” The protester compared ICE agents to the Ku Klux Klan, noting that both wore masks and raided immigrant communities. He went on: “You know, there’s like all this talk of revolution. We’re the counterrevolutionaries, right?” He explained: “[T]here is a minority who is trying to create a post-law, orderless, lawless society, where their might makes right. And because, you know, they have guns and are willing to use them, they think they can suspend the Constitution, suspend habeas corpus…, suspend civil liberties, generally speaking.”

To simplify: if the goons can create enough chaos and it erupts in violent anarchy (cue those wacked out liberals who have now armed themselves) then the president would gleefully invoke the Insurrection Act. Or just appoint himself dictator.

But here we are... the NRA linking arms with liberals, traditional (old-school) Republicans, furious Hispanics, angry blacks, and an increasingly appalled and fearful white middle class. It's the Democrats' coalition to lose.

Will we all buy guns and actually train to use them? (Spoiler alert, I've owned firearms for years. For hunting, for protection while living in dangerous neighborhoods, and for sport.) Can you (or I, for that matter) envision firing at them through a front door if someone is trying to get in... knowing that these goons will not stop until you are no longer a threat (either to their agenda or their court date)?

Will we take a look at all those dramatic photos and, as a nation, find a conscience and common cause? Seems doubtful, we don't have a national consensus on much anymore.

On the other hand, white people are dying.

Escapes, Distractions, and Diversions

If you need to disconnect, I had a bunch of luck this past weekend (as the cold weather set in) with a few movies and series. They're on various platforms. Go borrow your kid's login and password. They're worth it.

Landman (Paramount)
yeah, all the good things you've heard about it are true. Some of Billy Bob Thornton's finest work, written just for him. And that's not to diminish the rest of the cast, all amazing in their own right. Another Taylor Sheridan monster hit. Two seasons, the second season just finished up.

Breakdown: 1975.
A great documentary for those of us of a certain age, and for cinephiles in general. When the turbulent, societal upheaval of the 60s and early 70s met a new generation of filmmakers, we got some of the most iconic films of our time.
"...filmmakers turned chaos into art. This documentary explores how a turbulent era gave rise to iconic movies like “Taxi Driver,” “One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest” and “Network.” "Breakdown: 1975" is directed by Academy Award-winner Morgan Neville."
Worth it for the film clips alone.

Springsteen: Deliver Me from Nowhere | Hulu/Disney+Hulu
I didn't realize that this one had hit the streambox yet. Spoiler alert: I'm a Springsten fanboy for life.
Jeremy Allen White just knocks it out of the park playing 'Bruuuuuce.' It's uncanny. Not a straight imitation either. He brings his own touches to the role.
It's the story of how Springsteen, well on his way to meteoric success, needed somewhat of a sabbatical, locked himself away in the bedroom of a rented farmhouse, and wrote and recorded his album, "Nebraska." He was dealing with personal ghosts, how success was affecting him, a relationship that scared him... you know, the rock star usual. He recorded it on a 4-track cassette recorder, hoping to rough in a few cuts. Instead, he decided that bare sound was what he wanted, and insisted (against his record company's wishes - they were ready to release and promote "Born in the USA') that Nebraska be released as is. It was a bit of a dark period, but Nebraska became a redemption. And a tremendous success.
(You'll enjoy it even if you're not a big fan. White's performance is amazing.)

The Anti-Cancel Culture College Just Found 'Em Some Culture to Cancel

Remember that 60 Minutes piece on the new University of Austin, Texas, that was to be the new bastion for Free Speech? The anti-woke college? Bari Weiss, now the new Editor in Chief of CBS News, who is already ruffling feathers there and killing what's left of the Tiffany Network, is also one of its founders. It's also known, more recently as ScamU as teachers, administrators and board members jump ship. Some kind of freedom, eh? Which tells you right there what kind of 'education' you are in for.

Check out this Politico Article on how the big money behind it all is not happy with all that free speech. Leadership is slowly disappearing. Great read.