Free speech is a right. Obstruction of justice is a crime. The practice of civil disobedience comes with an acknowledgement that you may pay the price for committing a crime.
Ronald Reagan: "The nine most terrifying words in the English language are: I'm from the Government, and I'm here to help."
Donald Trump: "I'm from the Government, and I'm here to help."
Walt, I supported Trump, too, but he's gone off the reservation. Please don't be afraid to criticize his increasingly erratic actions. Come on in, the water's fine.
You're criticizing Trump for enforcing federal immigration law, which the executive branch of government is responsible for according to the U.S. Constitution? Besides, this was one of his biggest campaign issues. I know some Reagan Republicans don't agree with the way he is going about enforcement. But how else would you do it, under cover of darkness?
I agree. The intensity of the reaction has to match the original action. If hundreds of thousands of migrants were streaming across the border every month during Biden (we all saw the videos from the Texas border towns), the Trump reaction can’t be deporting people 1 or 2 at a time. When migrants were streaming in, it was an industrial scale operation involving numerous nonprofits, NGOs, cartels, US Government aircraft and foreign governments. Deportations will need to match that scale.
Hold on a dang minute! If I'm criticizing Trump on immigration, it's for getting weak-kneed about his promised "mass deportations." Curious why you beat me up over that. I guess because the news has been so much about ICE in MN.
My complaints are more about his string of Great Ideas of the Day. (Defense stocks must stop paying dividends. Bring a case against a Fed chair I don't like. Etc.) And how he morphed "no tax on SS" to yet another means-tested redistribution of wealth. And don't get me started on his crypto schemes...
I supported Trump's re-election. I didn't pledge undying fealty.
My apologies. I assumed, which is never good, that your comment was directed at immigration. The Federal Government was coming to "help" local government. It's funny because I agree with pretty much all of your criticism of Trump you just laid out. Thanks for your clarifying response.
The more I think about it, the more I think your assumption was a logical one. I was, after all, replying to an ATW title specifically about MN, and like you said, ICE had been sent there, and the situation was all over the news. I was careless in not being more specific about my complaint. For quite a few weeks, I'd been meaning to ding Walt on being a knee-jerk Trump apologist on a whole host of issues, and I just typed in my comment without thinking too much.
No, Kristi Noem and Trump are being criticized for the way they've decided to enforce the law. They're using quick hires of inexperience, untrained, and as we've seen from many videos, aggressive, purposely rude, cruel, taking avtions to inspire fear in the citizenry. We've seen the verbal threats, grabbing phones, kicking and tackling. They're acting like thugs and American see that.
Now, IMO, this is what should have happened. There were lists of undocumented people in the system, reporting to the courts and obeying instructions given when they entered.
Undoubtedly there are others who are avoiding ICE because they have chose to ignore summonses and have not reported as instructed. Then there are other who are in hiding because they've been arrested and have been paroled or are wanted.
According to what Trump told us, priority would be given to those who have committed crimes. That has not been done. I don't understand, they have everyone's name and they especially know those who are cooperating with the system. Those people should have been left alone. No, they are being picked up as well and it wouldn't surprise me if they are violating rules to do it.
So, they're dressed like shock troops with masks, the entire show designed to intimidate. They're not following the law and properly processing asylum seekers, they're acting like an occupying force and, I don't care what others think, no American should have to put up with armed, poorly trained thugs prowling the streets. Not to mention, had ICE and border control followed Trump's campaign promises and prioritize those who are known criminals, it would be different but they lied.
This is what I think. For 4 yours Biden let tons of undocumented people into the country with very minimal processing, passed them on to cities within the US with future appointments with an immigration court.
I cannot imagine that immigration laws governing the borders of the United States between 2021 and 2025 allowed that sort of abbreviated procedure. What Biden should have done is hired sufficient immigration judges (would have been cheaper than what they've spent this year in ICE) and properly process applicants for refugee status right at the border. I voted to have people who were either known to have committed crimes since entering and those who chose to ignore summons to appear in immigration process and deported. Everyone else in the system and cooperating should have been left alone. That was not done. Trump lied and his consultants (as well as the expected blueAnon crowd) reacted in protest.
Now the bottom line. Had Trump instructed his people to follow the law instead of projecting fear and a thuggish attitude, the whole process became far more difficult. That why Obama was more successful, deported more immigrants at a higher rate during his terms. Has ICE not been populated by assholes with chips on their shoulders showing a complete disrespect for the public.
ICE agents have been told by the vice president that they are immune from prosecution for their actions. That is a lie, but that's not what the agents believe. If Jonathon Ross is not at the very least indicted for his crime, things are going to get much worse. Both sides are responsible for any violence, but representatives of the government are supposed to be above emotionalism and instead act with professionalism.
To call these ICE agents professionals is a joke, a very bad joke.
Were you born stupid or did you grow into it? Your assumptions are based on emotional and political feelings not facts . Obama had higher deportations because majority of the illegals were never released into the country, they were met at border and deported. As far as current hires of Ice LEO's they are rehires that left after Biden and Covid and transfers withLEO/Sheriff backgrounds. If you are going to spout lies, aim for ones that do not make you a fool!
I agree with your argument as far as the Obama numbers (as well as the Clinton numbers which you didn't mention.). You diminish your argument by personal insults to an individual who is willing to identify themselves unlike yourself.
Can I get your address and phone number to verify? I will identify myself as soon as I verify you. I could put "John Doe" as a screen name or John Rubish , my facts are correct, yet you want to obfuscate arguments because I hurt someones feelings? Simply put the argument that the current ICE/LEO working for ALL OF US , is Bull💩
Oh, I never expected him to play by the book, but he's still miles less disastrous than Kammie would have been.
Not regretting my vote, only that we had no better choices. Hoping we will in 2028, I would love to help vote in President Paul. Now, there's a good choice right there.
Well, I voted Democrat for quite some years. Then for over 30 I voted third party or not at all. Now, for 2 election cycles I’ve voted Republican. Since nothing has changed, in these almost 50 years, how, precisely, would you suggest I DO vote to ensure it does, Mr. or Ms. Nobody?
Until a majority of people vote outside of the 2 party system, there isn't much we can do unfortunately. I either vote 3rd party or not at all personally. But it is worth noting that politcians will only serve those whose votes they have to earn. Loyal voters in modern politics are rewarded with nothing.
As I said, I did as you do for over 30 years. But I think it highly unlikely a majority will vote 3rd party during my lifetime, and if one doesn't vote, one isn't counted at all.
I voted Trump in 2020 for a couple of reasons. First, the manufactured Russiagate pernicious lies spawned a seditious Deep State persecution of a duly elected president, second, Democrats deserved to be locked out of power for a while. Then we got Faux Joe, and now I am certainly never going to vote for a Democrat again. Any Democrat.
That's not to rule out a return to my next most recent voting habits, but all that means is one less vote against trans individuals injuring girls and women in sports, anti-white bigotry, crippling DEI, and endless taxpayer funds for such things as censorship promotion, and trans promotion in other countries.
Not sure I can justify even a negative support for any of these to myself.
Curious as to whether you voted, and for whom, and why.
I'd love to see money out of politics. How do we do that, other than downsizing the federal government to a drastic degree - which I am all for, but don't think will happen.
When was there a president who didn't blame others for whatever went wrong on his watch?
It should be, but may not be, I grant. If not, so much the worse for the vision of a nation my forefathers fought and bled for, and helped to briefly almost make real.
Respectfully you may be too young to remember but in the 70's public financing of federal elections as far as I recall were considered somewhat feasible. That was a long time ago. We weren't $38 trillion in debt and a billion was a real big number. With this salient change we're stuck.
I remember and desire to go back to that time. It will never happen until we root out the NGO/ Non Profits getting Billions of Tax Payer money and are not held accountable for how it is spent. Many of these are Marxist and Communist in nature. It seems we are funding our own demise.
Limitations on campaign financing are the very least of the problem of money in government. The government doles out bucks and breaks to the winners and losers it picks, skewing the economy and our markets, for instance tax breaks and government loans for solar companies headed by cronies of Barack Obama, which then, having spent taxpayer money, went bankrupt. If only this practice had been of his invention and jettisoned after his tenure concluded.
How about the former USAID grants to teach gender neutral language to Indonesian journalists? Ukrainian drag fashion shows? Teaching trans activism in Brazil?
DOGE made a few tiny scratches.
This is not only hugely wasteful of resources, it's putting the government's very weighty thumb on the economic scales.
Crony capitalism is an abomination, as mercantilism as policy always is and always have been.
We need to starve the government of money so it has no favors to dole out. That would go a long way toward reducing the investment of corporate funds into campaigns. But we won't, more's the pity.
Your original comment spoke of "getting money out of politics." Nothing in that phrase suggests stopping at strictures on campaign financing. I merely have a much more sophisticated and comprehensive view of "money in politics," and, mistakenly, thought you shared it.
Take off the blinders, lift your gaze, look around and at the whole dirty road stretching out, not merely 10 feet ahead.
The story I am sharing is apocryphal. I swear I am not making it up but it happened so long ago I couldn't guess how to document it. Here goes, during Mao's great cultural revolution a bank occurred at "The Peoples Bank" embezzlement was discovered. Solution? The Red Guard took the bank executives out lined them up against a wall and shot them. Think that would improve accounting oversight?
Things got so screwed up during the OBiden administration (i.e., arguably Obama's third term) that drastic measures are really the only option.
On top of that, and again in no small way due to the imprudence of the OBiden administration in putatively starting the Ukraine conflict (i.e., by pushing for Ukraine admission into NATO, notably despite CIA Chief Burns' earlier warnings to Condoleezza Rice: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_J._Burns_(diplomat)#U.S._Foreign_Service), along with the damage done to the dollar as the reserve currency and the rise of BRICS, and increasing hegemony of the PRC/CCP, he's got a lot of issues to deal with...all at once.
The current domestic "strife" is completely astroturfed (i.e., in contrast to being "grassroots") and leverages all sorts of leftover tension from the COVID years (which I think really pushed a lot of people to the edge).
So I don't think Trump's off the reservation but is testing the boundaries thereof.
If he's successful -- and I for one hope he is -- it will be of historic importance.
The foreign policy gambits (e.g., the Caribbean, Greenland) represent tremendous possible upside. The situation in South America was allowed to disintegrate...purposefully, I think, and while there's clearly great risk, the possibility of success is tantalizing. I'll tell you, all the Venezuelans I know (a few) are not complaining about the recent action. It should be a rich, prosperous thriving country. THat would be great both for the Venezuelans and for the US.
I hope you don't think I'm needling you but I have a question. If as many acknowledge illegal immigration was not a problem during Obama's presidency why did things go so wrong with Biden? My point is blaming Obama for Biden may not be fair to Obama.
I agree -- this is a conundrum, I've wondered about it!
Here's a hypothetical: that Democrats (n.b., after putatively becoming "Obama's party") felt they had a grip on elections and Trump's victory completely freaked them out.
I don't think that's particularly far-fetched and I remember the sentiment at the end of Obama's second term being that he was the main force in the party's direction at the time -- everyone thought Hillary was going to win.
I last voted Democrat in a national election when I voted for Obama in 2008. I was extremely skeptical but I did vote for him.
I moved back to Chicago in 2004 and missed the 2004 election (the only one I've missed: the Bush v. Kerry choice [sic?] was super-uninspiring and I simply failed to get registered). That was the election in which Obama went to the Senate. It was a nasty election that involved spilling the very messy details of his opponent's (Jack Ryan) divorce which resulted in Ryan dropping out in June. With only a few months to get a replacement and line up a campaign (Alan Keyes), Obama won heartily.
So Obama was sworn in to his first national office in January of 2005. But then, after serving roughly one third of this first term of his first role in national politics, he declares he's running for President in January/February of 2007!
I thought he was committing political suicide.
Obama basically lucked out with the Senate election: if you look at his background, it's basically empty. A completely irrelevant academic career, a nonexistent legal career and the most trivial of roles in the Illinois State Senate.
Note that the NY Times promulgated a falsehood by saying he "turned down tenure".
Obama turned down tenure-track positions! Big difference. As in the difference between being offered a chance to tryout for a team versus being a starter! The U Chicago Law School clarified matters (possibly belatedly):
It's really hard to find that U of C article! It's buried under a load of links about what a "scholar" Obama was -- despite never publishing (or even writing as far as I can tell) any "academic" papers.
Google's AI even bs's about it!
"AI Overview
Barack Obama was a Senior Lecturer at the University of Chicago Law School from 1992 to 2004, teaching constitutional law, voting rights, and race and the law, but he was never a tenured, full-time professor, declining offers for such positions to focus on his political career, which included his time as an Illinois State Senator and later U.S. Senator. He taught several courses annually, earning a reputation for intellectual openness and debate, and remained connected to the school, returning for events after becoming President."
"Such positions" they call it. He stopped teaching as soon as he joined the US Senate. In fact, here's a hoot, Obama was considered full-time faculty (in Chicago) and a full-time attorney (in Chicago) while also a State Senator (considered 75% of full time)...in Springfield which is 200 miles away. There's a neat trick!
Yes, I do think his entire political career was one long con. That continues today. I don't think he's got a genuine position on anything. Everything is a pose, a fake.
I've gotten a little far afield but I think the guy has an enormous ego and a sense of being invincible.
So they get his puppet and former VP into the White House with a ton of ex-Obama aides (which increasingly looks like a con itself: COVID was the cover for mail-in voting...and some 300,000 votes from Georgia were recently declared invalid).
Want to make sure that the Trump phenomenon never happens again? Flood the country with cheap, controllable votes!
So that's how I'd rationalize this ostensible contradiction. But I agree with you, I was struck by this too.
Needless to say, I am pretty closely following developments on the origins of the so-called "Russia Collusion" matter. The materials released so far increasingly make it look like the "Steele Dossier" was ginned up by the Clinton campaign but it was Obama who coordinated the launch of the collusion investigation.
His temple-to-self...oops, sorry...."presidential library" (a brutalist structure right next to one of the last buildings from the Columbian Exposition -- the Museum of Science and Technology) is set to open this year. The timing might be perfect...perfectly bad...if these matters develop. In particular, if a "former constitutional law professor" is found square in the middle of an effort to overturn an election with fabricated evidence. Well, that's pretty rich.
What pisses me off more than just about anything is "fakeness". Ergo my dislike of these astroturfed protests (I went to college at U Chicago and grad school at UMN). Obama was elected on a promise of change....well, no-one thought that meant communism...and I think he squandered an incredible opportunity. He's fake as the day is long.
At the time, I had heard that Bill Ayers (another "rich kid revolutionary") was suspected of being a ghost-writer on at least the first book.
Hmmmm....exactly how many autobiographies has Obama written thus far?
I don't know if people (i.e., the press) were just afraid to confront or question Obama on any of this. Like Athena springing fully grown from the head of Zeus, the Obama mythology was almost instantaneously fully formed.
I was definitely skeptical.
As noted, the key issue that I would raise...and that seemed to bug very few people...was how Obama had just gotten to the Senate two years prior to announcing his run for the Presidency.
I don't care, I'll say it: if some white guy freshman senator pulled the same stunt, he would have been laughed out of the room.
I mean, Obama barely completed 33% of his first term in national office when he declared he was ready to run the entire show.
And "everyone" just went along.
Within a year of taking office, it was obvious there was a con being played. Between the "apology tour" to loading up the finance-clean-up crew with a bunch of Wall Street insiders (well documented in Matt's article for Rolling Stone), to the goofy messaging (cf. "If I had a son..."), Obama's shenanigans seemed overt.
I first voted Republican (in a national election) in 2012 when I voted for Romney. I didn't think Romney was a great candidate (still don't) but I figured, I think correctly, that Romney would not have made the same mistakes as I expected Obama to make.
In particular, I think most of the real damage was done in his second term: the radical increase in the federal debt, SNAP/food-stamp usage, the Paris Climate Accord, Trans-Pacific Partnership, "military budget sequestration", etc.
I know I sound like a broken record, but if there's one thing I can't stand it's a fake. In particular, a sanctimonius, disingenuous, divisive fake.
Your reply makes very interesting reading. I'm flattered you made to such a comprehensive reply. I'm sure you understand that I might not be familiar with your bio of Obama. But it will go into the permanent file as I evaluate issues. Thank you.
9-wha wha. Pobrecita is witnessing riotous behavior and goes all Karen. Clearly you have never lived in a place invaded by criminals aliens and experienced the crime wave it brings. LEOs put themselves in dangerous situations to protect and serve the public. When the psycho protestors engage in violence, they get what’s coming to them.
Walter. You just crossed a line. You’re lying. Why you’re lying is something you’ll deal with. Or not. The woman who was shot in the face was turning her wheel away from the cop and toward the road in order to leave.
Now…she should not have been there. That was a poor choice. And in the moment of panic she did bump the agent.
This doesn’t make you any less interesting to listen to Walter. Even entertaining. But as a “journalist” you have disqualified yourself where analyzing this present federal administration is concerned.
I mean…Matt is barely doing that job. He is (understandably in my view having reviewed my own thinking) presenting himself with a view to pleasing the majority of his current viewership/readership.
That’s okay. I don’t think he’s pretended any different.
Kirn’s motivation?
I think it’s fair to at least speculate he continues to be after the library of congress job. Or a reliable seat at the table on Fox News.
Again…fine.
But not terribly satisfying if we want some measure of objective hold-power-to-account reporting or commentary.
And John Patrick Daly… thanks for this post. ICE agent did NOT have to fire shots into the HEAD of the protester. Arms, shoulders, no need to kill the “ bitch” as he was heard saying.
I for one would think it would be really difficult to accurately pick a precise location to aim after being struck by a vehicle and falling down.
That being said, I wish the officer had not pulled the trigger, as legally/formally justified as it might have been.
But I can't stand these clown-@$$ agitators who, in all the years I've been around universities (including the U of Minnesota), couldn't give a sh!t less about the issue and are in the "game" for just that: cause trouble, scream, etc.
It's theater. Plain and simple.
But I sure wish that poor woman was still alive. As far as I can tell, she got sucked into the bs fake-@$$ "radical" [not] "progressive" [not] culture up in MN. Seems like Renee Good just wanted to be "part of the group" and her girlfriend ginned things up enough to get Good killed.
My honest take: Good panicked (while being egged on by her girlfriend), hit the gas, and the officer reacted. Legally but tragically.
I think when you watch the all the videos you can make a strong argument that Good and her wife had both agreed ahead of time if that if officers attempted arrest, they would flee in their car. The behavior of the wife is particularly damning.
Walter makes the argument that with the evidence shown we can't rule out purposeful attempted murder by Good. I think there is also an argument that they both agreed ahead of time that if officers attempted arrest they would fuck shit up before fleeing.
I am going to step in because your comment is over the line. #1 Are you aware that this woman spent the entire day antagonizing these federal agents? #2 She parked the car across the road and sat on her horn for a long time in order to get the attention of stressed-out armed Federal Agents. #3 Congrats - She got their attention, and the officer told her to get OUT OF THE CAR. #4 The woman refused to follow his order. #5 Her wife screamed Drive Baby Drive and she accelerated - the wheels were spinning on the ice - did you see that video?? So here’s the deal - these women were poking this bear all day. Your point of view is a suggestion of intent - Walter’s point of view is a suggestion of intent - neither of you know what her intent was - but Walter clearly said he did not know. Furthermore, Walter never made any definitive claim which shows he is a professional. You on the other hand, make this ridiculous claim that you have super powers and you knew what she was thinking. That disqualifies you…. You may not agree with him- you obviously don’t like what he said - but falsely accusing him of ‘lying’ shows that you do not pay attention or listen well - it was you who got it wrong, and it was you who stepped way over the line!
So what's your point? That targeted harassment of a LEO must be at least say 2 hours before they are allowed to be stressed? Your comment is in my opinion either naive or disingenuous.
My point is that everything they are saying is grossly exaggerated in order to cover up their lack of professionalism and vicious behavior. I'm sure the officers felt stressed out and angry for being inconvenienced and disrespected. That's not a valid excuse for murdering an unarmed woman.
That is valid- I should have said the reason they were there was to antagonize, disrupt and obstruct. "You wanna come at us? “You wanna come at us?” Ignoring their orders and “Drive, baby! Drive! Drive!”.
The woman was totally in the wrong the entire day. However, that is not germane to whether or not deadly force was called for in that moment. It's a pretty shaky claim that the woman was trying to run the guy down. Matt is right, IMO, when he says it is a privileged Karen and an overheated cop.
Walt sounds like a defense attorney for the agent. I don't know if he truly feels like he does or if he thinks of himself as being on a political "side."
Here is a question for you- what if that woman had seriously hurt or killed that officer - What would you imagine the response to be? Remorse - sadness or cheering in the streets?
Excellent question but you failed to say to whom? Sadly I suspect the agitators would applaud it; Minnesota politicians would look the other way; and the rest of us sheep would lament the tragedy.
Even in the midst of this terrible outcome I choose to look for signs of hope. The larger discussion: what are the implications of saying we believe in the “rule of law…” Who is upholding that principle. Who is ultimately responsible for the state of affairs vis a vis immigration and assimilation; housing and employment.
If those who agree these are collective responsibilities then there is a chance the ones aroused neurotically by conflict will surrender the field to sanity.
For now the exact same images will be seen completely differently by millions of people. That’s just about as tough as trouble as can be I think…
The officer had his gun put away. It was only when she changed direction, accelerated, and drove forward toward him that he took the gun out, and it was only after she hit him with her car that he shot her.
While I agree with your sympathies on this subject I call you on this assertion. This is not something I'm willing to take your word. However, if true which ought to come out of any investigation of whether a good shoot would be strong.
Call me all you want - and don't take my word. My point has been that no one knows what that woman was thinking and the devil is in the details - I do not believe anyone wants innocent civilians shot. So the details matter - a lot.
You have a closed mind. It seems you simply want to plant your spear in the ground. I guess that's ok. It seems to be the attitude of many posting here. I guess in the future rather than try to dialogue I'll simply say either I agree, disagree or strongly disagree.
LOL- Is your comment attempting to have a dialogue? "I call you on this assertion. This is not something I'm willing to take your word." Or are you planting your spear?
@16:30m Glad your guest corrected to say "members of" the community, because the people he is seeing do not represent those of us who do not believe agitation is the answer to anything. Also just before that, he mentioned rioters communicating via Signal - local agitators also communicate openly on Facebook groups for local neighborhoods. When other residents raise concerns, the vitriol is so vicious that most give up on discussion.
I was just about to add something similar to your comment.
I lived in Minnesota for a number of years, returning to Chicago about twenty years ago.
I still have plenty of friends up there -- both in the cities and out in the suburbs.
Almost all (both black and white) are tired of the incessant protests.
Also, I too noticed Ford Fischer's apparent bias in the matter. I appreciate his work but the line about "the community coming together" is pure bs.
"Liberal" Minnesotans live to protest. There's no "community", it's a cottage industry.
To boot, as they correctly noted, the ICE actions are in an area close to the idiotically-named "George Floyd Square" (I mean, really, how weak-minded do you have to be to honor a career criminal and drug abuser whose own actions largely contributed to his demise).
In particular, it's one of the more economically depressed areas in Minneapolis. From what my friends tell me, it's pretty much the same as it was when I lived up there: lots of drug use and related activities...and it's probably a perfect place for illegal immigrants to find a place.
So those people who are coming out of their house (i.e., almost certainly rented) and "throwing things" may well be part of the problem!
I have to say I was taken aback a bit by Fischer's ostensible sympathy with the agitators and fake-@$$ protesters.
It's theater. Minnesota liberals live for this sort of nonsense. It's as real and as genuine as the most fake thing you can think of.
This is not a ding at Ford. He's good at what he does, as far as that goes. But I can't watch his videos. It's people screaming for the sake of screaming. I have no use for it whatsoever. They should sit down and write a 500-page piece expressing their grievance. They might convince me. Screaming and banging drums and acting "rebellious" will never do it. As you said, fake, fake, fake. ("This faux protest paid for by...")
Having been a US Marine that went through riot training back in the early 70s. I can remember how nasty that was. Having fellow Marines from another company I knew were not a real threat, but, screaming and yelling at you as you hold formation.. getting right in your face, taunting you with cuss words and really trying to get you break ranks and use that rifle butt.. it only went on for a few hours, but I could barely keep it together there.. so hats off to ICE.. Those guys are doing one hell of a difficult job that's gotta get done..
Minneapolis? like Walter says, I remember when that place was the American dream.. clean, prosperous, and vibrant.. The state of Minnesota was the idyllic.. it had a host of the top corporations in the country.. Now you've got immigrant gangs/ Billions in fraud, in large part by Somali immigrant criminals.. time to clean house.. the decent legal immigrants who worked for years assimilating. Hate to see this just as much as any citizen of this nation that believes in this democratic Constitutional Republic.
Minnesota's pathetic group of political leaders who you know understood at the very least what was going on.. how low can they go ??? I mean ruthlessly exploiting the useful idiots and well as the professional agent provocateurs to dangerously interfere with ICE?? Whatever it takes to buy them a few extra weeks of freedom... Tampon Tim and Illegal Omar the COMMIE.. deserve what's ahead..
The DOJ in the not to distant future is going to ruin what's left of their absolutely Rotten Political careers..
“Those guys are doing one hell of a difficult job that’s gotta get done.” You know, you’ve done it. Thank you. I would lose my mind from all that noise, day and night.
Downtown Minneapolis used to be safe at night. I wouldn’t venture there alone in the daytime anymore.
I hope you are right and that the fraud investigations continue.
Did it strike anyone as the very blackest of comedy, in a way, for the Mayor to immediately denounce the event as murder, then condemn those who took the polar opposite point for rushing to judgment?
Protests: I am old enough to remember Martin Luther King and all the people associated with that movement break down the old Jim Crow system. Part of it was done with boycotts. A wonderful thing!
Then we had the likes of Jesse Jackson, who raised the art of protest to extortion. Things have gone downhill ever since, but mostly within the limits of the First Amendment.
It’s no secret the Woke-Progressives want to dismantle the constitutional republic we currently have. The idea of sanctuary city is the first step in this direction, because it is basically a nullification of particular federal laws. They’d like to nullify the whole federal system in its current form, eventually.
That’s the big trick here. The motives changed with the language. Protests these days are strictly about violence and rhetoric rather than actual change. The main goal is to provoke a response from law enforcement that can be spun in the movement’s favor. It isn’t about actually raising awareness to implement support for a change in legislation.
But Americans aren’t aware of this subtle change in the character and nature of this change that has occurred, under the skin of activism over the last 30 years. Most Americans still hold the connotation that protesting is engaged in by activists in good faith to correct a moral wrong. That, unfortunately, is no longer true. It is an organized and funded political campaign that borrows from guerrilla warfare in order to accomplish a tactical victory for whomever is organizing and financing. As such, these “activists”are more like paid agitators and light soldiers than activists. There is nothing grass roots or organic about what is going on here. Proof?
How do THIS MANY PEOPLE in the MIDDLE OF WINTER IN MINNESOTA in a labor market that has severe shortages afford to be out protesting in the middle of the day? Somewhere along the line we stopped asking simple common sense questions like these and just started accepting bullshit. It’s time for that to stop.
I imagine this will largely be a joint effort with Activism Uncensored.
To that end, I'd like to see interviews with the "protesters" [sic: vandals + revelers] to find out just how much...they don't know!
The ongoing dynamic -- "No Kings" (Kings? What kings? You mean like forced vaccination kings?), Anti-ICE demonstrations (where were they during the Bush and Obama years?), Anti-Tesla demonstrations ("Oh, Elon's not working with Trump now? Never mind!) -- deserves continued analysis.
What do these' "protesters" [again, "sic"] want? What is their objective? What exactly are they protesting?
What they really want is to kill off the center and center-right, finally and forever. They see the invisible disintegration of education and the visible chaos on the street as the quickest route to permanent victory at the polls.
They are protesting the removal of heinous criminals. “ICE released a list this week detailing some of the most dangerous non-citizen criminals arrested during a major enforcement surge in Minnesota. The list includes individuals convicted of child rape, sexual assault of minors, sodomy, and multiple homicides, many of whom had final deportation orders dating back decades.”
Great point - but can those facts, which are clear improvements to safety that the majority of American citizens want, compete at all with the sense of euphoria and the virtue high to be gotten by getting out there and screaming and yelling with an angry mob? An opportunity to get great photos of yourself standing up to the ICE "Thugs" that you can rush home with and virtue signal to the world what a good person you are?
The latest unhinged Kirn speculation re premeditated murder conspiracy perpetuated by an un armed women who was driving her Honda pilot after she had taken her daughter to school is one of his best movie pitches lately.
Of course you're right! Since they were first seen over a century ago, no automotive vehicle has ever been involved in a deliberate homicide! Nor does ice on roads cause any diminution of tires' traction.
It is entirely safe to accelerate on ice while a person is directly in front of your vehicle - magical elves will waft him or her away to safety in the twinkling!
/sarc
Walter is saying that all potentialities of the situation should be considered. That in fact is a possibility, though I would think a remote one.
The taunting wife cried, "why did you use real bullets?" Well, why did she encourage her beloved to hit a real gas pedal with a real live person, armed with a real gun, standing on the real ice in front of their real vehicle?
It is remarkable...and maybe even a little disappointing...how applicable the Underpants Gnomes (UG) are as a template or blueprint! For pretty much everything!
In particular, the UG are the prototype for much, possibly most, "protests".
1.) Throw soup on paintings and superglue one's hands to the wall.
I am trying to remain distant on this issue, but I am in Minnesota in a college town and these are hotbeds for protests.
To me, they seem almost schizophrenic. NO KINGS, CLIMATE CHANGE IS REAL, go away racists, the Palestinian and rainbow+ flags everywhere, MELT ICE and chants as annoying as incongruent as Dubtep.
One person just sat on a corner in a lawn chair with their "Resist" sign. I was like resist what? The wind?
I went to grad school at the UMN and lived up there for a few years.
Protesting is a cottage industry in Minnesota.
The "issue" is but a means to an end: the goal is have a protest and the "issue" provides convenient cover.
I came to dislike that mindset. I'm not big on "new slang" but when I heard the term "virtue signaling", I immediately thought "Minnesota".
What is possibly the most annoying aspect of the "protest culture" is the putative lack of concern about the original issue. If one genuinely cared about a matter, one would work to promote that matter and not associate it with vandalism, rioting and all the other "riot artifacts" that seem to be celebrated by the armchair revolutionary class,
Yes, the placards are very schizophrenic, especially as you leave the Twin Cities area. Take a drive down hwy 61. Redwing and Winona placards have zero cohesion. It's like they take their team jersey out, and just yell for their pet peeve. Talk about the Tower of Babel.
I went to college and still live in MN, so this is unsurprising. I wonder how much protesting has taken the place of partying as a vent for youthful energy?
Good point! I want to see the tox report of anyone injured, taken into custody or unfortunately "un-alived". As an aggregate. Names do not have to be disclosed. However, a tox report on the deceased will likely be presented as evidence either for or against anyone in this case.
Have you researched the activities of Good prior to the fatal incident? She was an ant ICE activist trained in obstructing ICE agents and her young daughter also receives this training in her school. Good’s wife got her involved with this school.
Could be, but all that's relevant is what the ICE agents knew at the time. Unless you're implying these extra facts could have been grounds for killing her.
Of course not. I want the investigation to decide the facts. Noem says ICE has released its video and it shows she is at fault. The only justification for shooting her is he felt she was going to hit him or could have hit him with her truck. My reason for bringing up her training in obstructing ICE will most likely be relevant in the case. That would show she was not an innocent bystander but was intentional and was participating in obstruction. We will see if that is the case. I’m with Walter. Let’s not go tribal but wait and see what is decided by the evidence.
It’s a way they can easily transition all the pro-Hamas protesters to the latest thing—stopping ICE— not that that would be a challenge. Both movements want the destruction of the West. Who on the Left (and the Woke Right like Tucker) doesn’t hate Israel/Jews/IDF and blame them for every problem on the planet?
That’s the address for the U.S. Consulate in Tel Aviv. Same building. If you don’t think there is a reason to have an office in Israel, given the number of U.S. dual citizens immigrating, and the number of Israelis requesting visas, then go figure.
Walter is saying she "centered" the wheels, but it's been observed that the front wheels were turned to the right. She was not intentionally aiming the car at the man.
The road was icy. Reckless disregard of human life, occupants of the vehicle included, to accelerate the way she did, even without a human being in her drive line.
Have you driven on icy roads or have you heard of hydroplaning in rain?
If the road was icy, which it appeared to be, wheel direction simply does not matter. Your car will go in any direction. Often the opposite. This was demonstrated in the Cars kids movie or better known as Tokyo Drift.
The best decision is not to cosplay The Dukes of Hazzard and YEE-HAW your way out of a deadly situation, but take your hands off the wheel, put your hands up, and get our of your car.
Now, I am not sure if she was told to do that? If not, then there is a case.
I heard Walter talk about My Lai massacre and how it could happen. It made me think back to something I wrote about my experience in Iraq as a Department of State 'Governance Advisor' In Kirkuk with a Provincial Reconstruction Team (PRT). We spent a lot of time riding around town in MRAPs (Mine-Resistant Ambush Protected Vehicles) The poor soul lost in the attack was SSG Johnny Roosevelt Polk of the 1st CAV.
We were out in town, I don’t remember exactly where they were taking me- most likely the Kirkuk city hall. We got word over the radio net that another MRAP had hit by an RKG-3. The unit was ordered to set-up a cordon and search to try to catch the grenade-thrower. A discussion took place in my MRAP among the crew. The desperately wanted to get in the fight, but they had standing orders that when transporting DoS personnel they were to avoid contact. Their primary mission was my safety. I countermanded that standing order and told them to deploy in the cordon-and-search with the rest of the MRAPs. As I was a DoS civilian, they were satisfied that I had the authority to give such an order. As we patrolled the streets, the chatter among the MRAP crew was all seething rage and a franticness for revenge. I understood that day how a massacre like My Lai could happen. After several fruitless hours of searching, we gave-up and accepted that the perpetrator had escaped.
When I got back to FOB Warrior I was exhausted. I went to the DFAC. The DFAC at FOB Warrior was a vast, massive building that could serve thousands of people at one time. But it was a strangely tribal place. Each group sticking mostly with their own kind. There were about 60+ people assigned to the PRT in Kirkuk (a very different experience than when I was down in Hawija, where I was the sole PRT rep.) Our closest tribal neighbor that we socialized with was USACE. There was a female USACE officer who was visiting Kirkuk for a few days to inspect some project or monitor some contract. I had spoken with her the day before. When I got to the DFAC, she saw me and beckoned me to sit with her. She was bubbling with excitement. She had also been out in Kirkuk when the attack happened. As an officer, she had been directed to take command of some small part of the “cordon and search”. She described the action (although there was not really any action) in detail. Her narrative made it easy to picture her with just her Beretta leading troops dramatically, through the streets of Kirkuk. “I got a combat patch!” she said, looking at the new CAV patch on her right shoulder with pride. It was the fulfillment of the ultimate fantasy of a desk bound contracting officer. – I felt terrible, I knew that no one at 3/82 was feeling that high and giddy about what had happened.
It is difficult to describe my feelings at that moment. The feelings are still vivid, even after all of these years. You might think reading this that I was disgusted and contemptuous of how thrilled she was at the day’s events, which was really only just one American KIA-someone we knew…and she didn’t.
But that is not how I felt at all, my feelings are much more complex than that. I didn’t resent her glee at the adventure that she had. She had gotten a whiff of the excitement of war. I know this intoxicating beverage only too well. There was a time back in the 1990s in Croatia and Bosnia that I totally drowned myself in the stuff. The most dramatic moment of my life was racing through the streets of Osijek at 90mph in Dimity’s Green Lada, with David Bowie’s “Changes” at full blast on the stereo- seeing shells and rockets hitting buildings on both sides of the street as we swerved to avoid debris and fresh shell craters in the road. The music was so loud and the adrenaline so intense, we didn’t realize that the car had been hit my shrapnel until we stopped.
No, I didn’t feel awful because of the excitement that she felt. I felt awful because I understood it completely and it was so familiar to me.
In my humble non-professional-or-trained-writer opinion, that was very well done.
Not only did your narrative compellingly convey the amazing flow of emotions but also put those emotions into a larger context.
I am not a veteran nor a former government employee. I have known loads of veterans. Your description jibes with everything I've heard.
The extreme non-simplicity of summarizing all the possible -- and valid -- emotions is lost all too often.
I find myself extremely jaded and unsympathetic to most "protests" because of what I've seen over the years: that the "protest" is the goal and the "issue" is merely the excuse for having the protest.
In particular, most "protesters" don't seem to have any appreciation or perspective as to the various "sides" in a story.
Thank you for your essay. Again, I found it very compelling and well-written.
Free speech is a right. Obstruction of justice is a crime. The practice of civil disobedience comes with an acknowledgement that you may pay the price for committing a crime.
Stay on the curb with your whistles and placards.
"The price" is supposed to be getting arrested. Not shot in the fucking face.
That’s what would have happened had she not tried to drive over one of them. https://youtu.be/iwGXHvWcLs4?si=mvFguS4-Ibl1sdNf
Quite right. But people seem to deliberately misunderstand that part.
Oh they’re not forgetting or misunderstanding.
They're just ignoring inconvenient facts contradictory to their preferred narrative. What else isn't new?
Ronald Reagan: "The nine most terrifying words in the English language are: I'm from the Government, and I'm here to help."
Donald Trump: "I'm from the Government, and I'm here to help."
Walt, I supported Trump, too, but he's gone off the reservation. Please don't be afraid to criticize his increasingly erratic actions. Come on in, the water's fine.
You're criticizing Trump for enforcing federal immigration law, which the executive branch of government is responsible for according to the U.S. Constitution? Besides, this was one of his biggest campaign issues. I know some Reagan Republicans don't agree with the way he is going about enforcement. But how else would you do it, under cover of darkness?
I agree. The intensity of the reaction has to match the original action. If hundreds of thousands of migrants were streaming across the border every month during Biden (we all saw the videos from the Texas border towns), the Trump reaction can’t be deporting people 1 or 2 at a time. When migrants were streaming in, it was an industrial scale operation involving numerous nonprofits, NGOs, cartels, US Government aircraft and foreign governments. Deportations will need to match that scale.
Hold on a dang minute! If I'm criticizing Trump on immigration, it's for getting weak-kneed about his promised "mass deportations." Curious why you beat me up over that. I guess because the news has been so much about ICE in MN.
My complaints are more about his string of Great Ideas of the Day. (Defense stocks must stop paying dividends. Bring a case against a Fed chair I don't like. Etc.) And how he morphed "no tax on SS" to yet another means-tested redistribution of wealth. And don't get me started on his crypto schemes...
I supported Trump's re-election. I didn't pledge undying fealty.
My apologies. I assumed, which is never good, that your comment was directed at immigration. The Federal Government was coming to "help" local government. It's funny because I agree with pretty much all of your criticism of Trump you just laid out. Thanks for your clarifying response.
The more I think about it, the more I think your assumption was a logical one. I was, after all, replying to an ATW title specifically about MN, and like you said, ICE had been sent there, and the situation was all over the news. I was careless in not being more specific about my complaint. For quite a few weeks, I'd been meaning to ding Walt on being a knee-jerk Trump apologist on a whole host of issues, and I just typed in my comment without thinking too much.
No, Kristi Noem and Trump are being criticized for the way they've decided to enforce the law. They're using quick hires of inexperience, untrained, and as we've seen from many videos, aggressive, purposely rude, cruel, taking avtions to inspire fear in the citizenry. We've seen the verbal threats, grabbing phones, kicking and tackling. They're acting like thugs and American see that.
Now, IMO, this is what should have happened. There were lists of undocumented people in the system, reporting to the courts and obeying instructions given when they entered.
Undoubtedly there are others who are avoiding ICE because they have chose to ignore summonses and have not reported as instructed. Then there are other who are in hiding because they've been arrested and have been paroled or are wanted.
According to what Trump told us, priority would be given to those who have committed crimes. That has not been done. I don't understand, they have everyone's name and they especially know those who are cooperating with the system. Those people should have been left alone. No, they are being picked up as well and it wouldn't surprise me if they are violating rules to do it.
So, they're dressed like shock troops with masks, the entire show designed to intimidate. They're not following the law and properly processing asylum seekers, they're acting like an occupying force and, I don't care what others think, no American should have to put up with armed, poorly trained thugs prowling the streets. Not to mention, had ICE and border control followed Trump's campaign promises and prioritize those who are known criminals, it would be different but they lied.
This is what I think. For 4 yours Biden let tons of undocumented people into the country with very minimal processing, passed them on to cities within the US with future appointments with an immigration court.
I cannot imagine that immigration laws governing the borders of the United States between 2021 and 2025 allowed that sort of abbreviated procedure. What Biden should have done is hired sufficient immigration judges (would have been cheaper than what they've spent this year in ICE) and properly process applicants for refugee status right at the border. I voted to have people who were either known to have committed crimes since entering and those who chose to ignore summons to appear in immigration process and deported. Everyone else in the system and cooperating should have been left alone. That was not done. Trump lied and his consultants (as well as the expected blueAnon crowd) reacted in protest.
Now the bottom line. Had Trump instructed his people to follow the law instead of projecting fear and a thuggish attitude, the whole process became far more difficult. That why Obama was more successful, deported more immigrants at a higher rate during his terms. Has ICE not been populated by assholes with chips on their shoulders showing a complete disrespect for the public.
ICE agents have been told by the vice president that they are immune from prosecution for their actions. That is a lie, but that's not what the agents believe. If Jonathon Ross is not at the very least indicted for his crime, things are going to get much worse. Both sides are responsible for any violence, but representatives of the government are supposed to be above emotionalism and instead act with professionalism.
To call these ICE agents professionals is a joke, a very bad joke.
Were you born stupid or did you grow into it? Your assumptions are based on emotional and political feelings not facts . Obama had higher deportations because majority of the illegals were never released into the country, they were met at border and deported. As far as current hires of Ice LEO's they are rehires that left after Biden and Covid and transfers withLEO/Sheriff backgrounds. If you are going to spout lies, aim for ones that do not make you a fool!
I agree with your argument as far as the Obama numbers (as well as the Clinton numbers which you didn't mention.). You diminish your argument by personal insults to an individual who is willing to identify themselves unlike yourself.
Can I get your address and phone number to verify? I will identify myself as soon as I verify you. I could put "John Doe" as a screen name or John Rubish , my facts are correct, yet you want to obfuscate arguments because I hurt someones feelings? Simply put the argument that the current ICE/LEO working for ALL OF US , is Bull💩
Oh, I never expected him to play by the book, but he's still miles less disastrous than Kammie would have been.
Not regretting my vote, only that we had no better choices. Hoping we will in 2028, I would love to help vote in President Paul. Now, there's a good choice right there.
There's no incentive to give a better choice so long as you keep voting the right way.
Well, I voted Democrat for quite some years. Then for over 30 I voted third party or not at all. Now, for 2 election cycles I’ve voted Republican. Since nothing has changed, in these almost 50 years, how, precisely, would you suggest I DO vote to ensure it does, Mr. or Ms. Nobody?
Until a majority of people vote outside of the 2 party system, there isn't much we can do unfortunately. I either vote 3rd party or not at all personally. But it is worth noting that politcians will only serve those whose votes they have to earn. Loyal voters in modern politics are rewarded with nothing.
As I said, I did as you do for over 30 years. But I think it highly unlikely a majority will vote 3rd party during my lifetime, and if one doesn't vote, one isn't counted at all.
I voted Trump in 2020 for a couple of reasons. First, the manufactured Russiagate pernicious lies spawned a seditious Deep State persecution of a duly elected president, second, Democrats deserved to be locked out of power for a while. Then we got Faux Joe, and now I am certainly never going to vote for a Democrat again. Any Democrat.
That's not to rule out a return to my next most recent voting habits, but all that means is one less vote against trans individuals injuring girls and women in sports, anti-white bigotry, crippling DEI, and endless taxpayer funds for such things as censorship promotion, and trans promotion in other countries.
Not sure I can justify even a negative support for any of these to myself.
I didn’t vote for Trump for these reasons:
1. He pushes until something breaks or someone stops him.
2. When he fails, it’s always someone else’s fault.
That’s it. That’s the list.
We need term limits on all politicians, money out of politics, and accounting oversight on ALL departments.
There has to be a growing “middle” that can figure this out and end the Democrat/Republican stronghold on all politics, we are better than this.
Curious as to whether you voted, and for whom, and why.
I'd love to see money out of politics. How do we do that, other than downsizing the federal government to a drastic degree - which I am all for, but don't think will happen.
When was there a president who didn't blame others for whatever went wrong on his watch?
In a $6 trillion dollars economy is that feasible?
It should be, but may not be, I grant. If not, so much the worse for the vision of a nation my forefathers fought and bled for, and helped to briefly almost make real.
Respectfully you may be too young to remember but in the 70's public financing of federal elections as far as I recall were considered somewhat feasible. That was a long time ago. We weren't $38 trillion in debt and a billion was a real big number. With this salient change we're stuck.
I remember and desire to go back to that time. It will never happen until we root out the NGO/ Non Profits getting Billions of Tax Payer money and are not held accountable for how it is spent. Many of these are Marxist and Communist in nature. It seems we are funding our own demise.
I do remember. If it could be worked, it might be worth trying, at least for a cycle as an experiment.
Why do you have to downsize the federal gov to limit campaign donations?
Limitations on campaign financing are the very least of the problem of money in government. The government doles out bucks and breaks to the winners and losers it picks, skewing the economy and our markets, for instance tax breaks and government loans for solar companies headed by cronies of Barack Obama, which then, having spent taxpayer money, went bankrupt. If only this practice had been of his invention and jettisoned after his tenure concluded.
How about the former USAID grants to teach gender neutral language to Indonesian journalists? Ukrainian drag fashion shows? Teaching trans activism in Brazil?
DOGE made a few tiny scratches.
This is not only hugely wasteful of resources, it's putting the government's very weighty thumb on the economic scales.
Crony capitalism is an abomination, as mercantilism as policy always is and always have been.
We need to starve the government of money so it has no favors to dole out. That would go a long way toward reducing the investment of corporate funds into campaigns. But we won't, more's the pity.
None of this is campaign finance.
Your original comment spoke of "getting money out of politics." Nothing in that phrase suggests stopping at strictures on campaign financing. I merely have a much more sophisticated and comprehensive view of "money in politics," and, mistakenly, thought you shared it.
Take off the blinders, lift your gaze, look around and at the whole dirty road stretching out, not merely 10 feet ahead.
The story I am sharing is apocryphal. I swear I am not making it up but it happened so long ago I couldn't guess how to document it. Here goes, during Mao's great cultural revolution a bank occurred at "The Peoples Bank" embezzlement was discovered. Solution? The Red Guard took the bank executives out lined them up against a wall and shot them. Think that would improve accounting oversight?
It might perhaps make fraud less likely; what it would do, though, is spur inventive minds to find more creative and less detectable methods of fraud.
I'm still giving Trump the benefit of the doubt.
Things got so screwed up during the OBiden administration (i.e., arguably Obama's third term) that drastic measures are really the only option.
On top of that, and again in no small way due to the imprudence of the OBiden administration in putatively starting the Ukraine conflict (i.e., by pushing for Ukraine admission into NATO, notably despite CIA Chief Burns' earlier warnings to Condoleezza Rice: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_J._Burns_(diplomat)#U.S._Foreign_Service), along with the damage done to the dollar as the reserve currency and the rise of BRICS, and increasing hegemony of the PRC/CCP, he's got a lot of issues to deal with...all at once.
The current domestic "strife" is completely astroturfed (i.e., in contrast to being "grassroots") and leverages all sorts of leftover tension from the COVID years (which I think really pushed a lot of people to the edge).
So I don't think Trump's off the reservation but is testing the boundaries thereof.
If he's successful -- and I for one hope he is -- it will be of historic importance.
The foreign policy gambits (e.g., the Caribbean, Greenland) represent tremendous possible upside. The situation in South America was allowed to disintegrate...purposefully, I think, and while there's clearly great risk, the possibility of success is tantalizing. I'll tell you, all the Venezuelans I know (a few) are not complaining about the recent action. It should be a rich, prosperous thriving country. THat would be great both for the Venezuelans and for the US.
So I'm still giving him time.
I hope you don't think I'm needling you but I have a question. If as many acknowledge illegal immigration was not a problem during Obama's presidency why did things go so wrong with Biden? My point is blaming Obama for Biden may not be fair to Obama.
No needling inferred or taken!
I agree -- this is a conundrum, I've wondered about it!
Here's a hypothetical: that Democrats (n.b., after putatively becoming "Obama's party") felt they had a grip on elections and Trump's victory completely freaked them out.
I don't think that's particularly far-fetched and I remember the sentiment at the end of Obama's second term being that he was the main force in the party's direction at the time -- everyone thought Hillary was going to win.
I last voted Democrat in a national election when I voted for Obama in 2008. I was extremely skeptical but I did vote for him.
I moved back to Chicago in 2004 and missed the 2004 election (the only one I've missed: the Bush v. Kerry choice [sic?] was super-uninspiring and I simply failed to get registered). That was the election in which Obama went to the Senate. It was a nasty election that involved spilling the very messy details of his opponent's (Jack Ryan) divorce which resulted in Ryan dropping out in June. With only a few months to get a replacement and line up a campaign (Alan Keyes), Obama won heartily.
So Obama was sworn in to his first national office in January of 2005. But then, after serving roughly one third of this first term of his first role in national politics, he declares he's running for President in January/February of 2007!
I thought he was committing political suicide.
Obama basically lucked out with the Senate election: if you look at his background, it's basically empty. A completely irrelevant academic career, a nonexistent legal career and the most trivial of roles in the Illinois State Senate.
Note that the NY Times promulgated a falsehood by saying he "turned down tenure".
https://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/30/us/politics/30law.html
Which they've never corrected!
Obama turned down tenure-track positions! Big difference. As in the difference between being offered a chance to tryout for a team versus being a starter! The U Chicago Law School clarified matters (possibly belatedly):
https://www.law.uchicago.edu/media
It's really hard to find that U of C article! It's buried under a load of links about what a "scholar" Obama was -- despite never publishing (or even writing as far as I can tell) any "academic" papers.
Google's AI even bs's about it!
"AI Overview
Barack Obama was a Senior Lecturer at the University of Chicago Law School from 1992 to 2004, teaching constitutional law, voting rights, and race and the law, but he was never a tenured, full-time professor, declining offers for such positions to focus on his political career, which included his time as an Illinois State Senator and later U.S. Senator. He taught several courses annually, earning a reputation for intellectual openness and debate, and remained connected to the school, returning for events after becoming President."
"Such positions" they call it. He stopped teaching as soon as he joined the US Senate. In fact, here's a hoot, Obama was considered full-time faculty (in Chicago) and a full-time attorney (in Chicago) while also a State Senator (considered 75% of full time)...in Springfield which is 200 miles away. There's a neat trick!
Yes, I do think his entire political career was one long con. That continues today. I don't think he's got a genuine position on anything. Everything is a pose, a fake.
I've gotten a little far afield but I think the guy has an enormous ego and a sense of being invincible.
So they get his puppet and former VP into the White House with a ton of ex-Obama aides (which increasingly looks like a con itself: COVID was the cover for mail-in voting...and some 300,000 votes from Georgia were recently declared invalid).
Want to make sure that the Trump phenomenon never happens again? Flood the country with cheap, controllable votes!
So that's how I'd rationalize this ostensible contradiction. But I agree with you, I was struck by this too.
Needless to say, I am pretty closely following developments on the origins of the so-called "Russia Collusion" matter. The materials released so far increasingly make it look like the "Steele Dossier" was ginned up by the Clinton campaign but it was Obama who coordinated the launch of the collusion investigation.
His temple-to-self...oops, sorry...."presidential library" (a brutalist structure right next to one of the last buildings from the Columbian Exposition -- the Museum of Science and Technology) is set to open this year. The timing might be perfect...perfectly bad...if these matters develop. In particular, if a "former constitutional law professor" is found square in the middle of an effort to overturn an election with fabricated evidence. Well, that's pretty rich.
What pisses me off more than just about anything is "fakeness". Ergo my dislike of these astroturfed protests (I went to college at U Chicago and grad school at UMN). Obama was elected on a promise of change....well, no-one thought that meant communism...and I think he squandered an incredible opportunity. He's fake as the day is long.
If you read either of Obama's books you would have known "fundamentally changing" America was
towards the Marxist/Communist model. From his father and "mentors"Esp. Frank Marshall Davis.
I can believe it.
At the time, I had heard that Bill Ayers (another "rich kid revolutionary") was suspected of being a ghost-writer on at least the first book.
Hmmmm....exactly how many autobiographies has Obama written thus far?
I don't know if people (i.e., the press) were just afraid to confront or question Obama on any of this. Like Athena springing fully grown from the head of Zeus, the Obama mythology was almost instantaneously fully formed.
I was definitely skeptical.
As noted, the key issue that I would raise...and that seemed to bug very few people...was how Obama had just gotten to the Senate two years prior to announcing his run for the Presidency.
I don't care, I'll say it: if some white guy freshman senator pulled the same stunt, he would have been laughed out of the room.
I mean, Obama barely completed 33% of his first term in national office when he declared he was ready to run the entire show.
And "everyone" just went along.
Within a year of taking office, it was obvious there was a con being played. Between the "apology tour" to loading up the finance-clean-up crew with a bunch of Wall Street insiders (well documented in Matt's article for Rolling Stone), to the goofy messaging (cf. "If I had a son..."), Obama's shenanigans seemed overt.
I first voted Republican (in a national election) in 2012 when I voted for Romney. I didn't think Romney was a great candidate (still don't) but I figured, I think correctly, that Romney would not have made the same mistakes as I expected Obama to make.
In particular, I think most of the real damage was done in his second term: the radical increase in the federal debt, SNAP/food-stamp usage, the Paris Climate Accord, Trans-Pacific Partnership, "military budget sequestration", etc.
I know I sound like a broken record, but if there's one thing I can't stand it's a fake. In particular, a sanctimonius, disingenuous, divisive fake.
Three books that I know of:
Dreams from My Father, Audacity of Hope and lastly A Promise Land
Your reply makes very interesting reading. I'm flattered you made to such a comprehensive reply. I'm sure you understand that I might not be familiar with your bio of Obama. But it will go into the permanent file as I evaluate issues. Thank you.
9-wha wha. Pobrecita is witnessing riotous behavior and goes all Karen. Clearly you have never lived in a place invaded by criminals aliens and experienced the crime wave it brings. LEOs put themselves in dangerous situations to protect and serve the public. When the psycho protestors engage in violence, they get what’s coming to them.
Walter. You just crossed a line. You’re lying. Why you’re lying is something you’ll deal with. Or not. The woman who was shot in the face was turning her wheel away from the cop and toward the road in order to leave.
Now…she should not have been there. That was a poor choice. And in the moment of panic she did bump the agent.
This doesn’t make you any less interesting to listen to Walter. Even entertaining. But as a “journalist” you have disqualified yourself where analyzing this present federal administration is concerned.
I mean…Matt is barely doing that job. He is (understandably in my view having reviewed my own thinking) presenting himself with a view to pleasing the majority of his current viewership/readership.
That’s okay. I don’t think he’s pretended any different.
Kirn’s motivation?
I think it’s fair to at least speculate he continues to be after the library of congress job. Or a reliable seat at the table on Fox News.
Again…fine.
But not terribly satisfying if we want some measure of objective hold-power-to-account reporting or commentary.
And John Patrick Daly… thanks for this post. ICE agent did NOT have to fire shots into the HEAD of the protester. Arms, shoulders, no need to kill the “ bitch” as he was heard saying.
You must be an expert marksman.
I for one would think it would be really difficult to accurately pick a precise location to aim after being struck by a vehicle and falling down.
That being said, I wish the officer had not pulled the trigger, as legally/formally justified as it might have been.
But I can't stand these clown-@$$ agitators who, in all the years I've been around universities (including the U of Minnesota), couldn't give a sh!t less about the issue and are in the "game" for just that: cause trouble, scream, etc.
It's theater. Plain and simple.
But I sure wish that poor woman was still alive. As far as I can tell, she got sucked into the bs fake-@$$ "radical" [not] "progressive" [not] culture up in MN. Seems like Renee Good just wanted to be "part of the group" and her girlfriend ginned things up enough to get Good killed.
My honest take: Good panicked (while being egged on by her girlfriend), hit the gas, and the officer reacted. Legally but tragically.
When the officers ordered Good out of her car, the wife tried to get back in the car on the passenger side, but the door was locked.
The "Drive, baby, drive" line came right after she tried the door and realized she couldn't get back into the car in time.
I think when you watch the all the videos you can make a strong argument that Good and her wife had both agreed ahead of time if that if officers attempted arrest, they would flee in their car. The behavior of the wife is particularly damning.
Walter makes the argument that with the evidence shown we can't rule out purposeful attempted murder by Good. I think there is also an argument that they both agreed ahead of time that if officers attempted arrest they would fuck shit up before fleeing.
I am going to step in because your comment is over the line. #1 Are you aware that this woman spent the entire day antagonizing these federal agents? #2 She parked the car across the road and sat on her horn for a long time in order to get the attention of stressed-out armed Federal Agents. #3 Congrats - She got their attention, and the officer told her to get OUT OF THE CAR. #4 The woman refused to follow his order. #5 Her wife screamed Drive Baby Drive and she accelerated - the wheels were spinning on the ice - did you see that video?? So here’s the deal - these women were poking this bear all day. Your point of view is a suggestion of intent - Walter’s point of view is a suggestion of intent - neither of you know what her intent was - but Walter clearly said he did not know. Furthermore, Walter never made any definitive claim which shows he is a professional. You on the other hand, make this ridiculous claim that you have super powers and you knew what she was thinking. That disqualifies you…. You may not agree with him- you obviously don’t like what he said - but falsely accusing him of ‘lying’ shows that you do not pay attention or listen well - it was you who got it wrong, and it was you who stepped way over the line!
The shooting occurred at 9:30am. Some “entire day”.
So what's your point? That targeted harassment of a LEO must be at least say 2 hours before they are allowed to be stressed? Your comment is in my opinion either naive or disingenuous.
My point is that everything they are saying is grossly exaggerated in order to cover up their lack of professionalism and vicious behavior. I'm sure the officers felt stressed out and angry for being inconvenienced and disrespected. That's not a valid excuse for murdering an unarmed woman.
That is valid- I should have said the reason they were there was to antagonize, disrupt and obstruct. "You wanna come at us? “You wanna come at us?” Ignoring their orders and “Drive, baby! Drive! Drive!”.
You expressed much better what I was struggling to put into words.
The woman was totally in the wrong the entire day. However, that is not germane to whether or not deadly force was called for in that moment. It's a pretty shaky claim that the woman was trying to run the guy down. Matt is right, IMO, when he says it is a privileged Karen and an overheated cop.
Walt sounds like a defense attorney for the agent. I don't know if he truly feels like he does or if he thinks of himself as being on a political "side."
Here is a question for you- what if that woman had seriously hurt or killed that officer - What would you imagine the response to be? Remorse - sadness or cheering in the streets?
Excellent question but you failed to say to whom? Sadly I suspect the agitators would applaud it; Minnesota politicians would look the other way; and the rest of us sheep would lament the tragedy.
Yeah, that's pretty much how I would have answered, too.
I wonder if jurors have that sort of mindset: "If THEY were in this jury room, THEY'D be dishonest. So I am justified in being dishonest myself!"
Even in the midst of this terrible outcome I choose to look for signs of hope. The larger discussion: what are the implications of saying we believe in the “rule of law…” Who is upholding that principle. Who is ultimately responsible for the state of affairs vis a vis immigration and assimilation; housing and employment.
If those who agree these are collective responsibilities then there is a chance the ones aroused neurotically by conflict will surrender the field to sanity.
For now the exact same images will be seen completely differently by millions of people. That’s just about as tough as trouble as can be I think…
The officer had his gun put away. It was only when she changed direction, accelerated, and drove forward toward him that he took the gun out, and it was only after she hit him with her car that he shot her.
While I agree with your sympathies on this subject I call you on this assertion. This is not something I'm willing to take your word. However, if true which ought to come out of any investigation of whether a good shoot would be strong.
Call me all you want - and don't take my word. My point has been that no one knows what that woman was thinking and the devil is in the details - I do not believe anyone wants innocent civilians shot. So the details matter - a lot.
You have a closed mind. It seems you simply want to plant your spear in the ground. I guess that's ok. It seems to be the attitude of many posting here. I guess in the future rather than try to dialogue I'll simply say either I agree, disagree or strongly disagree.
LOL- Is your comment attempting to have a dialogue? "I call you on this assertion. This is not something I'm willing to take your word." Or are you planting your spear?
Dialogue? Not any more. If planting my spear means I want evidence, yeah. But not with you.
Some actual reporting from the Minneapolis Star newspaper. Archived.
https://archive.md/bmfRE#selection-165.0-172.0
@16:30m Glad your guest corrected to say "members of" the community, because the people he is seeing do not represent those of us who do not believe agitation is the answer to anything. Also just before that, he mentioned rioters communicating via Signal - local agitators also communicate openly on Facebook groups for local neighborhoods. When other residents raise concerns, the vitriol is so vicious that most give up on discussion.
I was just about to add something similar to your comment.
I lived in Minnesota for a number of years, returning to Chicago about twenty years ago.
I still have plenty of friends up there -- both in the cities and out in the suburbs.
Almost all (both black and white) are tired of the incessant protests.
Also, I too noticed Ford Fischer's apparent bias in the matter. I appreciate his work but the line about "the community coming together" is pure bs.
"Liberal" Minnesotans live to protest. There's no "community", it's a cottage industry.
To boot, as they correctly noted, the ICE actions are in an area close to the idiotically-named "George Floyd Square" (I mean, really, how weak-minded do you have to be to honor a career criminal and drug abuser whose own actions largely contributed to his demise).
In particular, it's one of the more economically depressed areas in Minneapolis. From what my friends tell me, it's pretty much the same as it was when I lived up there: lots of drug use and related activities...and it's probably a perfect place for illegal immigrants to find a place.
So those people who are coming out of their house (i.e., almost certainly rented) and "throwing things" may well be part of the problem!
I have to say I was taken aback a bit by Fischer's ostensible sympathy with the agitators and fake-@$$ protesters.
It's theater. Minnesota liberals live for this sort of nonsense. It's as real and as genuine as the most fake thing you can think of.
This is not a ding at Ford. He's good at what he does, as far as that goes. But I can't watch his videos. It's people screaming for the sake of screaming. I have no use for it whatsoever. They should sit down and write a 500-page piece expressing their grievance. They might convince me. Screaming and banging drums and acting "rebellious" will never do it. As you said, fake, fake, fake. ("This faux protest paid for by...")
Having been a US Marine that went through riot training back in the early 70s. I can remember how nasty that was. Having fellow Marines from another company I knew were not a real threat, but, screaming and yelling at you as you hold formation.. getting right in your face, taunting you with cuss words and really trying to get you break ranks and use that rifle butt.. it only went on for a few hours, but I could barely keep it together there.. so hats off to ICE.. Those guys are doing one hell of a difficult job that's gotta get done..
Minneapolis? like Walter says, I remember when that place was the American dream.. clean, prosperous, and vibrant.. The state of Minnesota was the idyllic.. it had a host of the top corporations in the country.. Now you've got immigrant gangs/ Billions in fraud, in large part by Somali immigrant criminals.. time to clean house.. the decent legal immigrants who worked for years assimilating. Hate to see this just as much as any citizen of this nation that believes in this democratic Constitutional Republic.
Minnesota's pathetic group of political leaders who you know understood at the very least what was going on.. how low can they go ??? I mean ruthlessly exploiting the useful idiots and well as the professional agent provocateurs to dangerously interfere with ICE?? Whatever it takes to buy them a few extra weeks of freedom... Tampon Tim and Illegal Omar the COMMIE.. deserve what's ahead..
The DOJ in the not to distant future is going to ruin what's left of their absolutely Rotten Political careers..
“Those guys are doing one hell of a difficult job that’s gotta get done.” You know, you’ve done it. Thank you. I would lose my mind from all that noise, day and night.
Downtown Minneapolis used to be safe at night. I wouldn’t venture there alone in the daytime anymore.
I hope you are right and that the fraud investigations continue.
Did it strike anyone as the very blackest of comedy, in a way, for the Mayor to immediately denounce the event as murder, then condemn those who took the polar opposite point for rushing to judgment?
C'mon! You're being rational! Not allowed! :-)
I know, this is the way to get vilified by both sides, but I just can't help it.
Protests: I am old enough to remember Martin Luther King and all the people associated with that movement break down the old Jim Crow system. Part of it was done with boycotts. A wonderful thing!
Then we had the likes of Jesse Jackson, who raised the art of protest to extortion. Things have gone downhill ever since, but mostly within the limits of the First Amendment.
It’s no secret the Woke-Progressives want to dismantle the constitutional republic we currently have. The idea of sanctuary city is the first step in this direction, because it is basically a nullification of particular federal laws. They’d like to nullify the whole federal system in its current form, eventually.
That’s the big trick here. The motives changed with the language. Protests these days are strictly about violence and rhetoric rather than actual change. The main goal is to provoke a response from law enforcement that can be spun in the movement’s favor. It isn’t about actually raising awareness to implement support for a change in legislation.
But Americans aren’t aware of this subtle change in the character and nature of this change that has occurred, under the skin of activism over the last 30 years. Most Americans still hold the connotation that protesting is engaged in by activists in good faith to correct a moral wrong. That, unfortunately, is no longer true. It is an organized and funded political campaign that borrows from guerrilla warfare in order to accomplish a tactical victory for whomever is organizing and financing. As such, these “activists”are more like paid agitators and light soldiers than activists. There is nothing grass roots or organic about what is going on here. Proof?
How do THIS MANY PEOPLE in the MIDDLE OF WINTER IN MINNESOTA in a labor market that has severe shortages afford to be out protesting in the middle of the day? Somewhere along the line we stopped asking simple common sense questions like these and just started accepting bullshit. It’s time for that to stop.
It would be nice to unequivocally identify who is orchestrating this.
What in the world are you guys going to talk about? Nothing really weird happened during the weekend.
I imagine this will largely be a joint effort with Activism Uncensored.
To that end, I'd like to see interviews with the "protesters" [sic: vandals + revelers] to find out just how much...they don't know!
The ongoing dynamic -- "No Kings" (Kings? What kings? You mean like forced vaccination kings?), Anti-ICE demonstrations (where were they during the Bush and Obama years?), Anti-Tesla demonstrations ("Oh, Elon's not working with Trump now? Never mind!) -- deserves continued analysis.
What do these' "protesters" [again, "sic"] want? What is their objective? What exactly are they protesting?
I don't know about the protesters, but the organizers and funders want chaos.
What they really want is to kill off the center and center-right, finally and forever. They see the invisible disintegration of education and the visible chaos on the street as the quickest route to permanent victory at the polls.
Oh, dear Heaven. I pray you're wrong, but you're almost certainly right. God deliver us!
If you want G-d to deliver us do you pray to him daily for our salvation? And I say this with all seriousness, and not as a punch line. Respectfully
I pray daily, yes. Not always for everything I should, I acknowledge.
And.... the Dems want to:
Win the midterms
Get lots of news coverage that enrage their base which will motivate them to make donations to their campaign coffers
To keep the illegal immigrants here so they can use them as a guaranteed voting block
Win the WH in 2028
They are protesting the removal of heinous criminals. “ICE released a list this week detailing some of the most dangerous non-citizen criminals arrested during a major enforcement surge in Minnesota. The list includes individuals convicted of child rape, sexual assault of minors, sodomy, and multiple homicides, many of whom had final deportation orders dating back decades.”
https://open.substack.com/pub/thejefferymead/p/morning-briefing-sunday-january-11?r=1o2l6&utm_medium=ios&shareImageVariant=overlay
https://x.com/BillMelugin_/status/2010101496034074739
Well, yes, assuming they're bothering to follow up and read.
Which is a big "if" with these people!
I don't think there's any "if" at all they won't. If they even _can_ read. "We don't need no stinking facts!"
Great point - but can those facts, which are clear improvements to safety that the majority of American citizens want, compete at all with the sense of euphoria and the virtue high to be gotten by getting out there and screaming and yelling with an angry mob? An opportunity to get great photos of yourself standing up to the ICE "Thugs" that you can rush home with and virtue signal to the world what a good person you are?
The latest unhinged Kirn speculation re premeditated murder conspiracy perpetuated by an un armed women who was driving her Honda pilot after she had taken her daughter to school is one of his best movie pitches lately.
Of course you're right! Since they were first seen over a century ago, no automotive vehicle has ever been involved in a deliberate homicide! Nor does ice on roads cause any diminution of tires' traction.
It is entirely safe to accelerate on ice while a person is directly in front of your vehicle - magical elves will waft him or her away to safety in the twinkling!
/sarc
Walter is saying that all potentialities of the situation should be considered. That in fact is a possibility, though I would think a remote one.
The taunting wife cried, "why did you use real bullets?" Well, why did she encourage her beloved to hit a real gas pedal with a real live person, armed with a real gun, standing on the real ice in front of their real vehicle?
She was armed with a vehicle, knucklehead. https://youtu.be/iwGXHvWcLs4?si=mvFguS4-Ibl1sdNf
Why is it not feasible? In my opinion he only raised it as another alternative for what occurred.
The scene at the hotel lobby with protestors reminds me of the Underpants Gnomes.
1. Take over hotel lobby.
2.
3. Take over the world and ICE withdraws.
Yes!!!
It is remarkable...and maybe even a little disappointing...how applicable the Underpants Gnomes (UG) are as a template or blueprint! For pretty much everything!
In particular, the UG are the prototype for much, possibly most, "protests".
1.) Throw soup on paintings and superglue one's hands to the wall.
2.) ?
3.) End fossil fuel extraction and usage.
I am trying to remain distant on this issue, but I am in Minnesota in a college town and these are hotbeds for protests.
To me, they seem almost schizophrenic. NO KINGS, CLIMATE CHANGE IS REAL, go away racists, the Palestinian and rainbow+ flags everywhere, MELT ICE and chants as annoying as incongruent as Dubtep.
One person just sat on a corner in a lawn chair with their "Resist" sign. I was like resist what? The wind?
Just a big stupid temper tantrum.
I went to grad school at the UMN and lived up there for a few years.
Protesting is a cottage industry in Minnesota.
The "issue" is but a means to an end: the goal is have a protest and the "issue" provides convenient cover.
I came to dislike that mindset. I'm not big on "new slang" but when I heard the term "virtue signaling", I immediately thought "Minnesota".
What is possibly the most annoying aspect of the "protest culture" is the putative lack of concern about the original issue. If one genuinely cared about a matter, one would work to promote that matter and not associate it with vandalism, rioting and all the other "riot artifacts" that seem to be celebrated by the armchair revolutionary class,
I went to grad school at UW-Lax. Same thing in the Wisconsin system.
Yes, the placards are very schizophrenic, especially as you leave the Twin Cities area. Take a drive down hwy 61. Redwing and Winona placards have zero cohesion. It's like they take their team jersey out, and just yell for their pet peeve. Talk about the Tower of Babel.
I went to college and still live in MN, so this is unsurprising. I wonder how much protesting has taken the place of partying as a vent for youthful energy?
Good point! I want to see the tox report of anyone injured, taken into custody or unfortunately "un-alived". As an aggregate. Names do not have to be disclosed. However, a tox report on the deceased will likely be presented as evidence either for or against anyone in this case.
Have you researched the activities of Good prior to the fatal incident? She was an ant ICE activist trained in obstructing ICE agents and her young daughter also receives this training in her school. Good’s wife got her involved with this school.
Could be, but all that's relevant is what the ICE agents knew at the time. Unless you're implying these extra facts could have been grounds for killing her.
Of course not. I want the investigation to decide the facts. Noem says ICE has released its video and it shows she is at fault. The only justification for shooting her is he felt she was going to hit him or could have hit him with her truck. My reason for bringing up her training in obstructing ICE will most likely be relevant in the case. That would show she was not an innocent bystander but was intentional and was participating in obstruction. We will see if that is the case. I’m with Walter. Let’s not go tribal but wait and see what is decided by the evidence.
What does the IDF have with this protest? Sincere question.
It’s a way they can easily transition all the pro-Hamas protesters to the latest thing—stopping ICE— not that that would be a challenge. Both movements want the destruction of the West. Who on the Left (and the Woke Right like Tucker) doesn’t hate Israel/Jews/IDF and blame them for every problem on the planet?
https://www.ice.gov/field-office/tel-aviv
Just look at the list of foreign ICE offices. Amman, Jordan, Turkey. The list goes on and on. https://www.ice.gov/contact/international-offices
That’s the address for the U.S. Consulate in Tel Aviv. Same building. If you don’t think there is a reason to have an office in Israel, given the number of U.S. dual citizens immigrating, and the number of Israelis requesting visas, then go figure.
Intersectionality, baby. Everything they oppose is everything they oppose.
These people don't do anything resembling genuine thought.
Guys I am in luck! In my book collection is A Scanner Darkly!
I was hoping for VALIS also by PKD, but still, pleasesd.
You’re lucky!
I had to order a copy from Amazon, and it just got here Sunday. Then, on Monday, Matt announces that he is 2/3 of the way through it.
Ack!
Remember the ATW episodes when they talk about their favorite books and authors? From time to time I make lists and buy them.
Walter is saying she "centered" the wheels, but it's been observed that the front wheels were turned to the right. She was not intentionally aiming the car at the man.
The road was icy. Reckless disregard of human life, occupants of the vehicle included, to accelerate the way she did, even without a human being in her drive line.
Have you driven on icy roads or have you heard of hydroplaning in rain?
If the road was icy, which it appeared to be, wheel direction simply does not matter. Your car will go in any direction. Often the opposite. This was demonstrated in the Cars kids movie or better known as Tokyo Drift.
The best decision is not to cosplay The Dukes of Hazzard and YEE-HAW your way out of a deadly situation, but take your hands off the wheel, put your hands up, and get our of your car.
Now, I am not sure if she was told to do that? If not, then there is a case.
I heard Walter talk about My Lai massacre and how it could happen. It made me think back to something I wrote about my experience in Iraq as a Department of State 'Governance Advisor' In Kirkuk with a Provincial Reconstruction Team (PRT). We spent a lot of time riding around town in MRAPs (Mine-Resistant Ambush Protected Vehicles) The poor soul lost in the attack was SSG Johnny Roosevelt Polk of the 1st CAV.
We were out in town, I don’t remember exactly where they were taking me- most likely the Kirkuk city hall. We got word over the radio net that another MRAP had hit by an RKG-3. The unit was ordered to set-up a cordon and search to try to catch the grenade-thrower. A discussion took place in my MRAP among the crew. The desperately wanted to get in the fight, but they had standing orders that when transporting DoS personnel they were to avoid contact. Their primary mission was my safety. I countermanded that standing order and told them to deploy in the cordon-and-search with the rest of the MRAPs. As I was a DoS civilian, they were satisfied that I had the authority to give such an order. As we patrolled the streets, the chatter among the MRAP crew was all seething rage and a franticness for revenge. I understood that day how a massacre like My Lai could happen. After several fruitless hours of searching, we gave-up and accepted that the perpetrator had escaped.
When I got back to FOB Warrior I was exhausted. I went to the DFAC. The DFAC at FOB Warrior was a vast, massive building that could serve thousands of people at one time. But it was a strangely tribal place. Each group sticking mostly with their own kind. There were about 60+ people assigned to the PRT in Kirkuk (a very different experience than when I was down in Hawija, where I was the sole PRT rep.) Our closest tribal neighbor that we socialized with was USACE. There was a female USACE officer who was visiting Kirkuk for a few days to inspect some project or monitor some contract. I had spoken with her the day before. When I got to the DFAC, she saw me and beckoned me to sit with her. She was bubbling with excitement. She had also been out in Kirkuk when the attack happened. As an officer, she had been directed to take command of some small part of the “cordon and search”. She described the action (although there was not really any action) in detail. Her narrative made it easy to picture her with just her Beretta leading troops dramatically, through the streets of Kirkuk. “I got a combat patch!” she said, looking at the new CAV patch on her right shoulder with pride. It was the fulfillment of the ultimate fantasy of a desk bound contracting officer. – I felt terrible, I knew that no one at 3/82 was feeling that high and giddy about what had happened.
It is difficult to describe my feelings at that moment. The feelings are still vivid, even after all of these years. You might think reading this that I was disgusted and contemptuous of how thrilled she was at the day’s events, which was really only just one American KIA-someone we knew…and she didn’t.
But that is not how I felt at all, my feelings are much more complex than that. I didn’t resent her glee at the adventure that she had. She had gotten a whiff of the excitement of war. I know this intoxicating beverage only too well. There was a time back in the 1990s in Croatia and Bosnia that I totally drowned myself in the stuff. The most dramatic moment of my life was racing through the streets of Osijek at 90mph in Dimity’s Green Lada, with David Bowie’s “Changes” at full blast on the stereo- seeing shells and rockets hitting buildings on both sides of the street as we swerved to avoid debris and fresh shell craters in the road. The music was so loud and the adrenaline so intense, we didn’t realize that the car had been hit my shrapnel until we stopped.
No, I didn’t feel awful because of the excitement that she felt. I felt awful because I understood it completely and it was so familiar to me.
In my humble non-professional-or-trained-writer opinion, that was very well done.
Not only did your narrative compellingly convey the amazing flow of emotions but also put those emotions into a larger context.
I am not a veteran nor a former government employee. I have known loads of veterans. Your description jibes with everything I've heard.
The extreme non-simplicity of summarizing all the possible -- and valid -- emotions is lost all too often.
I find myself extremely jaded and unsympathetic to most "protests" because of what I've seen over the years: that the "protest" is the goal and the "issue" is merely the excuse for having the protest.
In particular, most "protesters" don't seem to have any appreciation or perspective as to the various "sides" in a story.
Thank you for your essay. Again, I found it very compelling and well-written.
The people making noise at hotel are foolish idiots. LEO's have ear/hearing protection(foam earplugs) and probably sleep well, after laughing ARSS off