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Notes -
https://www.newsweek.com/video-appears-to-show-new-ice-shooting-in-minneapolis-11411971
Ice shooting round 2 has kicked off. Numerous rumors already flying around but will be a bit before we have facts I imagine.
EDIT: I've been asked to add some relevant points, I'll say: this comment has links to various angles: https://www.themotte.org/post/3493/culture-war-roundup-for-the-week/405295?context=8#context This comment mentions the "Sig misfire" angle that I've seen a bit: https://www.themotte.org/post/3493/culture-war-roundup-for-the-week/405451?context=8#context
Walz has activatedthe national guard: https://x.com/MnDPS_DPS/status/2012614253090619619 The NBA postponed the Minnesota/Golden State game tonight.
This is all coming down to a simple question: does the state have a legitimate right to a monopoly on violence?
It seems as though a very small contingent of revolutionary communists believe that the answer to this question is no. This is where the idea of disrupting police, "de arresting" people, rioting, etc. comes from. They don't agree that the state should have the ultimate power to enforce laws that they don't agree with. In this case they seem to disagree with immigration laws, and because of this disagreement they don't believe that ICE/DHS has a right to enforce these laws.
This is a big problem. An actual threat to democracy. Half the country voted in an almost single issue fashion to have our immigration laws enforced. A small (but growing) contingent of the left does not believe that that is legitimate, and therefore believe that they have the right to use force to oppose this.
The real question is: how do you de-escalate from here? These people (some of them) have convinced themselves that they are living through the rise of an authoritarian/fascist dictatorship and have precipitated some things that do pattern match to that. Aside from some sort of science fiction style deprogramming effort: how do you bring them back to reality?
This is a question that genuinely troubles me.
No, that's only half the question. The full form of the question is "does the state have a legitimate right to a monopoly on violence when the wrong side wins the election?" And considering most of human history revolves around this question, I don't think it's particularly simple.
The US is special because its supreme law is very explicit that the State does not have a legitimate right to a monopoly on violence. It makes this clear in the original document, not just the second amendment to them. But those statements are insidious, because they also imply that you're going to have to be strong enough to assert your own monopoly (re: Shay's Rebellion) for that to be of any use to you- and so in practice, the monopoly on violence belonging to the citizenry legitimizes the State's -> People's institutions. (And can also get them to back down when they're doing something sufficiently stupid re: Battle of Athens.)
In this case, Minnesota, and its citizens, are very well aware that Taking The Sign Down and starting (or gearing up for) a shooting war over this would end very badly for them. 5 years ago, it would have been their opponents that would have been on the losing end if they started killing rioters- and this was the case right up until that FONOP incident in Wisconsin where 3 of BLM's enforcers were gunned down (and BLM reacted badly to this).
I am in complete agreement that they're trying to bring rise to their own authoritarian dictatorship. BLM = brownshirts, plain and simple.
I don't think de-escalation is the right call for either side right now- it's not what the people want, and it's not healthy for the system to tolerate aggressors in this way.
I think that reminding the aggressors that they should have hammered out an agreement back when they had the ability to do that (and not the 2024 "changes nothing" agreement, I'm talking about what's currently the status quo in 2026 where some big businesses are allowed to keep slaves, criminal slaves are deported right after being granted bail, Southern states are allowed to enforce border law again, and the other slaves are paid a small sum to hop a plane and get out... [in exchange for the anchor babies being allowed to sponsor their folks for citizenship, and provisions in law allowing for this] would have solved a lot of the current problem; and the fact that they listened to the destabilizing element and failed to do this means they're at fault. Everyone walks away grumbling but the problem is mostly solved.
This is the flip side of the "cuckservative": now it's the Progressives that are unambiguously in opposition to the law (and their arguments that in fact, they are following the law are Sovereign Citizen-tier... because that's exactly what they're doing), and those who would normally vote Blue for law and order must now vote Red. Because Blues are the Establishment (which is not the same as the legislature or the executive) this will hurt them more than Red (which is also why all other non-US Western countries have shifted Blue).
If the system is truly broken, then this won't work, and the people should be making war on the rebels now while they still have a chance. If I were the People, I'd want a few battalions stationed there- maybe that's enough?
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