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PaperclipPerfector  1mo ago (text post)   31669 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of January 26, 2026

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This forum basically presents the cause of protests in Minneapolis as "blue tribe doesn't want immigration policy enforced". If this claim is controversial, I can back it up by linking several comments from last week saying as such, so I hope you don't feel strawmanned if you're broadly anti-protestor.

I want to present the claim that what ICE is doing in Minneapolis is inefficient at its stated goals, broadly unlawful/lawless, and disproportionate. I'm going to steelman the cause of the protestors - why it's good to go around notifying others of ICE's presence, making noise, and generally annoying them. I'm not going to support any form of unlawful action with this post, as I think it's wrong and unwise for one's personal safety to get into fights with law enforcement - but I'm going to explain why 10,000 people took to the streets in Minneapolis on Friday.

I'm using Gemini to get stats for this post, but all of the writing is entirely my own. Many of the examples I take are drawn from a recent twitter thread

In 2025, there were roughly 15,000 violent crimes in the entire state of Minnesota. Let us assume all of them occurred in Minneapolis, all of them were committed by a different illegal immigrant who was immediately released on bail or sentenced to ten minutes by liberal activist judges and then released, and all of those illegals reside in Minneapolis today. 170 murderers, 2159 rapes, 2836 robberies, 9826 aggravated assaults, all of them committed by a different illegal immigrant who is now at large in Minneapolis.

ICE has deployed approximately 3000 federal agents to Minneapolis. Supposing ICE is in fact, after the bad guys, they should probably be done by now, because they only had to arrest five people each in order to get all of the highly criminal illegals out.

The problem is, they keep wasting their time by engaging in completely lawless and unbelievable actions. These have a few flavours:

a) Firstly, as shown in many videos, ICE takes time out of their day to stop and question, photograph, detain, and arrest people for blowing whistles near them, yelling at them, and generally being annoying. I sympathize that these agents have some legitimate fears of the public, there are bad dudes who want to hurt cops. But it seems uncertain that any of these actions are actually intended to promote their safety, rather than intimidate protestors. Take a look at what started the entire Alex Pretti confrontation - they pepper sprayed a woman for what purpose, with what justification?

b) Secondly, the current immigration enforcement protocol seems to act on people who prosecutorial discretion should be utilized for, and has very consistently in the past, and then the government doesn't even bother to defend its acts to judges. Take this case, wherein we have a highly sympathetic detainee - but someone who nonetheless, I acknowledge, ordered removed many years ago, but not yet removed. That said, the government's position to the judge isn't even that they should do this, are allowed to do this, or want to do this - they literally offered no argument as to why she shouldn't be released. No, seriously, they submitted a three sentence response that said "we have no argument to present" - and then didn't just release the person themselves, without being ordered to? Why not? For what purpose does the government take actions that it does not represent to a court that it agrees with? For what purpose does the government require judges and court costs to issue orders to make them take actions that they have no argument to oppose?

Thus, it appears that Respondents arrested a chronically ill, 70-year-old woman, who came to this country to avoid religious persecution and applied for asylum, who has lived here peacefully for 26 years and complied with all check-in requirements and other conditions of release, who has no known criminal record and poses no threat to anyone, without notice or the process required by their own regulations and without any plan for removing her from this country, then kept her in detention for months without sufficient medical care—and they do not have any argument to offer to even try to justify these actions. Further, having acknowledged that they have no opposition to present to Petitioner’s habeas petition, have they voluntarily released her? No. Thus, Petitioner remains in custody, and her counsel, and the Court, are required to expend resources and effort to address a matter that Respondents either cannot be bothered to defend or realize is indefensible.

Here's another case, this one directly out of Minnesota. Again, ICE should have plenty of evil criminals and pedophiles and whatnot to chase down - how and why do they have the time to go get this guy who appears to be causing no issues, other than being illegal? I understand that in the minds of many, that is sufficient, and that anyone who's illegal should be deported - ok, but what is pursuing that goal worth? Is it worth sending agents of the state to chase people down? The optimal level of any crime isn't zero, there are costs in lives, time, and tax dollars to enforce any law, and sending the government door to door for this guy is an insane waste of resources.

c) Thirdly, many of ICE's immigration enforcement actions are beyond "prosecutorial discretion should be used" - and thus, making the case for protest more important - they are actually lawless and illegal themselves. Take this case out of Minnesota. Let's assume that whatever this minor criminal history described is, it's highly objectionable, and this guy should be deported. You cannot just detain and deport someone with a pending application for lawful permanent residency, who is otherwise following the rules. If you want to deport him, you should file the paperwork to adjust his status, and give him a chance to contest it. This one is even more egregious - forget the tearjerking identity of the person arrested, just focus on the facts. This person applied for refugee status on entry, was vetted, and granted refugee status. The position of the administration, contrary to the law, appears to be that they can just arrest and detain anyone foreign present in the United States, even if they followed the rules. This is utterly lawless. Suppose that the Biden administration made a terrible mistake, and this woman is in fact a Burmese spy or a fugitive war criminal - how likely is it that figuring that out requires physical detention without warning? Has DHS actually raised a national security concern here? No - they're simply sweeping up whomever they can find, arresting people with valid paperwork, who entered lawfully, on the basis that the government has decided it wants to re-think prior decisions. This policy is illegal, cruel, arbitrary, and capricious. This is what ICE is doing in Minnesota - illegally kidnapping lawful migrants. If this alone is not worth taking to the streets to protest, what is?

d) Fourthly, and most importantly IMO, there are much better mechanisms to get to where ICE wants to go. We already have a surveillance state for the IRS that involves essentially all banking institutions and Paypal. Why won't Congress pass any number of measures that would criminalize, fine, and prevent employers from hiring illegal immigrants? If the economic opportunity were much more limited, nobody would jump the border if they couldn't feed themselves after! This would have immediate negative consequences for mostly red states, however, it would likely gut their economies in short order.

The whole reason ICE is in Minneapolis has nothing to do with criminal illegal immigrants. The federal government has decided that it wants to send poorly trained, armed, and disguised agents to a city, to intimidate and cause chaos. Those who condemn the protests miss the point - the point is to show that they're not intimidated! And this is why various administration figures spend their time slandering protestors, because the goal isn't to arrest (Criminal/Illegal/Previously Prosecutorially Discretion Tolerated, pick a combo) people, or even to reduce the number of illegal immigrants living in the USA. If that were the goal, there are cheaper, faster, easier methods that don't risk the life of any agents, unless you think Tyson Foods executives are going to shoot at federal agents if their HQ gets raided. The entire operation is political theater, not a sincere attempt at policy enforcement, and utterly illegitimate from conception.

Two other arguments that I see made frequently here are:

a) All of this is necessary because of Sanctuary Policies that the Police Don't Co-Operate with DHS, so ICE Must Go Looking For The Criminals. Why don't they hang out outside the county jail and question people on their immigration status there on their release? Why don't they hang out at the courthouse - recall, a judge was just convicted of obstruction for preventing ICE from arresting someone at a hearing, they can sit in the gallery and question everyone's immigration status at the end of every hearing! You would be much more likely to arrest people guilty of criminal acts if you did this, than going door to door and getting into fights with protestors.

b) If nobody protested or interfered, then there would be much less chaos - aren't you giving Trump what he wants? Largely, no - Trump recognized pretty quickly once he watched the Renee Good video that it was regrettable and would hurt his poll numbers and his statements reflect that. Furthermore, no, I think it's good and justifiable that people protest when the state decides to waste tax dollars and commit illegal acts while acting like an occupying force rather than servants of the public! My least favourite (former) congressional representative makes the point rather well here. The behaviour of the feds, to inefficiently pursue questionable goals of questionable legality with strongarm tactics is to blame. It is the sign of a healthy, engaged citizenry that ten thousand people decided to go out in extremely cold temperatures and make their voices heard, peacefully.

In the ACX Mark Russel posted this comment:

https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/open-thread-418/comment/205404360

A letter from Minneapolis

I have a weird job so I pretty much get winters off. Jill and I could go somewhere warm but lately we have been going to visit our friends in Minneapolis, where she lived before we married. we stay 4-8 weeks, depending, in the dead of winter because we love our friends here and we love this city.

ICE showed up to start their "Metro Surge" before I got here, and immediately started making like difficult wherever they went. They were atrociously rude drivers. They made belligerent sidewalk scenes during apprehensions. The active folks started following them around, using Signal chats and group texts, blowing whistles to gather crowds. But you could go about your business, which we did. Records stores, restaurants, the worlds largest cross-country ski snow-making operation!

And museums, lots of great museums. We were at the Minneapolis Institute of Art's (the 'Tute, colloquially) amazing Cambodian bronze exhibit, admiring casts of metal alloys from as much as 3000 years ago when my friends phone started blowing up. "Jesus fucking christ ICE just killed a woman."

Renee Good was shot 14 blocks from our house, on W33rd, due East, on Chicago between 33rd and 34th. Minneapolis is mostly a grid, with long blocks and short blocks; these were the long blocks. That evening we walked our way there to join the crowded impromptu memorial/demonstration. The public had blocked off some streets to car traffic, with an ad-hoc combination of civil volunteers in reflective vests and some leery MPD. The level of organization of the volunteers was remarkable. There were megaphones and speechifying, angry and concerned strangers getting comfort in the crowd, and lots and lots of swearing. ("Minnesota nice and fuck you ICE is pretty much how it goes now). A Xeroxed photo of Renee was taped to a lamp post.

I was on super high alert bc I can imagine and am a firm believer in edge cases, but there were no confrontations. I am not as brave as my wife, who acts from a strain of moral clarity that can sometimes be daunting.

Now our days were about protesting. It was like a part-time job, and we made sure to put in our time nearly every day at the Whipple, a Federal building where ICE and CPB were headquartered. The feds had hastily erected a perimeter fence of jersey barriers with posts and chain-link to secure the boundary. At the 4-way-stop intersection where the entrance was, the fence had wrapped around 2 of the stop signs, rendering them more or less invisible. There were dozens there the first day, swearing at ICE, holding signs, handing out hand-warmers. Press from all over were visible (it helps to wear PRESS on your front and back, for safety). Jill would yell "shame," and this has caught on enough that it could be audible on some news reports. Every time we went, the barriers were beefed up a little more. It started as an open sidewalk across from the entrance, at the 4-way, on both sides of the road leading to the indoor tennis club. Cars with tinted windows and/or masked men were to be yelled at and rudely gestured to. Regular folks got waves, but also some collateral damage of yelling. God help you if you were a normal guy in a pick-up truck. Tennis players would sheepishly wait for the crowd to clear so they could drive in and park. My sympathies were with them, these were their lives and happiness, after all. Other opinions were less generous. The Sheriffs were in charge of keeping the intersection clear, a thankless task. I thanked them anyway, when I could, and always waved and smiled. I was an outlier, as the protest set had learned habits and retained grievances from the time of George Floyd. To me the yelling and taunting at police was misplaced aggression, and counter productive but it was their town, not mine. By now there were 2800 ICE and CPB in the twin cities, while all the local police departments totaled 2400 personnel.

Still, we got up in the morning, put on our long underwear and gloves, yelled at the interlopers until we were cold/had to pee, then went out to lunch. I have done some great cc skiing, and he really begun to improve my form in the 'skate' technique. We went bowling. I walked to one of my favorite record stores in the world, Cheapos, and went through the stacks, adding Thin Lizzzy's "Vagabonds of the Western World" to my collection. We met people out for dinner at various restaurants, sometimes on the "eat street" row of Nicollette. A child of one couple at dinner--college friends of Jill--was reported to be doing IT work of a sort for Aerolamp, I think. Small world!

Alex Pretti was killed just south of Cheapos. The Meet-up Noodle, where we held a table for 8 just two nights earlier, is kitty-corner. Not to make it all about me, but that is a 15 minute walk of 7 short blocks from our hosts' home. I won't talk about his death because you know as much as I do.

Immediately after Jill and her friend went to the scene, and were soon commandeered into helping a first-aid site for tear-gas etc in a Middle Eastern restaurant two blocks south, that the MPD had cordoned off . There were few customers. When Jill was ready to leave I reminded her that it was way past lunch and we should eat before she crashed. I could see an active buffet in the Middle Eastern, and we grabbed some plates and had a great meal. The host brought us tea.

This is how it is done here, restaurants and other merchants immediately get in on the helping action. A sex shop in Lyn-Lake was coordinating a meal delivery service for those afraid to leave home. People walk around with cases of water and hand-warmers. School parents coordinate school bus and child drop-off's to protect kids from getting snatched. Yup, that is what citizens are organizing to prevent. And while the department of homeland security assures us that they are only arresting the worst of the worst 5-year-olds, I have my suspicions that that might not be the case.

Businesses are taking a noticeable beating in the cities. Restaurants are low-hanging fruit for agents with orders to ethnically profile anyone looking foreign. There are reports of agents lunching in restaurants, then returning later to round folks up, but of course I cannot verify it. Old protest grievances keep creeping into the discussion, with a large protest downtown (It was awesome to be with so many people braving the cold) being co-billed as a "general strike." Somehow capitalism and the general economy have been implicated, although I cannot figure how. All the restaurants are losing money. Shops and businesses were expected to close on Friday, a word eagerly spread through all local media. Confusion ensued. A hairdresser friend said his staff wanted the shop to close, but hair appointments being sacrosanct, a compromise was made: staff could donate their pay and the owners would match the donation. The people continue to have spectacular hair, even under the world's best collection of warm fuzzy winter hats. But make no mistake, the economy in this town is bleeding, and that cannot continue for long. Minneapolis is in a slow and fitfull recovery from the time of George Floyd, and the recent killings have sent the community into a backslide.

I thought I could come out here for a month, relax with friends, write some articles for my blog, do some skiing. Nate Silver, ever the pollster, says the country is largely sympathetic to Minneapolans, but says the country at large doesn't feel as though it is living in a time of creeping authoritarianism, and I get that. But out here, living in it, we just wonder "how many more?"

My only reaction to this is a very demonstrative lol, whut.

Is this dude seriously trying to weave together:

  1. Touring Cambodian art exhibits,
  2. Minneapolis Foodie subculture,
  3. "I liked it before it was cool" hipster vinyl collecting.

With:

  1. My wife is the paragon of moral virtue. I get to keep her lunch schedule.
  2. Good and Pretti. Dramatic pause continuing into solemn whisper.... "they died just blocks from my house."
  3. THEY STEALIN THE KIDS!

IFeelLikeI'mTakingCrazyPills.gif

This person isn't a serious person. I don't know if they're a real person. I do know that they don't actually like Cambodian bronze art and Middle Eastern food (if they did, they would've dropped that they knew about the specific time period of the Cambodian art and would've narrowed "Middle Eastern" food down to, you know, an actual country. Maybe he means Somali!)

But he really want you to know he likes these things - and Thin Lizzy - and that he is also so dedicated to the protestors cause but can also, like, you know, take a step back and see the bigger picture.

I don't trust this guy at all. I don't think he'd have anyone's back in a real fight. I feel like if his wife got into it with ICE, he might cause somewhat of a scene but then find some interesting way to get tackled by ICE preventing him, don't you know, from doing the heroic thing he was totally about to do.

Mostly, this is a shake my head moment. Whatever, Bro is the gut reaction.

Were it not for:

God help you if you were a normal guy in a pick-up truck.

Fuck you, dude. (Mods: I am talking to the guy in the quoted article, not any other poster here). I'm a normal (enough) guy in a pick-up. I am driving through Minneapolis because I have to go to work, or get groceries, or pick up my kid. You're literally saying "Ha! Sucks to be you, boy, should've stayed home where you belong, boy, might not make it back if you stay out after dark, boy!"

It feels to me more similar to the alleged sniper safaris in Bosnia (the motivation that is, not the situation)--a well-off tourist wanting in on the "excitement". Not so much demonstrative as treating the situation as a form of personal entertainment.

This is the mindset that I don't understand, but which clearly contributed to Good and Pretti turning up for a disaster.

This is going on about authoritarianism and so forth, but treating the Resistance Protests like, well, a holiday. "Did some light picketing in the morning, went for a pleasant meal and some skating in the afternoon". "Boycotted the Federal building from 9 to 12, then after lunch checked out original vinyl record stores".

God between us and all harm, but if this person gets hurt in any way, they and their spouse will be the first to be all shocked Pikachu face about "they used tear gas? real bullets???" Don't the baddies know they're not supposed to, in fact, do anything because this is our comfortable display of civic virtue and getting shot would really make it tough to grab that Middle Eastern buffet!

But that's exactly what it is.

When I was a teenager, my friends would often catch a train out to the nearest major city to go to protests. What were they protesting against? Fascism!

This is just Antifa doing Antifa things. Antifa isn't an organization? Sure! It's a mind-virus! A ridiculous meme! Made in Germany, please enjoy responsibly.

Teenagers are dumb and take stupid risks. This is normal. This, by the other hand, are grown-ass adults (their college friends are old enough to have an adult daughter).

Is "protest tourism" becoming a thing, like poverty tourism?

Schrodinger’s ICE agents.

ICE is composed of chubby manlet tacticool LARPers when you want to snicker and make fun of them to your team.

ICE is a deathsquad of roided out meatheads shooting to kill on behalf of a racist, fascist torture regime when you want to gas yourself and your team up as Stunning and Brave rebels, or when someone from your team finds out from fucking around.

I am also very confused by this. I don't know how to characterize this mindset without resorting to the word "unserious".

The starting premise for the protestors, as stated, seems to be that a swarm of evil, poorly trained stormtroopers are invading the city and snatching up and killing anyone they please. So why aren't they acting like it? Their behavior doesn't seem to follow from the premise. If they were getting into shootouts with the cops I would not be confused, because it would indicate to me they were taking the premise seriously.

Pretti got into a tangle with federal agents while armed. I don't think I can construct a coherent reason to carry while protesting that takes the premises seriously that doesn't involve an active intent to use it aggressively. Good seemed to be acting out of a misplaced sense of white liberal plot armor which is sort of understandable but still didn't take the "evil stormtroopers killing with impunity" premise seriously. Mark Russell and his wife went on vacation to a city they seem to think is under siege, and then proceed to treat the protest like a social function to kill time until the bowling alley opens.

Do they think this is for real or not? Did the constant crying wolf about Nazis for the last 10 years cause the reference to become so unmoored from the referent that they can't actually bring themselves to really mean it even while they're getting shot?

I don't think I can construct a coherent reason to carry while protesting that takes the premises seriously that doesn't involve an active intent to use it aggressively.

For some definition of "protesting", the Bundy standoffs might qualify as examples here (not endorsing, just observing): as far as I'm aware, the guns were never fired (although perhaps pointed aggressively), and it was quite plausibly IMO part of the fed's decisions to stand down there, rather than repeat Waco or Ruby Ridge.

You're right, of course. I think the difference relevant to this situation is that the Bundys were banking on the feds playing by the rules, but the protestors in MN appear to have it as a starting premise that they aren't.

Just the opposite. "I can carry a gun and get in their way, and they wouldn't dare shoot me!" is banking on ICE playing by rules that they weren't playing by. Debate over whether they "should have been" aside, they demonstrably did not.

In contrast, Bundys brought a lot of men with rifles and willingness to use them. That's what you do when you're serious about enforcing rules that the other side wouldn't ordinarily abide by.

+1, I think your interpretation is a more accurate one in terms of true beliefs. The protestors in MN definitely didn't think that they were going to get shot, but the disconnect between thinking that these are evil nazi thugs killing anyone they want but that they won't shoot you is the confusing thing for me. Saying one thing, acting on another.

It's because "they shouldn't be shooting me, dammit!". They're modeling ICE as if they'll do what they should, then getting angry when they don't. They're trying to use their righteous anger to force ICE to do the right thing, so that they don't have to update their expectations.

If instead they'd update on the fact that ICE isn't gonna do what they think ICE should do, they wouldn't be able to feel outrage anymore, because it'd just be "What do you expect? They're fascists". And then they'd have to sit soberly with the question of whether this is a hill they're willing to die on. And if so, whether they want to die a martyr for their beliefs or try to martyr the fascists for theirs.

Showing up with a holstered pistol and getting in physical confrontations where you don't use it shows that he hadn't thought things through and made a serious decision. It's like coming up to a fork in the road, and unsure whether to drive left or right, splitting the difference and driving straight.

All this effort on behalf of some stranger is something I will never understand.

Neither Renee Good nor Alex Pretti were part of my monkeysphere, so my reaction, had I been in Minneapolis at the time (colored by my utter hatred for the modern left in general) would have been "They should have damned well known better than to mess with law enforcement; they got what they deserved".

Obviously this Russell is a leftist of some stripe or other.

This is such a strange and off-putting read. It's like he's trying to paint a picture of a nation under siege, while constantly undermining his own narrative by sprinkling in bits about ordinary vacation activities. There's a dark authoritarian fog settling in Minneapolis, our country is in deep danger and I'm right in the middle of it...Oh the museums in Minneapolis are fantastic by the way, Jill and I go every time we visit! It's clear he doesn't actually know what's going on and doesn't actually feel any danger, but it feels right to join the protest and yell random slogans. Jill even got the herd to chant SHAME and it got on TV, +1 cool story to share back home! Is this guy just a mop and since his wife feels strongly about it he's obliged to at least pretend it's a big deal to him too? Is it a need to belong to something and an anti government protest in whatever form is good ol' proven reliable option for it?

Sounds like "I'm semi-retired and since we have a lot of spare time, we winter in Minneapolis because we have friends there. Last time we visited, there was protesting going on so we decided to change things up a bit and do some activism alongside our usual vacation routines". It really is treating it like tourism. For some reason this makes me think of Holiday in Cambodia by the Dead Kennedys.

I’m not sure about your response, for a much more extreme example everything I’ve read about how people behave in wartime always surprises me about how people go on about their normal lives even while bombs fall around them. I remember reading some stories during the Syrian civil war which were like, yeah, we had to avoid those blocks because the rebels have control and the government forces are also over here, but we could take X street though and so after school we went to the theater. Or I also remember following the account of a pair of teenagers in Gaza who would make videos where they make talk about memes and jokes and then say by the way guys we arrived safe at the refugee camp and today we’re trying to find a little extra bread for our mother.

This obviously isn’t wartime in the US, just a clash that feels rather authoritarian to many. I’d give the guy his pass to talk about the museums and think the feds are getting a bit authoritarian at the same time, though.

That's people living there and having no option but to cope with what is going on. It's not the same as "so we flew in, stayed with friends on our usual annual visit, then there were these protests so we decided to tag along and do our Resisting Fascism in the morning, while we had the afternoon free for skiing, museum visits, foodie dining, and vinyl shopping".

Him mixing in normal life activities in his narration is not what's making it off putting on it's own, it's the fact that he's trying to present his experience as exactly the examples you just brought up. It's an attempt at the slice of life narration about a person in (what he thinks are) adverse conditions, but in reality he's a middle aged/boomer good boy that is inconvenienced by self involvement into operation of completely lawful agents of the state.

I remember reading some stories during the Syrian civil war which were like, yeah, we had to avoid those blocks because the rebels have control and the government forces are also over here, but we could take X street though and so after school we went to the theater.

This is exactly what he thought this would come off as when he was writing. Except he's not an unlucky Syrian or a Gazan who is thrown in the middle of a war that turns his life (and fate) upside down. Every struggle is entirely self imposed, there's no stray bullets or bombs flying around. He, at any time, can make it all end for himself by walking a block over. I'm not discrediting his opinion (although I'm not entirely sold on if he actually has one, or if he has to consult Jill before he can take a stance) about what's happening as a whole, I'm merely put off by his dramatic narration.

Yeah, the fact that he and Jill can drop the protests by travelling to a different part of the city and doing their 'here's our fun visitor schedule' means that this is not wartime Syria/Gaza/Belfast during the Troubles. That's the tourism part of it: "a few blocks from where we stayed X happened" but then across the city we went to the museum, had our dinner, went shopping, etc. They're not embroiled in anything and are going to where the "creeping authoritarianism" is by choice, and making it sound like "aw shucks, tweren't nothing, we wuz just doing what decent folx do!"

Yeah, he has these melodramatic writing tics that undermine the gravity and solemnity he's trying to project:

Tennis players would sheepishly wait for the crowd to clear so they could drive in and park. My sympathies were with them, these were their lives and happiness, after all.

Like, what? Playing tennis is your "life" and "happiness"? I don't even know what you're trying to convey here.

It’s that NPR/New Yorker slice of life tone. It’s part of the blue tribe sensemaking apparatus. If they were forced to describe things as the red tribe do, all action and import, they feel they’re betraying a vital part of themselves.

Next week, on This American Life, we take a look at the quiet life of Cell Block D in Rikers Island. Enjoy this early preview:

_Tuesday is canteen day. Always a bustle of activity then. My cellie (for the week I am visiting) is named Bullwhip. He's a white supremacist who murdered a latino woman and her child. He's got a rugged complexion and a strong gaze that reminds me of my grandfather. I'd spend summers on grandpa's farm as a child, working on spiceracks in his woodshop that never turned out quite level.

Bullwhip leads me out of our cell with a friendly, "get your shit, faggot" to urge me on to the day. "Lead on", I think. Maybe this will be like one of my childhood summer adventures. When we get in line for canteen, a member of the Piru Crips steps on Bullwhips foot. I can't quite make out if its accidental, intentional as to make a point, or the kind of juvenile horseplay that is common in locker rooms. As I puzzle over this, Bullwhip gouges out the man's eyes. His shrieks of pain bounce of the concrete walls as the Correctional Officers - "screws" my fellow inmates call them - charge the scene. Bullwhip, covered in the other man's blood, keeps shouting "That's what you get, frog! That's what you fucking get!" while I lie prone and try to keep from tearing up due to the pepperspray that's been deployed.

Or ... am I misty eyed because maybe, just maybe, I can hear the bullfrogs from Grandpa's farm once again."_

slow clap

He doesn't talk about the why. Perhaps he truly believes it is self evident. 'I was just on holiday and then the nazis came, so I became the resistance.'

Something that stuck out for me was the 'only arresting the worst of the worst 5-year-olds'. The father abandoned the 5 year old to abscond from ICE. The author pretends that ICE is killing people randomly, arresting the innocent (including children) and otherwise being horrible people.

People really believe this? Its truly 2 movies, 1 screen.

Peace will eventually come. Reality always wins.

Sounds like the pilot episode of Star Trek: Starfleet High (I mean Academy) where Principal Captain Chancellor Girlboss (I mean Nahla Ake) threw a strop and resigned from Starfleet after doing the big, bad thing of separating a lickle boy from his mommykins. (Said lickle boy later turns up as Moody Teen Male Lead at the Academy).

Of course, this was because Mommy was working with a pirate, then grassed on him and thought she had cut a deal with the authorities for a lesser sentence. Oopsie! Turns out that in the commission of their crime, they killed a guy. That makes Mommy an accomplice to murder, which means the deal is out the window and she has to - gasp! the inhumanity! the horror! - serve time in a rehabilitation camp. Lickle kiddo will be taken in as a ward of the Federation.

This is so horrible and traumatising to all involved that Captain Girlboss quits, as I said. Because what were the options, here? Send lickle boy to space Club Fed with Mommy? Yeah, I don't think so. Then Mommy should have been set free because, uh, she has a kid? That seems to be the attitude here.

It is cruel and heartless to separate parent and child, and equally cruel and heartless to send innocent little kiddies to jail, so it's a get-out-of-jail-free card if you commit a crime and have a kid. And that's how it should be. Hence the snideness about arresting five year olds.

ICE (and CBP - Minneapolis is a joint operation) is arresting every illegal immigrant who comes to its attention, including schoolchildren. They have said they are doing this, the media say they are doing this, and supporters of the operation (including on this forum) say they should be doing this.

The argument about whether it is possible to be out of legal immigration status innocently has been done to death, but if you think the answer is "Yes" then ICE are absolutely rounding up innocents, and this is what the core MAGA vote want. The claim that Trump-era immigration enforcement is focussed on "the worst of the worst" is a lie for the benefit of low-information normies. MAGA think ICE are deporting them all and this is good, Minnesota Nice thinks ICE are deporting them all and this is bad. So mocking the "worst of the worst" lie is an entirely normal thing to do.

Think of the five year olds! It is a nice emotional appeal, but what does it actually mean?

My take on children who are not legally present is that they will either have a illegally present parent or their parents are in another country. It is a pretty weird edge case for one to have a legally present parent but somehow be illegally present themselves. If that is the case, then I 100% would prefer they become naturalized themselves over deportation.

If their parents are in another country, they were effectively kidnapped. They should be recovered and sent back to their parents.

If their parents are not legally present and have a final order of removal, then the child should also be deported with their parent. The fate of staying in the US and going into the foster system is not superior to keeping the child with their parents.

If the child was sent to stay with legally present relatives by their parents in another country, I still think it's better to send them back to their parents. How do we know that both parents consented to this? Otherwise we have to investigate a lot of domestic situations in other countries, which each might have their own custody laws, it's simpler and more ethical to send them back to their parents.

Ideally we would have a lot more family detention centers that look more like kindergartens than Alcatraz. We need a place to put kids and their guardians in a monitored and controlled way while we determine if they are even related to the people bringing them over the border. That would be my ideal. But deporting fewer five year olds seems like an odd goal when actually thought through.

Certainly ICE is not rounding up innocents. They've mistakenly detained at least a few innocents who (following the activist playbook) refused to identify themselves, but those innocents were released when identified. The illegal immigrants they've arrested, detained and/or deported may not have committed any crimes, but they were not innocent -- they were unlawfully present in the United States, and had orders of removal against them. Arresting them is ICE's job.

And, quite a few of these detained immigrants are also, in fact, serious criminals.

I thought I could come out here for a month, relax with friends, write some articles for my blog, do some skiing. Nate Silver, ever the pollster, says the country is largely sympathetic to Minneapolans, but says the country at large doesn't feel as though it is living in a time of creeping authoritarianism, and I get that. But out here, living in it, we just wonder "how many more?"

I mean, isn't the answer, eventually, up to the people going out and harassing police? If I, a person with no criminal history, went to the house of a known murderer, and armed myself, and had compatriots in my pro-murder cause, then saw a fellow murderist being arrested and I tried to pull officers off my murderist friend, what would be the result?

We can hope the police are good enough to merely send me to prison for a few years. But, reality is that force in resistance of lawful authority endangers everyone in the vicinity, including officers and yourself. ANd if an officer kills a bystander, I am the one who should be charged with murder.

Revolutions are intoxicating, I can see how you'd be swept up into the love bombing for being on the right side of history. But it seems to me that the blue leaders in Minnesota/Minneapolis are trying to engineer a siege mentality in their base.

black and white thinking, social conformity, and lack of trust, but also a preparedness for the worst and a strong sense of social cohesion.

Some bits that caught my attention

ICE showed up to start their "Metro Surge" before I got here, and immediately started making like difficult wherever they went. They were atrociously rude drivers. They made belligerent sidewalk scenes during apprehensions. The active folks started following them around, using Signal chats and group texts, blowing whistles to gather crowds.

I'm sure in his (Jill's?) version of history the local activists only started impeding ICE activities after being exposed to their rude driving, since as Minnesotans they're just too nice to just let belligerence like that go.

It was awesome to be with so many people braving the cold

You can feel the energy, the belonging, like being bombed with love.

To me the yelling and taunting at police was misplaced aggression, and counter productive but it was their town, not mine.

we got up in the morning, put on our long underwear and gloves, yelled at the interlopers until we were cold/had to pee, then went out to lunch. I have done some great cc skiing, and he really begun to improve my form in the 'skate' technique.

were soon commandeered into helping a first-aid site for tear-gas etc in a Middle Eastern restaurant two blocks south [...] it was way past lunch and we should eat before she crashed. I could see an active buffet in the Middle Eastern, and we grabbed some plates and had a great meal. The host brought us tea.

If you didn't catch the cognitive dissonance in the main text above, no worries, his reply further down (quoted by @phailyoor) should make you do a double take

they are nearly invisible. The closest I have been is watching a Charger with tinted windows out my bedroom window in the morning [...] we were alerted that they were at the elementary school around the block [...] it as all over before she got there. not sure what ever happened. [...] I have occasionally heard the sound of dozens of whistles being blown in the distance, and seen the rising cloud of dispersal smoke

So it sounds like if you're a legal resident not looking for trouble you're perfectly safe?

I have also been present while crowds waited for them to leave apartment buildings. I split those scenes.

Yeah, it might ruin your appetite for the tapas dinner to hang around there.

https://old.reddit.com/r/minnesota/comments/1qn6dfp/ice_agents_and_what_looks_like_police_stand_at/ https://old.reddit.com/r/minnesota/comments/1qn81j3/protestors_have_taken_over_the_hotel_ice_is/

But out here, living in it, we just wonder "how many more?"

Living in what? Some light protesting before the apres-ski? If you truly believe this is authoritarianism, why not beg Jill to lend you your balls back so you can go spit some ICE officers in the face. Make sure to take some weaponry, you're fighting Nazis after all.

“ Revolutions are intoxicating, I can see how you'd be swept up into the love bombing for being on the right side of history.”

Isn’t the central American Revolutionary mythology basically false? No taxation without representation is basically bullshit? Everything I have seen indicates total attempted taxation was like 1-2% of colonial income which to modern me basically feels like zero. My gut says having the British Navy to protect trade lanes was probably worth that contribution. British subjects in Britain were paying something like 20%.

I think that would be something like being a US allied country today and equivalent to the 3% of gdp to the military within NATO.

I guess you can make an argument that it still needed to happen for the country to grow and achieve manifest destiny. I have forgotten a lot of history so perhaps there were pressing concerns but that’s a lot of blood to be spilled to not paying a small tax where you also got some military protection. It doesn’t feel like a war that could have passed any just war theory.

Those import taxes were more like a combination of tariff policy and bailouts, propping up British tea and coffee growers using the American colonies. They were part of a broader pattern of extractive rule. Whether or not it was a good deal, British policy had a way of trampling the colonial ego.

I’m curious about those 1-2% numbers. Are they something like percent of household income? I think the impact was concentrated on shipping interests, which played a much larger part in the pre-industrial economy.

Isn’t the central American Revolutionary mythology basically false? No taxation without representation is basically bullshit? Everything I have seen indicates total attempted taxation was like 1-2% of colonial income which to modern me basically feels like zero.

Maybe, but I think taxes were in general lower back then. Income tax for example didn't exist, and neither did sales tax (some goods were excise taxed), leaving land, poll, and other assorted local taxes. One may grumble at their taxes going to the local corrupt politician, but you can shame them or vote them out.

So I think that it was mostly a matter of principle for them. The Americans didn't view themselves as a British colony/territory, but citizens. When they were scorned by the king they probably saw themselves as fighting for a say in their own future.

Incidentally, if the Puerto Ricans made a similar argument with similar fervor, it might behoove the United States to give them a senator or let them go.

Incidentally, if the Puerto Ricans made a similar argument with similar fervor, it might behoove the United States to give them a senator or let them go.

Puerto Ricans do not have to pay federal income tax. And they consistently vote against independence in referenda (though a fair number of those are tainted in some way). For statehood, it's not only their interests but the interests of the rest of the country which should be considered.

TIL about no federal income tax for Puerto Ricans. Maybe I should move there...

If everyone's happy with the status quo, sounds like a great outcome

PR has a territorial income tax that makes up for it. And the territorial government is corrupt and incompetent so you can be sure very few of your tax dollars go for anything you'd want them to go to.

And in the replies a very telling piece of information by the same poster:

how noticeable is ICE presence to ordinary Minneapolis citizens (who are neither seeking them out or avoiding them)?

Oddly enough, they are nearly invisible. The closest I have been is watching a Charger with tinted windows out my bedroom window in the morning, going a lot faster than prudent around the corner. Soon we were alerted that they were at the elementary school around the block. My host, a retired public teacher, went to respond, but it as all over before she got there. not sure what ever happened. Walking uptown, I have occasionally heard the sound of dozens of whistles being blown in the distance, and seen the rising cloud of dispersal smoke, a blob roughly 100' wide by 100' high, that is their parting shot, as if they were magicians. I have also been present while crowds waited for them to leave apartment buildings. I split those scenes.

There's no invasion. Ice isn't terrorizing the streets. Normal people wouldn't even notice. It's only because of fulltime agitators who have nothing to do but to stalk and harrass agents 24/7 that all of this is happening.

Jill would yell "shame," and this has caught on enough that it could be audible on some news reports.

Are they ringing bells?

This is a very interesting post as an insight into the protest attending mindset. It is very strange to me, he seems continually befuddled by the extremes of hostility ("To me the yelling and taunting at police was misplaced aggression, and counter productive but it was their town, not mine"/"Somehow capitalism and the general economy have been implicated, although I cannot figure how") but nonetheless attends the protests regardless despite it being not his town. He seems to regard the protesting as mostly a harmless social activity that he groups together with going to record stores and restaurants. I get the sense his wife is basically dragging him to this ("I am not as brave as my wife, who acts from a strain of moral clarity that can sometimes be daunting") and he is playing the role of an agreeable husband that regards this like his wife dragging him to a museum or board game night, so he is happy to go there and shout obscenities for a few hours in between other tourist activities. I know it sounds cliche, but there is just such beta energy radiating off the entire post.

I had to do a double take. Wait, you're at the protests? As if that follows immediately and naturally from being in Minneapolis?

Look I participated in Occupy Wall Streets Zucotti Park protest because I wanted tacos and there was a hot chick smoking a tea cigarette there. If you've got nothing better to do and you know the fuzz aren't going to crack your skulls a protest can be hella fun. Getting a critical population mass so it isn't just single issue weirdos CAN be an intoxicating environment to be around, like a rave with less open drug consumption and better music.

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