When I make these suggestions to my fellow liberals, I am met with venom. They say now is not the time for depolarization—which they’ve been saying for the last 10 years. It’s always the time. It’s always the time for nuance, even in the middle of a battlefield. It’s always the time for viewpoint diversity and debate and seeing complex situations from multiple angles. But we who believe so are in the minority.
Yup. They will remain filled with hate, most of them, for life.
I don't know what will happen in 2028 but it does seem clear that Gen Z, particularly the younger half of Gen Z, is pretty conservative. See The Liberal Patriot's breakdown:
Eventually the hate-filled millennial leftists will have to decide between being like the segregationists after Civil Rights (dying old and bitter and still complaining about how they were right), or admitting they were wrong and maybe letting some light back into their lives.
This is exactly what is wrong with so many liberals, especially the Regressives. They ARE arrogant; they ARE condescending; they DO think those on the other side are stupid and morally corrupt. That is why the party’s approval ratings are at an all-time low.
Even this article misrepresents the conservative take on ICE
- first, this is an armed and violent insurrection. The left doesn't get to decide which laws they'll follow.
- second, both Good and Pretti had lethal force. Good used it and Pretti began an altercation with law enforcement with a gun.
There is almost no scenario in which you can start a fight with law enforcement while armed and not end up dead. The left is focusing on the fact that he'd already been disarmed, but:
- he was reaching back towards his gun and he could have had a second
- cops are not NFL referees, expected to see in real time what slow motion reply reveals to viewers. If someone is actively fighting and has a gun, that's all police need for reasonable fear of being in mortal danger. My best take from the videos is that his Sig accidentally discharged after the ICE agent took it. But if he was fighting after the first person yelled "gun", then that's enough.
I had to take the NRA gun safety class to get my first handgun in a blue state, and one point they drilled in is that if you are carrying, when you get stopped by the police, you stay extremely calm and comply with everything they say, because you could easily end up dead.
My question is, "Why, exactly, was he carrying a pistol?" All the explanations I can think of range from stupid to really stupid.
a) He expected to draw down on ICE. There is no way that would turn out well. He had a pistol with what? Ten rounds? They have shotguns, submachine guns, pistols -- and they have shown a willingness to use them.
b) He always went heeled on the street because of danger. In Minneapolis? Really?
c) He planned on waving it around so people wouldn't mess with him. That sort of thing merely assures that someone will mess with him. A much better tactic is to back away. Remember, "He who fights and runs away / Lives to fight (or run) another day."
d) He planned to provoke the authorities so they would shoot him and he would become a martyr and advance the Cause. Apparently that's what is happening -- but was it his plan?
His Sig 9mm was loaded and he had two full extra magazines. That is 25 bullets. Why so much ammunition? He's not around to explain his motive so we can only speculate. One motive for carrying so much ammunition would be the intention to commit a mass shooting, but we'll never know for certain what he was planning.
I had heard of the extra magazines, but I wasn't sure they actually existed, because the only picture I had seen of the pistol had just one magazine next to it -- and it looked like it had been removed from the pistol. Since the three-magazine statement has now been repeated several times, it may well be true. That just adds another alternative -- and another level of confusion -- to his possible motives.
JMan: I think it's a fair point that ICE are not NFL replay officials watching things in slow motion. It is much more chaotic in real time, and I do think we need to keep that in mind.
Having said that, I have questions/issues with a few things you wrote.
In reverse order:
1. "he was reaching back towards his gun and he could have had a second"
Can you point to a video you have seen that shows Pretti reaching for his gun and provide the timestamp for when that is happening. My guess is that you're confused because you have seen this image (https://www.facebook.com/carmine77/photos/here-it-is-the-screenshot-that-should-end-thisalex-pretti-reached-for-the-gun-in/10162786925416731/). But at this moment, Pretti has already been shot (which is why he is no longer surrounded by officers since they pulled away for him after he was shot). I suppose it's possible he was reaching for where his gun used to be at that point, but I think it's more likely he was just in his death throes. In any case, this moment was AFTER he was shot, so it couldn't have a reason for the agent to shoot him the first time.
I think by far the most revealing video of what actually happened is the detailed compilation from multiple angles put together by the Times:
When you watch that, it's clear that when he was shot, Pretti's arms were up by head, almost certainly trying to protect himself from the agent who was hitting him in the head with a spray cannister (see 2:15-3:00).
2. "Pretti began an altercation with law enforcement with a gun."
I think that's an incredibly deceptive sentence. What it means in normal English is that Pretti used a gun to start a fight with law enforcement. Since he never once used the gun in any way, what would be a fairer sentence is that he "began an altercation with law enforcement while in possession of a gun" But even the "began an altercation" part of the sentence is deceptive too. Normally, if one says "began an altercation", it means "started a fight." But Pretti never did anything to start a fight. It's accurate to say that he did step between an agent and the woman the agent had shoved off her a feet, but stepping in front of someone is not starting an altercation. And after that he is just reacting to being pepper sprayed and being tackled. But even then, he never once strikes or even grabs law enforcement.
3. "this is an armed and violent insurrection"
Folks on the left describe January 6th as an armed and violent insurrection. Here is video from that day (https://youtu.be/DXnHIJkZZAs?si=X1P-rKWW8K6GhsLr&t=30) and a description of the injuries sustained by police that I think they would use to justify that claim:
Can you provide comparable video or descriptions of injuries to law enforcement that you think justify comparing what is happening in Minnesota as an armed and violent insurrection. I haven't seen any video that I think is remotely comparable, but I'm sure there is a lot that I have missed. I'd be interested in seeing the footage that most supports your statement.
1. No weapons at January 6th except one guy who planted a pipe bomb the night before.
2. No coordination between Jan 6th rioters. By contrast, Minnesota has multiple encrypted Signal groups limited to 1000 members for security purposes. They were actively tracking ICE and coordinating responses.
3. No government officials or military involved in Jan 6. But the Signal groups apparently do have Democratic politicians involved.
To use the left's favorite descriptive phrase for protests, January 6th was "mostly peaceful". The vast majority strolled through the capitol building and took selfies and returned to their ordinary lives. Then the FBI SWAT teams showed up six weeks later.
You're certainly right that Signal groups are being used to organize the protests against ICE. Don't know there if there are Democratic politicians involved in those Signal groups (and would be curious to hear the names of the politicians you believe are doing so), although I'm not sure it matters. Whether politicians are involved or not, they're certainly organized.
I also agree with you that most people who marched on the Capitol on January 6 behaved peacefully. If I had to guess, of the 2000-2500 folks who marched on the Capitol, at most only a few hundred behaved violently.
But the first two statements above are just crazily wrong. Below I asked Gemini a question, and you can see the response. If you want all the links that drove that answer, let me know and I'll provide them.
Meanwhile, I'm still interested in seeing the videos or other evidence of all the violence. There have been weeks(/months) of protests in Minnesota. Where is the evidence of violence?
------
Question: Were any of the January 6 protesters armed?
Gemini Response (Let me know if you want links to the articles that provided the info for the response, and I'll provide them):
"Yes, many of the protesters and rioters on January 6, 2021, were armed with a wide variety of weapons, including firearms. While some public figures have claimed the crowd was "unarmed," court records, police reports, and video evidence tell a different story.
The weapons present that day generally fall into three categories:
1. Firearms
While the majority of weapons seized were not guns, several individuals were specifically charged for carrying firearms on Capitol grounds or in the immediate vicinity:
Christopher Michael Alberts: Arrested with a loaded 9mm pistol and extra ammunition while on the Capitol grounds.
Guy Reffitt: Convicted of carrying a handgun while on the Capitol’s west front.
Mark Mazza: Admitted to carrying a loaded Taurus revolver to the Ellipse and later to the Capitol.
Jererey Bargar: Sentenced for carrying a loaded 9mm semi-automatic pistol on restricted Capitol grounds.
Lonnie Coffman: His truck, parked near the Capitol, contained an "unlawful trove" of weapons including a loaded handgun, rifle, shotgun, and 11 Molotov cocktails.
2. "Deadly or Dangerous" Weapons
The Department of Justice reported that approximately 170 defendants were charged with using a deadly or dangerous weapon against law enforcement. These included:
Chemical Sprays: Bear spray, pepper spray, and mace.
Impact Weapons: Baseball bats, hockey sticks, flagpoles, and batons.
Sharp/Heavy Tools: Tomahawk axes, crowbars, knives, and even a "stinger" whip.
Improvised Weapons: Fire extinguishers, wooden clubs, and heavy desk drawers thrown at officers.
3. Tactical Gear and Staged Armories
Many individuals arrived in tactical vests, helmets, and gas masks. Furthermore, members of the Oath Keepers were found to have staged a "Quick Reaction Force" (QRF) at a hotel in Arlington, Virginia. This QRF held a massive stockpile of firearms and ammunition intended for transport into the city if they were "called up" by the president.
Note on Law Enforcement Observations: During the rally at the Ellipse earlier that morning, police radio transmissions recorded officers identifying individuals in the trees and the crowd who were carrying AR-15s and other rifles. Many attendees refused to go through the magnetometers because they did not want their weapons confiscated."
Great comment! I appreciate the pushback, but I think the Times video is extremely misleading. Times video breakdown:
> "Pretti does not appear to pose a threat to agents, and at several critical junctures is outnumbered and under their control."
Wrong. George Floyd was under their control. He was trapped, unable to move and unable to breath. By contrast, this is an *armed* man who *initiated* the conflict by joining other protestors/insurrectionists in using physical force to stop ICE. He was never under their control at any point of the engagement until he was shot dead.
> "Pretti stepped between her [shoved protestor/insurrectionist] and the agent who shoved her"
Exactly. He was an aggressor in a physical conflict with the police. And he *was armed*.
> "briefly putting his hand on the agents waist"
Exactly. That's battery. Armed aggressor.
> "and again, he makes no threatening movements towards the agents."
Wrong. He's (1) committed battery, (2) interfering with federal agents, and (3) armed.
> "[agents yelling] he's got a gun! he's got a gun!"
Yup, at this point there are really only two options:
1. immediately go limp and *maybe* survive
2. continue to fight back and almost certainly die.
Pretti chose option 2
At this point the video, even with frame-by-frame, is not clear. According to the times, the agent who reacted to "he's got a gun!" drew his gun and shot. They claim that you can see his arm recoil but I can't see anything inconsistent with his normal shifting movement. But it is here that the right and left tend to disagree:
RIGHT: the first shot was an accidental discharge from the recovered Sig
LEFT: the first shot came from the ICE agent reacting to "he's got a gun!"
Either way, the shooting is 100% justified. An armed man intentionally engages with law enforcement and then continues to fight and resist arrest after being pepper sprayed. But obviously the right's narrative (accidental discharge) makes it even cleaner.
Edit: Forgot to address my reaching point. It happened after the first shot. It makes more sense on the accidental discharge theory then on the ICE taking the first shot theory. Look at 27 seconds.
I think it's legit to push back on some of the Times commentary, though I also think it's something of a semantic debate. You're certainly right that Pretti was never handcuffed and fully immobile. At the same time, it's also true that he was on his hands and knees with his hands by his head while four guys were on top of him (including one beating him in the head with a spray can). I don't think it's unreasonable for someone in that position to be trying to protect his head and face with his arms, and I don't think it's unreasonable for someone to describe that situation as the officers having him under control (versus say the first 1:45 of the Times video when he's still on his feet or being dragged down). But again, you're right that he's not immobilized and under full control.
A few other points about things you wrote:
- I wrote: "briefly putting his hand on the agents waist"
You replied: "That's battery. Armed aggressor."
I guess we'll have to agree to disagree on this. But I'd invite other folks to look again at the seconds in question (20-23 secs in the video here: https://www.nytimes.com/2026/01/24/us/minneapolis-shooting-federal-agents-video.html) and come to their own judgements. I'd wager there is not a jury in the country that would convict someone of battery based on those actions. If someone shoves someone to the ground and a third party tries to stand between them to protect the person who has been shoved but does nothing more than to try to interpose their body, that's not battery.
- You wrote: "continues to fight and resist arrest"
Again, can you provide any moment in any video that shows him "fighting". I think it's legitimate to say he was resisting arrest (although even there, I mainly see someone who has been pepper sprayed trying to stay on his feet and then trying to protect himself while being beaten).
- "Either way, the shooting is 100% justified."
While I disagree (I don't see how when he fired the first shot, a reasonable officer would conclude that Pretti was a threat), I'm certainly not a use of force expert. So I look forward to hearing the full case for the defense at the trial.
> "While I disagree (I don't see how when he fired the first shot, a reasonable officer would conclude that Pretti was a threat), I'm certainly not a use of force expert. So I look forward to hearing the full case for the defense at the trial."
I'm not a lawyer either, but as I pointed out in my first post in this sub-thread, in my gun safety training (20 years ago), it was made clear that if you are carrying and do not (1) comply and (2) stay calm, there is a very good probability you will end up dead, and the police will be justified in justified in killing you.
If you want to get in a fight with the police, don't bring a weapon.
No argument that Pretti would have been better off without a gun.
But again, I think it's really wrong to describe him as "getting in a fight with the police." He never fought. And it's why people are so outraged.
Meanwhile, coincidentally, Peter Miller (one of my favorite writers although he usually writes about much different stuff) has a great piece on the Renee Good shooting which I highly recommend:
> "But again, I think it's really wrong to describe him as "getting in a fight with the police." He never fought. And it's why people are so outraged."
If someone without TikTok or X were reading your response, they'd think Pretti was walking down the street and then ICE grabbed him and threw him to the ground. Pretti was interfering with the police carrying out their duties. He was obstructing the police. He was the aggressor.
Then, when the police pepper sprayed him, he resisted arrest. So yes, that's fighting the police.
Complying is:
- not getting in the way of the police
- doing what the police tell you to do without resisting
Renee Good
--------------
- also was actively obstructing the police
- pace your link, Ross was not in her way, but she made a three point turn to aim directly at him, then accelerated.
Many people don’t agree with federal drug laws. Would you consider the actions taken by Minneapolis protestors, Good, Pretti, et al to be acceptable if they were done during DEA enforcement actions? How about people who don’t like gun sale and registration laws? Could they justifiably behave this way during ATF actions? Why or why not?
Any thoughts on the "assault me, motherfuckers" video that now seems to be corroboarated?
This is not a great source, but I assume you wouldn't trust anything that wasn't from a lefty source. He kicks out the taillight of an ICE car and shouts "Assault me, motherfuckers!"
I haven't read it yet, and will respond, but I'm familiar with Jesse Singal because he is one of the few sane liberals/leftists when it comes to gender ideology, and well-informed on the issue.
But he's so blind when it comes to everything else. I remember a recent comment on the reddit sub r/blockedandreported when a commentator there was frustrated with his Gell-Mann Amnesia about NPR. He's frequently criticized their horrible coverage on transgender issues, but he uncritically believes them on everything else.
You can always subscribe for the trial period and cancel within 7 days. But here are the most relevant paragraphs after the paywall:
"I’ve been thinking a lot about those two incidents in the wake of Alex Pretti’s killing by ICE agents, because we’re seeing a right-wing version of the same disturbing dynamics—arguably, a more intense version...
"While the scene of the Pretti killing was chaotic and certain details of certain moments are obscured from view, there is not one iota of a trace of evidence, anywhere, that Pretti did anything that warranted lethal force on the part of the ICE officers who had wrestled him to the ground, beat him, and pepper-sprayed him by the time they shot him. The New York Times, as is often the case with these sorts of heavily scrutinized incidents, has done the best video analysis I’m aware of.
On right-wing social media, though, you would think that we didn’t know all this, that much of these videos simply don’t exist. It is very, very hard to even understand the arguments many Trump supporters are making because the videos do provide so much information and prove so demonstrably that Pretti posed no threat to them at the moment they shot him.
It’s been interesting to notice all the similarities between how these folks justify adopting such a reality-denying position and how lefties have in similar, prior circumstances. One is to simply invoke tropes common to their movement that don’t quite map onto what happened, but which seem to activate certain feelings of anger and resentment. In the case of the Covington Catholic kids, for example, the situation superficially looked similar enough to an incident of white-on-nonwhite racial harassment that many commentators just sort of shrugged and went with that. Kyle Rittenhouse, meanwhile, was a “white vigilante” or a “white militiaman” with a gun — figures that loom very large and dangerous in the liberal/left imagination ....
We have another trope here, a conservative one, in the case of Pretti: the armed anti-cop lunatic. So conservative commentators and the more deranged Xers keep mentioning that he was armed at the time of his death, echoing the misleading statements put out by top-level Trump officials right afterward. But, at the risk of repeating myself from earlier this week, not only did Pretti never threaten the cops with his gun, but all the available evidence suggests they didn’t even notice it until he was completely subdued.
The latest video of Pretti to come out, which shows him spitting and cursing at ICE agents and kicking in a taillight of one of their videos 11 days before he was killed, has only “vindicated” the right-wing belief that the shooting was justified. Here we see the same sort of deeply tribalistic, pseudomagical thinking — albeit applied to a much more serious incident — that can cause someone to believe that they can infer heaps of useful information about a 16-year-old based on the angel of his smile. The fact that Pretti engaged in an earlier, destructive incident somehow tells us, contrary to all the available evidence of the shooting itself, that the shooting was justified."
The point, which I fully agree with, is that arguing with right wing folks about Pretti is just like arguing with left wing folks about Rittenhouse. They are so caught up in the narrative that they want to believe that they refuse to see what is right in front of their eyes on video.
Well he made the same assertion you did, and then referenced the same NY Times video you did.
This debate is not "objective leftists" vs. "biased conservatives" or even "biased leftists" vs. "biased conservatives". It's conservatives who know, practice, and live the ethics of lethal force (because of gun culture) against leftists who just started thinking about it five minutes ago. Go take an NRA gun safety class sometime. You'll spend 2 days learning that things 100 times milder than Pretti's actions will get you killed, and it will be your own fault.
I hereby create "The leg fallacy" from the ladies in The View, who after one of the high-profile shootings suggested that the police officer should have simply shot the guy in the leg. Now, leg shots are not safe no matter what cop shows portray. There are several major arteries like femoral, popliteal, deep femoral etc. You might actually have a better chance of hitting an artery in the leg than in the torso.
But suppose that leg shots were safe. One of the first things you learn about the ethics of self-defense is that if you aren't in mortal fear, then you don't shoot at all. In fact, you'd be guilty of murder or manslaughter if you killed someone even if you meant it to be nonlethal. And if you are in mortal fear, then you shoot to kill. And you overkill because a fatal gunshot may not kill someone before they can draw their own gun and fire back. Brain or spinal cord is *usually* an instant kill, heart may take 15 seconds, and a major artery might take 2 minutes to stop your opponent.
What I'm getting at with the leg fallacy is that leftists who don't know anything about guns are creating their own Rashi (commentary on the Torah) from square 1 with a politically motivated case as their starting point. That's why so many leftists questioned why Pretti was shot so many times.
Yeah. It makes me think less of Pretti overall. Think he was wrong to kick the taillight (and to scream obscenities), and I have no issue with the agents tackling him after he did so. Would have had no issues with them arresting him either.
But it obviously doesn't change anything to justify his shooting this weekend. In fact, since Pretti was also apparently carrying a gun that first time, it reinforces the fact that he regularly carried a gun.
To be honest, I'm not a huge fan of that, but that's because I'm not a fan of carrying weapons in general. It certainly doesn't justify shooting someone.
So do you truly believe that having anything other than open borders is the moral equivalent of dangerous and unsafe factory conditions during the gilded Age?*
Even if your answer is 'yes' - and leftists have rejected national sovereignty since the communists - that doesn't give leftists the right to ignore the law and use violence against law enforcement.
But he is right about it being the women. As Orwell put it in 1984: "It was always the women, and above all the young ones, who were the most bigoted adherents of the Party, the swallowers of slogans, the amateur spies and nosers-out of unorthodoxy." We see that today - studies on female academics show that they are far more inclined to censorship of the truth for the sake of their moral beliefs.
In the Bible, women were more attuned to Jesus' true ministry than the men, which is why Mary of Betheny anointed Jesus' feet for burial, while male disciples didn't understand Jesus when he suggested he would die soon. But unanchored from a source of truth, women are all-too-often conformists who prize orthodoxy over truth and goodness.
* I don’t consider dangerous mills to be a source of oppressive injustice. They were harmful and it is a use-case for government intervention, but they are not an historic injustice like the progressive support for “scientific racism”, Social Darwinism, and eugenics.
So while the left considers themselves an historic source for good, the opposite is true. Leftists have created harm at every stage in their history, beginning with the tyranny of the French Revolution, running through scientific racism, Social Darwinism, and eugenics (all embraced by the 20th century progressives), communism and fascism, their mass sterilizations during the 60s and 70s because of the population bomb, and continuing through their support for promiscuous sex - which plunged 30% of the population into poverty - and abortion, and their generalized attack on national sovereignty.
By contrast, the enduring good changes have been Christian, such as representative government (The Dutch in 1581, Cromwell, and the Puritans initiating the American Revolution), abolition, opposition to eugenics, and opposition to abortion and promiscuous sex.
First off, I made a mistake when sharing the Junger link. It was intended to be a reply to Heyjude (it was relevant to the back and forth we were having, not your post). The point was to share another historical example of civil disobedience, not to compare unsafe factories to immigration policy.
Second, I'm certainly not advocating for open borders. The Searchlight Institute just put out a good memo which does a good job of capturing what I think should happen:
Democrats have to offer a proactive vision that shows we are serious about enforcing our immigration laws and directly addresses the cruelty and lawlessness of the Trump Administration’s policies.
We have already lived through this movie: the chaos caused by ICE’s tactics in our cities today is in part the result of voters losing trust in Democrats’ ability to secure the border during the Biden Administration. Democrats are right to call Trump’s racist and vindictive approach to immigration for what it is, but they should be specific and direct about what their approach to interior immigration law enforcement would be. Public trust is the bedrock for law enforcement, and ICE will have a steep road ahead of itself to rebuild the confidence it has lost with many American communities. But we will
always need a federal agency charged with deporting people who are in the United States illegally. We can have a debate about whether we need to replace ICE with a new agency that has this mission, or provide meaningful reforms that rebuild the public’s fractured trust in ICE’s ability to discharge its mandate safely and effectively—but we should not fall for the trap Trump has set by advocating for wholesale abolition.
An aggressive plan can be summed up in two words: Reform and Retrain.
REFORM
Reform ICE root and branch, including:
- We are a nation of laws. We need to enforce our interior immigration laws in a way that adheres to the constitutional right to due process.
- No masks. If you are enforcing lawful orders, there is no justification for hiding your name, your face, or your agency affiliation.
- No one is above the law. There must be stiff consequences, including dismissal and prison time, for officers who break the law.
- No indiscriminate enforcement. ICE needs to focus its limited resources on
criminals and people who pose a threat to our communities, not landscapers and nurses.
- Outside oversight. We need a bipartisan group of law enforcement professionals to be charged with overseeing and reviewing ICE use of force policies, training, and incidents. And we need to provide justice and compensation for victims identified by this bipartisan group.
RETRAIN:
ICE needs to become a modern, accountable, and professional law enforcement organization, including:
- Use of Force Policies. ICE officers need to undergo rigorous—and
recurring—training that adheres to law enforcement best practices on how and when to use force.
- Community policing practices. ICE should be trained on, and adhere to, the best practices identified by state and local police forces when interacting with the public.
- Identify and weed out the bad apples. Rescind Trump Administration policies that have significantly relaxed vetting and standards for new employees, and ensure that all personnel undergo recurring vetting to ensure they meet the highest standards for professionalism.
- Rightsize ICE. Refocus the agency on its core mission and ensure that remaining. One Big Beautiful Bill Act funding is spent on core law enforcement functions, not immigration theater.
My whole comment above obviously is premised on the the idea that we need ICE (or at least some kind of law enforcement equivalent).
However, it's not true that there is 10 times as much ICE activity in Texas. With the recent surge that drove all the drama, there are 3000 agents operating in Minneapolis. I can't find the personnel numbers for Texas, but since there are only 22,000 ICE agents nationwide, there obviously aren't 30k operating in Texas.
It's also worth noting that Minneapolis has a population of under 500k folks. So an equivalent kind of surge in Houston, San Antonio, Dallas, and Austin would mean about 50k agents operating in those cities. There is obviously nothing close to that going on.
Now, I would agree that this isn't the whole story. Folks in Minneapolis don't want ICE there much more strongly than people in Texas (at least from what I can tell; haven't spent time recently in either place). But if you think what's going on in Minneapolis isn't unprecedented, then you simply don't have an accurate picture of what is happening.
The fact that there are currently many ICE agents in Minnesota is because of the defiance of Federal immigration law in Minnesota. When people follow the law, you don't need many officers.
This is full of excellent observations. Perhaps when societies begin with the "c" word, "cult", it is all downhill from there. The term has always perplexed me, because Obama appeared to enjoy far more unquestioning universal admiration from Dems, than Trump ever did, from Reps.
As a moderate Conservative who spent nearly a quarter century in an overwhelmingly bright Blue upper middle class enclave, can I vote for "morally and intellectually superior" being a main issue, along with hypocrisy?
I have no idea if many Coastal Dems always loathed Flyover residents and Trump just gave them permission to finally release their snark, or if the vitriol is new. Either way, if the middle section of the US ever heard many Coastal Dems describe them, we would have permanent single Party rule, but not in a way Dems would enjoy.
Vicious is the only word that often does the diatribes justice, except perhaps, clueless. "Racist rubes, misogynistic, homophobic, ill educated and fat" were often Rep descriptions. Hilary's "Basket of Deplorables" was her normal speech.
The superior intellects were always amusing since many "Elites" seem to truly believe, food magically appears in Whole Foods, electricity is an energy source, rather than a delivery system and the world would be just fine, powered exclusively by wind and solar.
The lack of common sense if often surpassed only by blatant hypocrisy. School choice is White Supremacy when offered to poor children, but not when utilized by wealthy Dem families. Then, it is just good parenting.
SUVs that deliver children safely to and from school are killing the planet, but private jet travel is a life sustaining necessity, for those of certain lineage.
Millions of migrants in Texas is a compassionate necessity, but 2 dozen in Martha's Vineyard is a demographic emergency, requiring military assistance.
Dems believe in diverse neighborhoods, but are often, oddly, ensconced in neighborhoods entirely devoid of certain ethnicities. They evidently reside there against their will.
Homelessness is not a Coastal problem, because everyone knows the homeless are all relocated Red State residents.
After 25 years, I could write a book, but surely a pattern is forming. However bad Reps might imagine, the outright distain is far worse.
Am sure many Reps also have entrenched inaccurate beliefs about Dems, but in my experience there is absolutely no balance in loathing the politically different.
> "Dems believe in diverse neighborhoods, but are often, oddly, ensconced in neighborhoods entirely devoid of certain ethnicities. They evidently reside there against their will."
"Leftism for thee, but not for me."
Democrats intentionally choose to live in expensive neighborhoods that firewall them against the harmful consequences of leftist policies. We see this in both defunding the police and open borders immigration.
From the article: "For instance, in contrast to the first two groups, a plurality of Mainline Republicans and a majority of the Reluctant Right agree with the statement, “The government should not deport anyone without a hearing before a judge so that people who have a genuine right to be in the US don’t get mistakenly deported.”
Headline News: "...over 500,000 noncitizens did not show up for their scheduled removal hearings, while the Department of Homeland Security dismissed or closed an additional 700,000 pending immigration cases, according to the findings of Andrew R. Arthur, the Resident Fellow in Law and Policy at the Center for Immigration Studies." Golly, who would have thought that a million foreigners who flouted our immigration laws would flout our immigration laws?
I think this is an excellent approach to reaching the other side. But the calculation is missing at least one element. MAGA sees this issue as largely occurring in cities or states with blue government. The anti-ice movement is not broad across the country. It has specific flashpoints — all of them in blue, poorly governed cities.
People in red states are largely unaffected. So it reads more like a side show than a worrisome trend.
The uncomfortable truth is that, where ICE is allowed to operate with impunity and is supported (or at least unhindered) by local government and citizenry, they are accomplishing their task with little notice or fanfare.
This results in the narrative on the right that the lefts only goal is to hang on to votes and census numbers from illegal immigrants in their midst. This view is problematic but the fact that every flashpoint is a blue city lends it credence.
I would add one more thought to your comment. The key variable isn’t whether protests exist, it’s whether local authorities enforce the boundary between protest and obstruction early and consistently. Where that line is enforced, escalation is cut off and the risk of someone getting hurt drops dramatically. Where it isn’t, small confrontations compound into national flashpoints. That is what has happened in Minneapolis. There were several protests in red states like Texas where protestors crossed the line of obstruction and were shut down by local/ state police. This lowered the risks considerably of someone getting hurt.
Our town of half a million had 300 protesters this weekend (of course it made the front page). Yesterday four illegal immigrants were in the courthouse with DUI charges and they left with ICE. No riots or anything. Can you guess if I live in a Red or Blue state?
Yeah same here. Media also conflates thousands at a protest (as in minneapolis) with protests in Omaha or Tulsa, as if they were equally supported. the Headline is never “small group of anti-ICE protesters,” it’s alway “protest erupts in xxx”
There already was a good plan on immigration. Put forth during Clinton after careful study by the civil rights icon Barbara Jordan. It failed, the following is from Google.
"Barbara Jordan’s 1990s immigration reform proposals failed to pass Congress primarily due to intense, unified opposition from a "left-right coalition" comprising business groups seeking low-wage labor, ethnic advocacy groups, and libertarians"
Those are the same folks paying off both parties to this day. Bush loved illegal immigrant labor, Obama did well on his first term but got shanghaied by the leaders of ethnic advocacy groups whom we now know don't really represent those groups.
Maybe after we go back to levels that would have been under Jordan's plan we can revisit how many more than zero we should let in.
Bear in mind I'm a registered D, worked as an election judge, precinct coordinator as they now call it for many years, lots of work for the D Party.
Barbara Jordan feels like the last time we tried to treat immigration as a national strategy: policy that serves the national interest, with workable enforcement and a disciplined legal system. The irony is I suspect we’re going to spend the next 30 to 40 years gradually realizing we need orderly immigration because birth rates are falling. And the U.S. is one of the few countries with a real capacity to assimilate newcomers at scale if we do it competently. That’s why this moment is such a shame: we’re burning trust on chaos instead of building a durable bargain the country can unite around. I’d bet my grandkids will look back and ask why we couldn’t do the obvious, set a strategic policy, enforce it predictably, and bring people in legally and openly.
One other major issue is that the the left views assimilation as a dirty word. It would be nice to get back to the 20th century view of an America that’s multi-ethnic and mono-cultural a.k.a. The Melting Pot
Boy I agree with that. The three principal items I look at for assimilation are a) spoken and written English with competence, b) either education, job training or apprenticeship and c) learning our legal system including the basics of constitutional rights and obligations. This is what is needed for someone to be successful.
"To get Danish citizenship, you generally need 9 years of continuous residence, a permanent residence permit, passing a Danish language test and citizenship test (on Danish society/history), being financially self-sufficient (e.g., 3.5 years full-time work in 4 years), no serious criminal record, and declaring loyalty to Denmark."
Especially considering the quality of many of the people wishing to immigrate. China has the best engineering schools in the world, yet many/most of their best students would like to immigrate here. The east Asians assimilate very well also.
Barbara's plan had no amnesty whatsoever of course. I'd certainly support that. They can apply at the US consulate in their home countries. Of course priority is to the young, highly educated, employable, etc., and almost no immigration until we get a handle on things. But for those who left voluntarily they would be able to apply.
David Brooks is a liberal but he had the insight to see that liberals misunderestimate their conservative opponents. "Every election year, we in the commentariat come up with a story line to explain the result and the story line has to have two features. First, it has to be completely wrong. Second, it has to reassure liberals that they are morally superior to the people who just defeated them. In past years, the story line has involved Angry White Males or Willie Horton-bashing racists. This year, the official story is that throngs of homophobic, Red America values voters surged to the polls to put George W. Bush over the top. The same insularity that caused many liberals to lose touch with the rest of the country now causes them to simplify, misunderstand and condescend to the people who voted for Bush. If you want to understand why Democrats keep losing elections, just listen to some coastal and university town liberals talk about how conformist and intolerant people in Red America are." David Brooks, 11/5/2004
Many liberals conflate understanding with approval. They recoil at the idea of trying to understand where conservatives are coming from b/c understanding, in their minds, implies agreement or acceptance. Most are also pretty convinced that they've got a monopoly on truth and that there is zero possibility that they might learn something or change their minds. (Neither of these things is unique to liberals).
I agree with your goals, but your ideas for attaining them have proven at best ineffective and at worst destructive. I think this because I see the results of your ideas in action in every major city in the country. It’s time we attach accountability for results to programs. Good intentions are not enough.
This is the fundamental premise of conservatives that liberals can never accept. Liberals prefer to believe we are all just racist bigots exhibiting every kind of “phobia” they can dream up.
This is an excellent analysis of the existential risk to our society’s civil cohesion. The failure to acknowledge those with a contrary opinion or view about contentious issues have legitimate reasons for their positions has become a sickness that infects both sides of the political divide between so-called liberals and conservatives. Another way to think about this critical problem is the failure to apply strategic empathy when analyzing any issue or event. Instead of demonizing the “other side,” we should listen without anger or emotion, engage in non-confrontational discourse, and respond with logic rather than ad hominem arguments.
Another important point made here is that patience is necessary when trying to create the environment for changing mindsets and policies. Incremental change is the best way to move a society towards a new way of thinking. Gay marriage is a perfect example, as is the civil rights movement in the 50s and 60s.
We are living now in a time of impatience and information silos that feed a one sided narrative to people stuck in a mindset that does not tolerate dissent.
The truth is there is no one truth. The issues of the day should be seen through a lens that sees grey, not black and white.
Iron Law: "You can always tell a 'progressive,' but you can never tell a 'progressive' a single thing. They think they are better and smarter and everyone else. They talk at everyone else, but only listen to each other."
“The government should not deport anyone without a hearing before a judge so that people who have a genuine right to be in the US don’t get mistakenly deported.”
Is it your contention that this isn’t currently happening? Or is it your contention that an order of removal from an immigration judge and subsequent administrative warrant to execute the removal doesn’t meet that standard? Because I’ve seen no credible evidence of the former and plenty of rhetoric based on the latter. E.g. “without a judicial warrant”
I posted this the other day but it bears repeating. Someone ran the numbers and showed the Tump administration has a lower deportation error rate than the Obama administration.
Most Americans support deporting illegal immigrants who have committed other crimes. And, I think, most Americans support deporting non-citizen Radical Islamists and their supporters (even if they came in legally). So, we kind of have a consensus on policy. Re others in the US illegally, there appears to be a consensus to require them to return to their country of origin, however, utilize administrative and financial incentives to accomplish this. But no rough tactics or ICE for the last group. And possibly allow legitimate asylum claims, with quick adjudication.
Thank you for the link. Unfortunately, Edwards is better at identifying the problem than recommending solutions. His Get Ahead Accounts, Great Promise Partnerships, Second Chance Schools, all are retreads of existing programs. His Working Society is no more likely to solve poverty than Lyndon Johnson's Great Society did because the fundamental problem is the passivity and short-term mentality of our country's poor.
Poverty simply means little money. If people have more money they are no longer in poverty. In the US almost everyone works, and if work pays good money even more people are incentivised to work. Edwards unlike the current populist actually wanted to pay people more.
When I make these suggestions to my fellow liberals, I am met with venom. They say now is not the time for depolarization—which they’ve been saying for the last 10 years. It’s always the time. It’s always the time for nuance, even in the middle of a battlefield. It’s always the time for viewpoint diversity and debate and seeing complex situations from multiple angles. But we who believe so are in the minority.
Yup. They will remain filled with hate, most of them, for life.
I don't know what will happen in 2028 but it does seem clear that Gen Z, particularly the younger half of Gen Z, is pretty conservative. See The Liberal Patriot's breakdown:
https://www.liberalpatriot.com/p/a-final-comprehensive-look-at-how
Eventually the hate-filled millennial leftists will have to decide between being like the segregationists after Civil Rights (dying old and bitter and still complaining about how they were right), or admitting they were wrong and maybe letting some light back into their lives.
This is exactly what is wrong with so many liberals, especially the Regressives. They ARE arrogant; they ARE condescending; they DO think those on the other side are stupid and morally corrupt. That is why the party’s approval ratings are at an all-time low.
100% It's mind blowing that they can't see it objectively for what it is.
That is because they are not liberals. Most Democrats today are not truly liberal. The progressive left is not actually liberal!
Even this article misrepresents the conservative take on ICE
- first, this is an armed and violent insurrection. The left doesn't get to decide which laws they'll follow.
- second, both Good and Pretti had lethal force. Good used it and Pretti began an altercation with law enforcement with a gun.
There is almost no scenario in which you can start a fight with law enforcement while armed and not end up dead. The left is focusing on the fact that he'd already been disarmed, but:
- he was reaching back towards his gun and he could have had a second
- cops are not NFL referees, expected to see in real time what slow motion reply reveals to viewers. If someone is actively fighting and has a gun, that's all police need for reasonable fear of being in mortal danger. My best take from the videos is that his Sig accidentally discharged after the ICE agent took it. But if he was fighting after the first person yelled "gun", then that's enough.
I had to take the NRA gun safety class to get my first handgun in a blue state, and one point they drilled in is that if you are carrying, when you get stopped by the police, you stay extremely calm and comply with everything they say, because you could easily end up dead.
My question is, "Why, exactly, was he carrying a pistol?" All the explanations I can think of range from stupid to really stupid.
a) He expected to draw down on ICE. There is no way that would turn out well. He had a pistol with what? Ten rounds? They have shotguns, submachine guns, pistols -- and they have shown a willingness to use them.
b) He always went heeled on the street because of danger. In Minneapolis? Really?
c) He planned on waving it around so people wouldn't mess with him. That sort of thing merely assures that someone will mess with him. A much better tactic is to back away. Remember, "He who fights and runs away / Lives to fight (or run) another day."
d) He planned to provoke the authorities so they would shoot him and he would become a martyr and advance the Cause. Apparently that's what is happening -- but was it his plan?
His Sig 9mm was loaded and he had two full extra magazines. That is 25 bullets. Why so much ammunition? He's not around to explain his motive so we can only speculate. One motive for carrying so much ammunition would be the intention to commit a mass shooting, but we'll never know for certain what he was planning.
I had heard of the extra magazines, but I wasn't sure they actually existed, because the only picture I had seen of the pistol had just one magazine next to it -- and it looked like it had been removed from the pistol. Since the three-magazine statement has now been repeated several times, it may well be true. That just adds another alternative -- and another level of confusion -- to his possible motives.
JMan: I think it's a fair point that ICE are not NFL replay officials watching things in slow motion. It is much more chaotic in real time, and I do think we need to keep that in mind.
Having said that, I have questions/issues with a few things you wrote.
In reverse order:
1. "he was reaching back towards his gun and he could have had a second"
Can you point to a video you have seen that shows Pretti reaching for his gun and provide the timestamp for when that is happening. My guess is that you're confused because you have seen this image (https://www.facebook.com/carmine77/photos/here-it-is-the-screenshot-that-should-end-thisalex-pretti-reached-for-the-gun-in/10162786925416731/). But at this moment, Pretti has already been shot (which is why he is no longer surrounded by officers since they pulled away for him after he was shot). I suppose it's possible he was reaching for where his gun used to be at that point, but I think it's more likely he was just in his death throes. In any case, this moment was AFTER he was shot, so it couldn't have a reason for the agent to shoot him the first time.
I think by far the most revealing video of what actually happened is the detailed compilation from multiple angles put together by the Times:
https://www.nytimes.com/video/us/100000010668660/new-video-analysis-reveals-flawed-and-fatal-decisions-in-shooting-of-pretti.html
When you watch that, it's clear that when he was shot, Pretti's arms were up by head, almost certainly trying to protect himself from the agent who was hitting him in the head with a spray cannister (see 2:15-3:00).
2. "Pretti began an altercation with law enforcement with a gun."
I think that's an incredibly deceptive sentence. What it means in normal English is that Pretti used a gun to start a fight with law enforcement. Since he never once used the gun in any way, what would be a fairer sentence is that he "began an altercation with law enforcement while in possession of a gun" But even the "began an altercation" part of the sentence is deceptive too. Normally, if one says "began an altercation", it means "started a fight." But Pretti never did anything to start a fight. It's accurate to say that he did step between an agent and the woman the agent had shoved off her a feet, but stepping in front of someone is not starting an altercation. And after that he is just reacting to being pepper sprayed and being tackled. But even then, he never once strikes or even grabs law enforcement.
3. "this is an armed and violent insurrection"
Folks on the left describe January 6th as an armed and violent insurrection. Here is video from that day (https://youtu.be/DXnHIJkZZAs?si=X1P-rKWW8K6GhsLr&t=30) and a description of the injuries sustained by police that I think they would use to justify that claim:
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/11/us/politics/capitol-riot-police-officer-injuries.html
Can you provide comparable video or descriptions of injuries to law enforcement that you think justify comparing what is happening in Minnesota as an armed and violent insurrection. I haven't seen any video that I think is remotely comparable, but I'm sure there is a lot that I have missed. I'd be interested in seeing the footage that most supports your statement.
Differences between January 6th and Minnesota:
1. No weapons at January 6th except one guy who planted a pipe bomb the night before.
2. No coordination between Jan 6th rioters. By contrast, Minnesota has multiple encrypted Signal groups limited to 1000 members for security purposes. They were actively tracking ICE and coordinating responses.
3. No government officials or military involved in Jan 6. But the Signal groups apparently do have Democratic politicians involved.
To use the left's favorite descriptive phrase for protests, January 6th was "mostly peaceful". The vast majority strolled through the capitol building and took selfies and returned to their ordinary lives. Then the FBI SWAT teams showed up six weeks later.
You're certainly right that Signal groups are being used to organize the protests against ICE. Don't know there if there are Democratic politicians involved in those Signal groups (and would be curious to hear the names of the politicians you believe are doing so), although I'm not sure it matters. Whether politicians are involved or not, they're certainly organized.
I also agree with you that most people who marched on the Capitol on January 6 behaved peacefully. If I had to guess, of the 2000-2500 folks who marched on the Capitol, at most only a few hundred behaved violently.
But the first two statements above are just crazily wrong. Below I asked Gemini a question, and you can see the response. If you want all the links that drove that answer, let me know and I'll provide them.
Meanwhile, I'm still interested in seeing the videos or other evidence of all the violence. There have been weeks(/months) of protests in Minnesota. Where is the evidence of violence?
------
Question: Were any of the January 6 protesters armed?
Gemini Response (Let me know if you want links to the articles that provided the info for the response, and I'll provide them):
"Yes, many of the protesters and rioters on January 6, 2021, were armed with a wide variety of weapons, including firearms. While some public figures have claimed the crowd was "unarmed," court records, police reports, and video evidence tell a different story.
The weapons present that day generally fall into three categories:
1. Firearms
While the majority of weapons seized were not guns, several individuals were specifically charged for carrying firearms on Capitol grounds or in the immediate vicinity:
Christopher Michael Alberts: Arrested with a loaded 9mm pistol and extra ammunition while on the Capitol grounds.
Guy Reffitt: Convicted of carrying a handgun while on the Capitol’s west front.
Mark Mazza: Admitted to carrying a loaded Taurus revolver to the Ellipse and later to the Capitol.
Jererey Bargar: Sentenced for carrying a loaded 9mm semi-automatic pistol on restricted Capitol grounds.
Lonnie Coffman: His truck, parked near the Capitol, contained an "unlawful trove" of weapons including a loaded handgun, rifle, shotgun, and 11 Molotov cocktails.
2. "Deadly or Dangerous" Weapons
The Department of Justice reported that approximately 170 defendants were charged with using a deadly or dangerous weapon against law enforcement. These included:
Chemical Sprays: Bear spray, pepper spray, and mace.
Impact Weapons: Baseball bats, hockey sticks, flagpoles, and batons.
Sharp/Heavy Tools: Tomahawk axes, crowbars, knives, and even a "stinger" whip.
Improvised Weapons: Fire extinguishers, wooden clubs, and heavy desk drawers thrown at officers.
3. Tactical Gear and Staged Armories
Many individuals arrived in tactical vests, helmets, and gas masks. Furthermore, members of the Oath Keepers were found to have staged a "Quick Reaction Force" (QRF) at a hotel in Arlington, Virginia. This QRF held a massive stockpile of firearms and ammunition intended for transport into the city if they were "called up" by the president.
Note on Law Enforcement Observations: During the rally at the Ellipse earlier that morning, police radio transmissions recorded officers identifying individuals in the trees and the crowd who were carrying AR-15s and other rifles. Many attendees refused to go through the magnetometers because they did not want their weapons confiscated."
Good post! Some new information for me.
Great comment! I appreciate the pushback, but I think the Times video is extremely misleading. Times video breakdown:
> "Pretti does not appear to pose a threat to agents, and at several critical junctures is outnumbered and under their control."
Wrong. George Floyd was under their control. He was trapped, unable to move and unable to breath. By contrast, this is an *armed* man who *initiated* the conflict by joining other protestors/insurrectionists in using physical force to stop ICE. He was never under their control at any point of the engagement until he was shot dead.
> "Pretti stepped between her [shoved protestor/insurrectionist] and the agent who shoved her"
Exactly. He was an aggressor in a physical conflict with the police. And he *was armed*.
> "briefly putting his hand on the agents waist"
Exactly. That's battery. Armed aggressor.
> "and again, he makes no threatening movements towards the agents."
Wrong. He's (1) committed battery, (2) interfering with federal agents, and (3) armed.
> "[agents yelling] he's got a gun! he's got a gun!"
Yup, at this point there are really only two options:
1. immediately go limp and *maybe* survive
2. continue to fight back and almost certainly die.
Pretti chose option 2
At this point the video, even with frame-by-frame, is not clear. According to the times, the agent who reacted to "he's got a gun!" drew his gun and shot. They claim that you can see his arm recoil but I can't see anything inconsistent with his normal shifting movement. But it is here that the right and left tend to disagree:
RIGHT: the first shot was an accidental discharge from the recovered Sig
LEFT: the first shot came from the ICE agent reacting to "he's got a gun!"
Either way, the shooting is 100% justified. An armed man intentionally engages with law enforcement and then continues to fight and resist arrest after being pepper sprayed. But obviously the right's narrative (accidental discharge) makes it even cleaner.
Edit: Forgot to address my reaching point. It happened after the first shot. It makes more sense on the accidental discharge theory then on the ICE taking the first shot theory. Look at 27 seconds.
https://x.com/PatriotForgeUSA/status/2015221841665691993
Edit 2: I don't normally like my own comments, but wanted to sort the ICE response above the J6 response.
I think it's legit to push back on some of the Times commentary, though I also think it's something of a semantic debate. You're certainly right that Pretti was never handcuffed and fully immobile. At the same time, it's also true that he was on his hands and knees with his hands by his head while four guys were on top of him (including one beating him in the head with a spray can). I don't think it's unreasonable for someone in that position to be trying to protect his head and face with his arms, and I don't think it's unreasonable for someone to describe that situation as the officers having him under control (versus say the first 1:45 of the Times video when he's still on his feet or being dragged down). But again, you're right that he's not immobilized and under full control.
A few other points about things you wrote:
- I wrote: "briefly putting his hand on the agents waist"
You replied: "That's battery. Armed aggressor."
I guess we'll have to agree to disagree on this. But I'd invite other folks to look again at the seconds in question (20-23 secs in the video here: https://www.nytimes.com/2026/01/24/us/minneapolis-shooting-federal-agents-video.html) and come to their own judgements. I'd wager there is not a jury in the country that would convict someone of battery based on those actions. If someone shoves someone to the ground and a third party tries to stand between them to protect the person who has been shoved but does nothing more than to try to interpose their body, that's not battery.
- You wrote: "continues to fight and resist arrest"
Again, can you provide any moment in any video that shows him "fighting". I think it's legitimate to say he was resisting arrest (although even there, I mainly see someone who has been pepper sprayed trying to stay on his feet and then trying to protect himself while being beaten).
- "Either way, the shooting is 100% justified."
While I disagree (I don't see how when he fired the first shot, a reasonable officer would conclude that Pretti was a threat), I'm certainly not a use of force expert. So I look forward to hearing the full case for the defense at the trial.
> "While I disagree (I don't see how when he fired the first shot, a reasonable officer would conclude that Pretti was a threat), I'm certainly not a use of force expert. So I look forward to hearing the full case for the defense at the trial."
I'm not a lawyer either, but as I pointed out in my first post in this sub-thread, in my gun safety training (20 years ago), it was made clear that if you are carrying and do not (1) comply and (2) stay calm, there is a very good probability you will end up dead, and the police will be justified in justified in killing you.
If you want to get in a fight with the police, don't bring a weapon.
No argument that Pretti would have been better off without a gun.
But again, I think it's really wrong to describe him as "getting in a fight with the police." He never fought. And it's why people are so outraged.
Meanwhile, coincidentally, Peter Miller (one of my favorite writers although he usually writes about much different stuff) has a great piece on the Renee Good shooting which I highly recommend:
https://medium.com/@tgof137/would-jonathan-ross-lose-a-trial-over-shooting-renee-good-6c7f3db0f361
> "But again, I think it's really wrong to describe him as "getting in a fight with the police." He never fought. And it's why people are so outraged."
If someone without TikTok or X were reading your response, they'd think Pretti was walking down the street and then ICE grabbed him and threw him to the ground. Pretti was interfering with the police carrying out their duties. He was obstructing the police. He was the aggressor.
Then, when the police pepper sprayed him, he resisted arrest. So yes, that's fighting the police.
Complying is:
- not getting in the way of the police
- doing what the police tell you to do without resisting
Renee Good
--------------
- also was actively obstructing the police
- pace your link, Ross was not in her way, but she made a three point turn to aim directly at him, then accelerated.
An interesting debate.
Many people don’t agree with federal drug laws. Would you consider the actions taken by Minneapolis protestors, Good, Pretti, et al to be acceptable if they were done during DEA enforcement actions? How about people who don’t like gun sale and registration laws? Could they justifiably behave this way during ATF actions? Why or why not?
Any thoughts on the "assault me, motherfuckers" video that now seems to be corroboarated?
This is not a great source, but I assume you wouldn't trust anything that wasn't from a lefty source. He kicks out the taillight of an ICE car and shouts "Assault me, motherfuckers!"
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/jan/29/alex-pretti-shooting-11-days-before-federal-officers-clash
While I had not intended to extend the conversation further, this piece by Jesse Singal today is directly on point:
https://jessesingal.substack.com/p/why-ubiquitous-video-isnt-making
Think he is spot on about Covington, Rittenhouse, and Pretti.
I haven't read it yet, and will respond, but I'm familiar with Jesse Singal because he is one of the few sane liberals/leftists when it comes to gender ideology, and well-informed on the issue.
But he's so blind when it comes to everything else. I remember a recent comment on the reddit sub r/blockedandreported when a commentator there was frustrated with his Gell-Mann Amnesia about NPR. He's frequently criticized their horrible coverage on transgender issues, but he uncritically believes them on everything else.
And it's paywalled, as is the archive.
You can always subscribe for the trial period and cancel within 7 days. But here are the most relevant paragraphs after the paywall:
"I’ve been thinking a lot about those two incidents in the wake of Alex Pretti’s killing by ICE agents, because we’re seeing a right-wing version of the same disturbing dynamics—arguably, a more intense version...
"While the scene of the Pretti killing was chaotic and certain details of certain moments are obscured from view, there is not one iota of a trace of evidence, anywhere, that Pretti did anything that warranted lethal force on the part of the ICE officers who had wrestled him to the ground, beat him, and pepper-sprayed him by the time they shot him. The New York Times, as is often the case with these sorts of heavily scrutinized incidents, has done the best video analysis I’m aware of.
On right-wing social media, though, you would think that we didn’t know all this, that much of these videos simply don’t exist. It is very, very hard to even understand the arguments many Trump supporters are making because the videos do provide so much information and prove so demonstrably that Pretti posed no threat to them at the moment they shot him.
It’s been interesting to notice all the similarities between how these folks justify adopting such a reality-denying position and how lefties have in similar, prior circumstances. One is to simply invoke tropes common to their movement that don’t quite map onto what happened, but which seem to activate certain feelings of anger and resentment. In the case of the Covington Catholic kids, for example, the situation superficially looked similar enough to an incident of white-on-nonwhite racial harassment that many commentators just sort of shrugged and went with that. Kyle Rittenhouse, meanwhile, was a “white vigilante” or a “white militiaman” with a gun — figures that loom very large and dangerous in the liberal/left imagination ....
We have another trope here, a conservative one, in the case of Pretti: the armed anti-cop lunatic. So conservative commentators and the more deranged Xers keep mentioning that he was armed at the time of his death, echoing the misleading statements put out by top-level Trump officials right afterward. But, at the risk of repeating myself from earlier this week, not only did Pretti never threaten the cops with his gun, but all the available evidence suggests they didn’t even notice it until he was completely subdued.
The latest video of Pretti to come out, which shows him spitting and cursing at ICE agents and kicking in a taillight of one of their videos 11 days before he was killed, has only “vindicated” the right-wing belief that the shooting was justified. Here we see the same sort of deeply tribalistic, pseudomagical thinking — albeit applied to a much more serious incident — that can cause someone to believe that they can infer heaps of useful information about a 16-year-old based on the angel of his smile. The fact that Pretti engaged in an earlier, destructive incident somehow tells us, contrary to all the available evidence of the shooting itself, that the shooting was justified."
He then goes on to talk about to this exchange:
https://x.com/JDHaltigan/status/2016727616976273464
The point, which I fully agree with, is that arguing with right wing folks about Pretti is just like arguing with left wing folks about Rittenhouse. They are so caught up in the narrative that they want to believe that they refuse to see what is right in front of their eyes on video.
Well he made the same assertion you did, and then referenced the same NY Times video you did.
This debate is not "objective leftists" vs. "biased conservatives" or even "biased leftists" vs. "biased conservatives". It's conservatives who know, practice, and live the ethics of lethal force (because of gun culture) against leftists who just started thinking about it five minutes ago. Go take an NRA gun safety class sometime. You'll spend 2 days learning that things 100 times milder than Pretti's actions will get you killed, and it will be your own fault.
I hereby create "The leg fallacy" from the ladies in The View, who after one of the high-profile shootings suggested that the police officer should have simply shot the guy in the leg. Now, leg shots are not safe no matter what cop shows portray. There are several major arteries like femoral, popliteal, deep femoral etc. You might actually have a better chance of hitting an artery in the leg than in the torso.
But suppose that leg shots were safe. One of the first things you learn about the ethics of self-defense is that if you aren't in mortal fear, then you don't shoot at all. In fact, you'd be guilty of murder or manslaughter if you killed someone even if you meant it to be nonlethal. And if you are in mortal fear, then you shoot to kill. And you overkill because a fatal gunshot may not kill someone before they can draw their own gun and fire back. Brain or spinal cord is *usually* an instant kill, heart may take 15 seconds, and a major artery might take 2 minutes to stop your opponent.
What I'm getting at with the leg fallacy is that leftists who don't know anything about guns are creating their own Rashi (commentary on the Torah) from square 1 with a politically motivated case as their starting point. That's why so many leftists questioned why Pretti was shot so many times.
Yeah. It makes me think less of Pretti overall. Think he was wrong to kick the taillight (and to scream obscenities), and I have no issue with the agents tackling him after he did so. Would have had no issues with them arresting him either.
But it obviously doesn't change anything to justify his shooting this weekend. In fact, since Pretti was also apparently carrying a gun that first time, it reinforces the fact that he regularly carried a gun.
To be honest, I'm not a huge fan of that, but that's because I'm not a fan of carrying weapons in general. It certainly doesn't justify shooting someone.
Just read this Sebastian Junger piece which I think provides some interesting historical perspective on the back and forth we’re having;
https://open.substack.com/pub/sebastianjunger/p/women-are-the-key
So do you truly believe that having anything other than open borders is the moral equivalent of dangerous and unsafe factory conditions during the gilded Age?*
Even if your answer is 'yes' - and leftists have rejected national sovereignty since the communists - that doesn't give leftists the right to ignore the law and use violence against law enforcement.
But he is right about it being the women. As Orwell put it in 1984: "It was always the women, and above all the young ones, who were the most bigoted adherents of the Party, the swallowers of slogans, the amateur spies and nosers-out of unorthodoxy." We see that today - studies on female academics show that they are far more inclined to censorship of the truth for the sake of their moral beliefs.
In the Bible, women were more attuned to Jesus' true ministry than the men, which is why Mary of Betheny anointed Jesus' feet for burial, while male disciples didn't understand Jesus when he suggested he would die soon. But unanchored from a source of truth, women are all-too-often conformists who prize orthodoxy over truth and goodness.
* I don’t consider dangerous mills to be a source of oppressive injustice. They were harmful and it is a use-case for government intervention, but they are not an historic injustice like the progressive support for “scientific racism”, Social Darwinism, and eugenics.
So while the left considers themselves an historic source for good, the opposite is true. Leftists have created harm at every stage in their history, beginning with the tyranny of the French Revolution, running through scientific racism, Social Darwinism, and eugenics (all embraced by the 20th century progressives), communism and fascism, their mass sterilizations during the 60s and 70s because of the population bomb, and continuing through their support for promiscuous sex - which plunged 30% of the population into poverty - and abortion, and their generalized attack on national sovereignty.
By contrast, the enduring good changes have been Christian, such as representative government (The Dutch in 1581, Cromwell, and the Puritans initiating the American Revolution), abolition, opposition to eugenics, and opposition to abortion and promiscuous sex.
First off, I made a mistake when sharing the Junger link. It was intended to be a reply to Heyjude (it was relevant to the back and forth we were having, not your post). The point was to share another historical example of civil disobedience, not to compare unsafe factories to immigration policy.
Second, I'm certainly not advocating for open borders. The Searchlight Institute just put out a good memo which does a good job of capturing what I think should happen:
https://www.searchlightinstitute.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Searchlight-Memo-to-Interested-Parties_-Reform-and-Retrain-ICE-Dont-Abolish-It.pdf
Here's the concluding section:
The Plan: Reform and Retrain
Democrats have to offer a proactive vision that shows we are serious about enforcing our immigration laws and directly addresses the cruelty and lawlessness of the Trump Administration’s policies.
We have already lived through this movie: the chaos caused by ICE’s tactics in our cities today is in part the result of voters losing trust in Democrats’ ability to secure the border during the Biden Administration. Democrats are right to call Trump’s racist and vindictive approach to immigration for what it is, but they should be specific and direct about what their approach to interior immigration law enforcement would be. Public trust is the bedrock for law enforcement, and ICE will have a steep road ahead of itself to rebuild the confidence it has lost with many American communities. But we will
always need a federal agency charged with deporting people who are in the United States illegally. We can have a debate about whether we need to replace ICE with a new agency that has this mission, or provide meaningful reforms that rebuild the public’s fractured trust in ICE’s ability to discharge its mandate safely and effectively—but we should not fall for the trap Trump has set by advocating for wholesale abolition.
An aggressive plan can be summed up in two words: Reform and Retrain.
REFORM
Reform ICE root and branch, including:
- We are a nation of laws. We need to enforce our interior immigration laws in a way that adheres to the constitutional right to due process.
- No masks. If you are enforcing lawful orders, there is no justification for hiding your name, your face, or your agency affiliation.
- No one is above the law. There must be stiff consequences, including dismissal and prison time, for officers who break the law.
- No indiscriminate enforcement. ICE needs to focus its limited resources on
criminals and people who pose a threat to our communities, not landscapers and nurses.
- Outside oversight. We need a bipartisan group of law enforcement professionals to be charged with overseeing and reviewing ICE use of force policies, training, and incidents. And we need to provide justice and compensation for victims identified by this bipartisan group.
RETRAIN:
ICE needs to become a modern, accountable, and professional law enforcement organization, including:
- Use of Force Policies. ICE officers need to undergo rigorous—and
recurring—training that adheres to law enforcement best practices on how and when to use force.
- Community policing practices. ICE should be trained on, and adhere to, the best practices identified by state and local police forces when interacting with the public.
- Identify and weed out the bad apples. Rescind Trump Administration policies that have significantly relaxed vetting and standards for new employees, and ensure that all personnel undergo recurring vetting to ensure they meet the highest standards for professionalism.
- Rightsize ICE. Refocus the agency on its core mission and ensure that remaining. One Big Beautiful Bill Act funding is spent on core law enforcement functions, not immigration theater.
If you don't support open borders then we need ICE.
ICE has ten times as much activity in Texas as they do in Minnesota, and yet none of the drama. The problem isn't ICE, the problem is Minnesota.
My whole comment above obviously is premised on the the idea that we need ICE (or at least some kind of law enforcement equivalent).
However, it's not true that there is 10 times as much ICE activity in Texas. With the recent surge that drove all the drama, there are 3000 agents operating in Minneapolis. I can't find the personnel numbers for Texas, but since there are only 22,000 ICE agents nationwide, there obviously aren't 30k operating in Texas.
It's also worth noting that Minneapolis has a population of under 500k folks. So an equivalent kind of surge in Houston, San Antonio, Dallas, and Austin would mean about 50k agents operating in those cities. There is obviously nothing close to that going on.
Now, I would agree that this isn't the whole story. Folks in Minneapolis don't want ICE there much more strongly than people in Texas (at least from what I can tell; haven't spent time recently in either place). But if you think what's going on in Minneapolis isn't unprecedented, then you simply don't have an accurate picture of what is happening.
The relevant metric is "number of deportations"
- Minnesota: 12,000
- Texas: 171,000
The fact that there are currently many ICE agents in Minnesota is because of the defiance of Federal immigration law in Minnesota. When people follow the law, you don't need many officers.
https://tracreports.org/immigration/reports/651/
I noticed that you did not address Pretti's history of actively courting violent resistance. He *wanted* to be a martyr.
This is full of excellent observations. Perhaps when societies begin with the "c" word, "cult", it is all downhill from there. The term has always perplexed me, because Obama appeared to enjoy far more unquestioning universal admiration from Dems, than Trump ever did, from Reps.
As a moderate Conservative who spent nearly a quarter century in an overwhelmingly bright Blue upper middle class enclave, can I vote for "morally and intellectually superior" being a main issue, along with hypocrisy?
I have no idea if many Coastal Dems always loathed Flyover residents and Trump just gave them permission to finally release their snark, or if the vitriol is new. Either way, if the middle section of the US ever heard many Coastal Dems describe them, we would have permanent single Party rule, but not in a way Dems would enjoy.
Vicious is the only word that often does the diatribes justice, except perhaps, clueless. "Racist rubes, misogynistic, homophobic, ill educated and fat" were often Rep descriptions. Hilary's "Basket of Deplorables" was her normal speech.
The superior intellects were always amusing since many "Elites" seem to truly believe, food magically appears in Whole Foods, electricity is an energy source, rather than a delivery system and the world would be just fine, powered exclusively by wind and solar.
The lack of common sense if often surpassed only by blatant hypocrisy. School choice is White Supremacy when offered to poor children, but not when utilized by wealthy Dem families. Then, it is just good parenting.
SUVs that deliver children safely to and from school are killing the planet, but private jet travel is a life sustaining necessity, for those of certain lineage.
Millions of migrants in Texas is a compassionate necessity, but 2 dozen in Martha's Vineyard is a demographic emergency, requiring military assistance.
Dems believe in diverse neighborhoods, but are often, oddly, ensconced in neighborhoods entirely devoid of certain ethnicities. They evidently reside there against their will.
Homelessness is not a Coastal problem, because everyone knows the homeless are all relocated Red State residents.
After 25 years, I could write a book, but surely a pattern is forming. However bad Reps might imagine, the outright distain is far worse.
Am sure many Reps also have entrenched inaccurate beliefs about Dems, but in my experience there is absolutely no balance in loathing the politically different.
> "Dems believe in diverse neighborhoods, but are often, oddly, ensconced in neighborhoods entirely devoid of certain ethnicities. They evidently reside there against their will."
"Leftism for thee, but not for me."
Democrats intentionally choose to live in expensive neighborhoods that firewall them against the harmful consequences of leftist policies. We see this in both defunding the police and open borders immigration.
Bravo, Madam! Bravissimo!
From the article: "For instance, in contrast to the first two groups, a plurality of Mainline Republicans and a majority of the Reluctant Right agree with the statement, “The government should not deport anyone without a hearing before a judge so that people who have a genuine right to be in the US don’t get mistakenly deported.”
Headline News: "...over 500,000 noncitizens did not show up for their scheduled removal hearings, while the Department of Homeland Security dismissed or closed an additional 700,000 pending immigration cases, according to the findings of Andrew R. Arthur, the Resident Fellow in Law and Policy at the Center for Immigration Studies." Golly, who would have thought that a million foreigners who flouted our immigration laws would flout our immigration laws?
Any form of amnesty for illegal aliens will simply encourage more illegal immigrants waiting for the next amnesty.
True, however now that the border is really closed, per Trump Administration, it may be a good time to at least discuss.
Guest worker permits, maybe. Citizenship, NEVER.
I think this is an excellent approach to reaching the other side. But the calculation is missing at least one element. MAGA sees this issue as largely occurring in cities or states with blue government. The anti-ice movement is not broad across the country. It has specific flashpoints — all of them in blue, poorly governed cities.
People in red states are largely unaffected. So it reads more like a side show than a worrisome trend.
The uncomfortable truth is that, where ICE is allowed to operate with impunity and is supported (or at least unhindered) by local government and citizenry, they are accomplishing their task with little notice or fanfare.
This results in the narrative on the right that the lefts only goal is to hang on to votes and census numbers from illegal immigrants in their midst. This view is problematic but the fact that every flashpoint is a blue city lends it credence.
I would add one more thought to your comment. The key variable isn’t whether protests exist, it’s whether local authorities enforce the boundary between protest and obstruction early and consistently. Where that line is enforced, escalation is cut off and the risk of someone getting hurt drops dramatically. Where it isn’t, small confrontations compound into national flashpoints. That is what has happened in Minneapolis. There were several protests in red states like Texas where protestors crossed the line of obstruction and were shut down by local/ state police. This lowered the risks considerably of someone getting hurt.
Our town of half a million had 300 protesters this weekend (of course it made the front page). Yesterday four illegal immigrants were in the courthouse with DUI charges and they left with ICE. No riots or anything. Can you guess if I live in a Red or Blue state?
Yeah same here. Media also conflates thousands at a protest (as in minneapolis) with protests in Omaha or Tulsa, as if they were equally supported. the Headline is never “small group of anti-ICE protesters,” it’s alway “protest erupts in xxx”
If they were to win, they’d be like the dog that caught the car.
No idea how to actually govern, too focused on their hatred of the leader of the opposition party who won’t be running next election.
They need some adults in charge to be credible.
There already was a good plan on immigration. Put forth during Clinton after careful study by the civil rights icon Barbara Jordan. It failed, the following is from Google.
"Barbara Jordan’s 1990s immigration reform proposals failed to pass Congress primarily due to intense, unified opposition from a "left-right coalition" comprising business groups seeking low-wage labor, ethnic advocacy groups, and libertarians"
Those are the same folks paying off both parties to this day. Bush loved illegal immigrant labor, Obama did well on his first term but got shanghaied by the leaders of ethnic advocacy groups whom we now know don't really represent those groups.
Maybe after we go back to levels that would have been under Jordan's plan we can revisit how many more than zero we should let in.
Bear in mind I'm a registered D, worked as an election judge, precinct coordinator as they now call it for many years, lots of work for the D Party.
Barbara Jordan feels like the last time we tried to treat immigration as a national strategy: policy that serves the national interest, with workable enforcement and a disciplined legal system. The irony is I suspect we’re going to spend the next 30 to 40 years gradually realizing we need orderly immigration because birth rates are falling. And the U.S. is one of the few countries with a real capacity to assimilate newcomers at scale if we do it competently. That’s why this moment is such a shame: we’re burning trust on chaos instead of building a durable bargain the country can unite around. I’d bet my grandkids will look back and ask why we couldn’t do the obvious, set a strategic policy, enforce it predictably, and bring people in legally and openly.
One other major issue is that the the left views assimilation as a dirty word. It would be nice to get back to the 20th century view of an America that’s multi-ethnic and mono-cultural a.k.a. The Melting Pot
Boy I agree with that. The three principal items I look at for assimilation are a) spoken and written English with competence, b) either education, job training or apprenticeship and c) learning our legal system including the basics of constitutional rights and obligations. This is what is needed for someone to be successful.
"To get Danish citizenship, you generally need 9 years of continuous residence, a permanent residence permit, passing a Danish language test and citizenship test (on Danish society/history), being financially self-sufficient (e.g., 3.5 years full-time work in 4 years), no serious criminal record, and declaring loyalty to Denmark."
Especially considering the quality of many of the people wishing to immigrate. China has the best engineering schools in the world, yet many/most of their best students would like to immigrate here. The east Asians assimilate very well also.
And what would you do with the 15-20M already here?
Barbara's plan had no amnesty whatsoever of course. I'd certainly support that. They can apply at the US consulate in their home countries. Of course priority is to the young, highly educated, employable, etc., and almost no immigration until we get a handle on things. But for those who left voluntarily they would be able to apply.
David Brooks is a liberal but he had the insight to see that liberals misunderestimate their conservative opponents. "Every election year, we in the commentariat come up with a story line to explain the result and the story line has to have two features. First, it has to be completely wrong. Second, it has to reassure liberals that they are morally superior to the people who just defeated them. In past years, the story line has involved Angry White Males or Willie Horton-bashing racists. This year, the official story is that throngs of homophobic, Red America values voters surged to the polls to put George W. Bush over the top. The same insularity that caused many liberals to lose touch with the rest of the country now causes them to simplify, misunderstand and condescend to the people who voted for Bush. If you want to understand why Democrats keep losing elections, just listen to some coastal and university town liberals talk about how conformist and intolerant people in Red America are." David Brooks, 11/5/2004
Many liberals conflate understanding with approval. They recoil at the idea of trying to understand where conservatives are coming from b/c understanding, in their minds, implies agreement or acceptance. Most are also pretty convinced that they've got a monopoly on truth and that there is zero possibility that they might learn something or change their minds. (Neither of these things is unique to liberals).
I agree with your goals, but your ideas for attaining them have proven at best ineffective and at worst destructive. I think this because I see the results of your ideas in action in every major city in the country. It’s time we attach accountability for results to programs. Good intentions are not enough.
This is the fundamental premise of conservatives that liberals can never accept. Liberals prefer to believe we are all just racist bigots exhibiting every kind of “phobia” they can dream up.
This is an excellent analysis of the existential risk to our society’s civil cohesion. The failure to acknowledge those with a contrary opinion or view about contentious issues have legitimate reasons for their positions has become a sickness that infects both sides of the political divide between so-called liberals and conservatives. Another way to think about this critical problem is the failure to apply strategic empathy when analyzing any issue or event. Instead of demonizing the “other side,” we should listen without anger or emotion, engage in non-confrontational discourse, and respond with logic rather than ad hominem arguments.
Another important point made here is that patience is necessary when trying to create the environment for changing mindsets and policies. Incremental change is the best way to move a society towards a new way of thinking. Gay marriage is a perfect example, as is the civil rights movement in the 50s and 60s.
We are living now in a time of impatience and information silos that feed a one sided narrative to people stuck in a mindset that does not tolerate dissent.
The truth is there is no one truth. The issues of the day should be seen through a lens that sees grey, not black and white.
Thank you for this important perspective.
Iron Law: "You can always tell a 'progressive,' but you can never tell a 'progressive' a single thing. They think they are better and smarter and everyone else. They talk at everyone else, but only listen to each other."
My 20s progressive granddaughter lecturing her grandfather (20 year veteran) about how the military should be run....
“The government should not deport anyone without a hearing before a judge so that people who have a genuine right to be in the US don’t get mistakenly deported.”
Is it your contention that this isn’t currently happening? Or is it your contention that an order of removal from an immigration judge and subsequent administrative warrant to execute the removal doesn’t meet that standard? Because I’ve seen no credible evidence of the former and plenty of rhetoric based on the latter. E.g. “without a judicial warrant”
I posted this the other day but it bears repeating. Someone ran the numbers and showed the Tump administration has a lower deportation error rate than the Obama administration.
https://nypost.com/2026/01/22/opinion/how-trumps-ice-enforcement-record-blows-obamas-out-of-the-water-by-a-lot/
Most Americans support deporting illegal immigrants who have committed other crimes. And, I think, most Americans support deporting non-citizen Radical Islamists and their supporters (even if they came in legally). So, we kind of have a consensus on policy. Re others in the US illegally, there appears to be a consensus to require them to return to their country of origin, however, utilize administrative and financial incentives to accomplish this. But no rough tactics or ICE for the last group. And possibly allow legitimate asylum claims, with quick adjudication.
Not calling the other party adversaries and opponents would be a good start.
John Edwards gave a speech in 2008--Building One America--that has a different framing.
https://inequality.stanford.edu/sites/default/files/media/_media/pdf/pathways/winter_2008/Edwards.pdf
I liked him better than the rest, unfortunate about his personal issues which look tame compared to the current occupant.
Yes he was. And the personal issues were blown up in ways that would be dismissed today. Saw him at the postal workers union hall in Tampa.
Thank you for the link. Unfortunately, Edwards is better at identifying the problem than recommending solutions. His Get Ahead Accounts, Great Promise Partnerships, Second Chance Schools, all are retreads of existing programs. His Working Society is no more likely to solve poverty than Lyndon Johnson's Great Society did because the fundamental problem is the passivity and short-term mentality of our country's poor.
Poverty simply means little money. If people have more money they are no longer in poverty. In the US almost everyone works, and if work pays good money even more people are incentivised to work. Edwards unlike the current populist actually wanted to pay people more.