AJW on the ICE/Pretti Shooting

I had heard Noem's comments about the shooting, but wasn't paying close attention. I remember being annoyed by her inaccurate, propagandistic description, but Sean is right: it's really bad. In fact, now that I've paid attention to it, it pisses me off more than it seems to piss him off. Noem's description is the moral equivalent of a lie.

   She needs to go.

   Like, yesterday.

   You can be incompetent. Or you can be dishonest. But both is just too much.

   And Trump needs to stop hiring people for their looks.

   AJW also reveals--and I had no idea this was part of the story--that Pretti was carrying a Sig P320...and it seems to have suffered an unintentional discharge just after the agent relieved Pretti of the firearm. The slo-mo video seems to show the slide going back immediately after the first shot is heard. The agent with possession of the firearm is moving away from the scrum, and doesn't seem to have his finger on the trigger--it would be crazy if he did, of course.

   I'm sure I don't have to tell you that the P320 is notorious for unintentional discharges.

   So, after the agents discover Pretti's firearm, and you hear someone say "gun, gun, gun," and the firearm is being taken away from the fight, the Sig goes off...and then a second agent mag dumps Pretti.

   I was skeptical about this shooting...but if that's the true timeline...it certainly seems defensible. The obvious explanation is that the second agent, hearing "gun, gun, gun" and a shot, and likely not realizing that Pretti had been disarmed, thought he (Pretti) had fired the shot at ICE.

   If that's what happened, it's tragic.

   Sean also shows footage of Pretti, in his capacity as a nurse, reading a very respectful statement about a veteran who had passed away. A reminder to righties that they didn't know this man, and he's not likely to be the America-hating moonbat of their imaginations...

   

Record High Gun Ownership, Record Low Homicide Rate, Media Silent

link

Brittany Bernstein: Media Inflame Anti-ICE Tension With False Kidnapping Claims

Well, they basically just lie about everything.

Jim Geraghty: The Administration's Crazy Claims About Firearms Re: The Pretti/MN Shooting; Noem Needs To Go

link

   The anti-Second-Amendment rhetoric from the administration (esp. Noem and Patel) is nuts. Pretti was an idiot, but not a domestic terrorist. And carrying without proper ID is dumb, but not some kind of grounds for getting shot.

   Now, I think it's dumb to carry when you think you might get into a scuffle with the cops...especially when your side is in the wrong...and it's the side that always initiates the confrontations... If we were actually in a shooting war, things would be different, of course. But we aren't. So far, anyway...

   The administration and ICE are generally in the right. They're fighting a well-oiled anarchy-and-propaganda machine that wants to undermine the rule of law...but they're so obviously wrong that they're unlikely to win...unless the good guys help them out. Fatal mistakes by ICE and dumbass comments by the administration are exactly the help the crazies need.

Also see the story on the Chinese general at the bottom of the Geraghty piece.

Kenin M. Spivak: The Campaign Against ICE Is All About Open Borders

Correct.

Well, I still think that it is ultimately about open borders--that's what the academic/activist vanguard of the left wants. But it becomes about feelz when it is repackaged for consumption by shitlibs.

Also one might say: actually ultimately, it's about the destruction of the USA and the West. Open borders is really a means to an end... But I think that's a genuine dispute on the vanguard of the left. So you can go either way on that.

NR: The ICE/Pretti Minneapolis Shooting Deserves a Credible Investigation

I couldn't agree more.

I didn't realize any other option was on the table.

The Good shooting also deserves a credible investigation, in case that doesn't go without saying.

At any rate, here's something we learned from Derek Chauvin being railroaded by the corrupt MN AG: 

Credible means: don't let those people anywhere near it.

   But then that seems to leave the DoJ...which has long been politicized by the Dems...and now seems to have been thoroughly politicized by Trump. At least, in the Before Time, they tried to hide it at least a little bit...

   At any rate: a credible investigation doesn't mean: a foregone conviction.

  Unless Keith Ellison and that MN bunch get involved, of course. Then that's exactly what it means.

   I could pontificate about how I think we got here. But you've heard it all before.

   I suppose we might hope that, now that both sides have declared total lawfare and full politicization of the process, maybe voters will be disgusted enough to vote against such repulsive bullshit.

   I certainly didn't vote for this. I understand why Trump is doing it. Maybe I'm being naive, but I'm not on board with it. I'm ok with giving people tastes of their own medicine. But I don't think Trump had to go this far.

More From the New New Age Star Trek

Apparently, "diversity" is the Federation's strength, too...or something.

Also apparently: the Klingon's name is Jay-Den.

He has an eyebrow ring.

Not even making that up.

Minneapolis ICE Shooting (Pretti) and "Organizational Provocation"

Totally agree with these guys that:

[1] The left in Minneapolis is extremely well-organized and its goal is to provoke ICE.

[2] People on the left saying that you shouldn't carry around cops or at protests are wrong*

Yeah, I know I've said that I don't like people carrying at protests...but what I meant was: open-carrying, especially long guns. It's for show...and it's not a good look. Concealed-carry is different, I think.

Obvs, there are grounds for objection here.

The Spamburgler: The Left's Trojan Horse

Elections have consequences...often very bad ones...

I'd say it's going to be a rough four years...but, honestly, I think it's going to be a lot longer than that...

VA is probably gonna end up like CA, IL, MA, and other such dumbass states--permanently locked into leftist shitholery.

I briefly semi-bought the bullshit about Spanberger being a moderate...but not for long.

For one thing: centrist Democrats are a dying breed in general.

There just don't seem to be many of them left.

For another thing: it was clear from her stances on "trans" pseudoscience and abortion that she was no moderate.

Reason: 5th Column Podcast on Pretti Minneapolis ICE Shooting

I still don't have a settled position on this. It's like the Good shooting in that, prima facie, it doesn't look great. But it's also clear that there's a lot of chaos and things happen fast. The agents get his gun, then it looks like he reaches for it / for his empty holster, one or more agents shout 'weapon', a round is fired, then the agent fires a couple of times...then mag dumps the decedent... There's plenty of room for other judgments here.

Both Teams Absolutely Sure About the Second Minneapolis ICE Shooting, Too

Looks like both the reds and the blues are, again, absolutely certain about the second Minneapolis ICE shooting...but, of course, certain about opposite conclusions.

   Seems to me that the one thing that's obvious is that it isn't obvious--that is: it isn't obvious whether it was a justified shooting.

   I do think it's obvious that the blue team is, in general, to blame. They're action are quasi-insurrectionary. their overall goals are nuts, and they intentionally foment chaos and push the boundaries of the legal in harassing law enforcement.

   But, again: as for the legal and/or moral status of this particular shooting: I just don't know.

   Though I will add:  as I've been saying for almost ten years: IMO the right started this by mixing the First and Second Amendments in a dangerous way: that is, bringing firearms to demonstrations. (Well, maybe they didn't start it--but they started the most recent spasm of it.) Now we've got lefties--who tend to be even less stable than righties--routinely bringing guns to their protests--protests that are already right on the verge of chaos and violence.

BCP: Video Shows ICE Shooting Armed Minneapolis Protestor Was Justified

Again: I don't have a view about this--not yet, anyway:

WSJ: "Videos Contradict U.S. Account of Minneapolis Shooting by Federal Agents"

I've heard conflicting accounts of this.

I've got no view about this, and may not deserve one.

I've got no inclination to defend illicit use of force by LEOs--but I'm not sure what counts as justified use of force here.

Yinka that Guy: More Crying, Ranting Moonbats

The most entertaining crazy probably starts at 20:45.

Blacks have fewer rights...it's in the Constitution!!!

Hundreds of Americans are Alive Today Because Trump Won the Election

Democrat policies cost lives.

There are literally hundreds of Americans who would be dead if Kamala Harris had won the 2024 election. https://t.co/qsFSReDcV7

— The Patriarch Tree (@PatriarchTree) January 22, 2026

Let's not think about the Iraq insanity right now...k?

Oh and: anybody tempted to make the tired correlation/causation point here needs to be slapped.

Judson Berger: The Cost of Trump's Greenland Grab

Agree.

WSJ Opinion: The Minneapolis Protests and the Dems' Nonprofit Problem

"A subtler and more effective attack on democracy than anything Mr. Trump has attempted."

Kahlenburg and Lin: American Studies Can't Stand Its Subject

80% of articles in the field's leading journal were negative, 0 were positive.

If this is at all surprising, it can only be because it's even more lopsided than one might have guessed.

Philip Pilkington: Greenland is Punishment for Europe's Role in Ukraine

Big if true.

Though I really don't see why this would be the right way to go about things even if Pilkington is right about everything.

Is diplomacy really so catty?

Anyway...eminently worth a read, says me.

Trump Rules Out Using Military Force to Steal Greenland

Idiot.

The real headline here is that he had to rule it out...

Democrats (and the Bulwark...but I Repeat Myself...) Desperate to Avoid Admitting that "Trans Women" are not Women

Lindsey tries all the tricks: this not our biggest problem! Why do conservatives care about such a small group of people? Let's not talk about kids, let's talk about adults! It's nobody else's business!...Let people say what they want about themselves...blah blah blah...

   And, contra Robbie: the most important problem here isn't about public policy.

The most important points: 

• [1] No male is a woman and no female is a man.
• [2] Truth matters.
• [3] The American left--which now includes the Democratic party--denies both [1] and [2].

   Political correctness...i.e. prope-Lysenkoism...i.e. the subordination of truth to (leftist) political dogma is...well...plausibly the most dangerous threat the USA has ever faced. If you give up on the very idea of truth, that is the end of everything. As bad as the left's mass sexual mutilation of children is, it is far less dangerous and destructive than the general leftist rejection of truth. A bad as Trump's habitual bullshitting is, it's nothing compared to the outright, in-principle rejection of the very ideas of truth and falsehood...

   And the fact that Gavin Newsom, the shitheads at the Bulwark, and all other not-quite-sufficiently-radical Democrats are spewing out every red herring they can think of to avoid answering the question tells you everything you need to know about them: they know their party has gone insane, but they're too afraid to admit it.

Horrific.

To repeat myself repeating myself:

Breakdown of contemporary Democrats:

• ~1/3 believe that men can become women just by saying so--or by putting on dresses or having plastic surgery.
• ~1/3 know that's insane but can't bear to admit it--either because they can't bring themselves to contradict the dogmas of their tribe, or because they're afraid of being dogpiled by the crazies.
• ~1/3 are either stuck in a superposition of the first two states...or are not smart or intellectually honest enough to understand the difference between them.

If a huge percentage of a major political faction is willing to say that up is down or left is right or dogs can fly or the sky is red...and to say such things because their political tribe tells them to...we're screwed. But even worse...many leftists don't just say such insane things...they actually believe them...

   People like Gavin Newsome are repulsive. He knows the truth, but refuses to say it. Worse are people like Lindsey Grager (who I actually think I would like personally if I knew her), who frantically prevents herself from even focusing on the question, knowing that, if she did, she'd likely have to admit the truth. But worse still are the people on the fringe who actually believe that up is down...

   Look, I think similar things can be said about religion--and those folks are mostly on the right. But I think they have excuses the left doesn't have. People are generally indoctrinated with religion from the time they're kids. The left knew the truth about men and women, but decided to forget it (or pretend to) when it became politically fashionable to do so. It's not like they were raised from childhood to believe. That'd at least be some kind of excuse. Rather, their vanguard just basically announced one day ca. 2014, that 2+2 would henceforth equal 5...and they all either jumped right on the crazy train...or looked away...or just decided to shut up and go along with it all...

Disgusting.

Bad Times Ahead for the OD

Whelp, the Democrats are now more-or-less completely in control of the government of the Commonwealth.

Strap in, boys 'n' girls...'n'...nondichotomous persons of indeterminate classification...

It's gonna be a bumpy ride.

Jim Geraghty: "Tearing Apart NATO Over A Trinket," or: A Different Kind of TDS

As Geraghty notes: in a saner world, Trump's cabinet would be at least discussing invoking the 25th Amendment.

In addition to doing lasting damage to the nation and its alliances, Trump is basically breathing life into a moribund Democrat party.

Nice work, dumbass.

Danes Stunned at Trump's/America's Betrayal

As well they should.

Fuck Trump, in case I haven't mentioned that recently.

I've defended him from unfair criticisms for 8 years.

And I'm still grateful for the good things he's done for the country.

But he can fuck right off on this one.

It needs to be made clear to Demark that this is a Trump thing, not an America thing.

Oh and: Vance.

He's being a fuckhead about this one, too.

Danish Lawmaker Tells Trump to "Fuck Off"--Greenland's Not For Sale

link

Let me second that fuck off.

The Contemporary Left In Yet Another Nutshell

It's amazing how much leftist discourse is just them pretending not to understand things, thus making discourse impossible.

— Millennial Woes (@MillennialWoes) February 22, 2025

Jeffrey Blehar: "Trump Versus the World;" So...Is Trump Insane...or What?

Yeah...I'm afraid the guy really might be insane. Either that, or a fucking idiot.

Or, of course, both...

This is a pretty fair summary of this dismal, embarrassing, and possibly disastrous Greenland business:

For those too embarrassed to keep up with current events, I recommend the work of my colleague Andrew Stuttaford, who has been covering the breakneck pace of weekend developments like a hawk. I will summarize: Donald Trump’s thuggish demands for Greenland, an island that we already have unlimited military basing rights with, are now at a fever pitch. In the wake of his big show of force in Venezuela, he cannot rest until he has added it to his trophy case: Its acquisition is “psychologically needed for success.” So now not only will Denmark be tariffed — at an opening rate of 10 percent, escalating to 25 percent until such time as they give Trump what he demands — so too will ten other countries who have responded to Denmark’s symbolic request for NATO allies to come to Greenland.
Who knows if Trump will actually go through with it; half of what he writes on Truth Social is bloviation, but the other half is deadly serious, and given this, the only safe thing to do is to take him at his word. But I have no time for those who blithely wave off this sort of wildly destructive behavior as “dealmaking.” It is no such thing; it is outright megalomania. There is no other way, no more “neutral” a term, to describe a president who now mutters about his personal right to “a sacred piece of Land” like Captain Queeg hunting for missing strawberries, or who now hints at war with NATO if he is not given what he will never be able to have. This language will have repercussions.
Because yes, that’s where Trump is at now rhetorically, and if you didn’t see the tie-in coming from a mile away, you need to update your Unified Theory of Trump. Just yesterday, the president wrote a missive to Norway’s leader that he had cc’d to every American embassy in Europe: “Considering your Country decided not to give me the Nobel Peace Prize for having stopped 8 Wars PLUS, I no longer feel an obligation to think purely of Peace, although it will always be predominant, but can now think about what is good and proper for the United States of America.”
Please read that again. Let the implication sink in: Trump is now on the warpath against Denmark, and is threatening the forced dissolution of the American alliance, and as an excuse, he is citing to Norway their awarding the Nobel Peace Prize to Maria Machado. Maybe, you might say, he’s just lashing out blindly in his frustration, reaching for any weapon to hand. But what a commentary that is on the mindset of the president of the United States: We are asked to understand him either as a schoolyard bully or a child throwing a tantrum. Wresting the physical medal from Machado — by dangling the prospect of freedom for her people before her eyes — was clearly not enough: All of Europe must pay for its sin in not awarding it to him in the first place. (For those wondering what relationship the actions of a Norwegian Nobel committee have to the government of Denmark, just assume that Trump thinks all Scandinavians are the same.)
This is our president. Is he “on tilt?” No, I think he is operating as programmed. He is living a power fantasy. He has mastered the Republican Party through both showmanship and fear. Only external forces — the bond markets, perhaps the Supreme Court, and finally the ironclad laws of political gravity — will act as a check on him now. So all of his actions are of a piece: demands for the fulfillment of his ego, relentless escalation, and desperately cheap attempts to create a permanent “legacy” that will forever be denied to him. Trump may be the main character in his own story, but he will never be able to write history’s verdict of him; that work belongs to future generations, and his helplessness in the face of it lies at the hidden core of his narcissistic rage.
The clearer this becomes, the more I expect Trump to lash out against a world that has rejected him — and I fear with disastrous, irrevocable consequences. Defend Trump’s actions with respect to Greenland if you must — my job is to judge them. And I have a clear enough picture of the man at this point to predict the dire future to come: To paraphrase the verdict of Cormac McCarthy in Blood Meridian, what’s wrong with Donald Trump is wrong all the way through him. And this will not end here.

Trump has done a helluva lot to save the country. He's still, as of this moment, done a lot more good than harm. But he seems to be going over the edge now.

   Sure, maybe this is all trolling and negotiation...but it doesn't seem that way...and even if it is negotiation, it seems like the most retarded of all possible negotiation...

   WTF is wrong with this stupid jackass?

   And the Nobel Prize shit...it's just like the cherry on top of this batshit sundae...

   I legitimately can't believe how fucking stupid this all is. Nobody can reign him in? Nobody?

Peter Schweizer: How Radical Muslims Unite to "Fight America Everywhere and All the Time"

Establishing this conclusion would require a lot more evidence, of course.

My view here has a couple of components:

[1] Important parts of the left are open about their goal of destroying the U.S. and Western Civilization more generally. These views obviously trickle down from the radical vanguard to blue-team types who would not regard themselves as radical. But they trickle down in forms that are obscured--they have the effect of undermining the U.S., but this isn't open/obvious. Thus, e.g., the blue team's current views on immigration are, like so many destructive policies, marketed to progressives in terms of kindness...but their ulterior motive is destruction of the country.

[2] Every faction has its anti-American fringe. The right clearly has one. But an important question is: how extensive and influential is it? That's the question here. This fringe obviously exists on the left...and is actually pretty extensive and influential...but we need to know: how much so?

[3]  Perhaps the major problem here is: the left simply will not even consider such arguments. Show this Schweizer piece to a lefty and you know what the response will be: REEEEEE RACIST!!!111one!

I'd be happy for this thesis to be false. But it has significant prima facie plausibility. Mostly, I just demand that it be considered rather than rejected out of hand with the left's standard sophistry and name-calling. 

Rich Lowry: The Deportation Numbers Vindicate ICE (and Trump) and Rebut Its Critics

HMD: Trump: Rude, but Right About Crime

I Mac Donald articulates an important point here almost in passing: for all his bluster and bullshitting, and despite his occasional insistence that obvious falsehoods are true, Trump also often speaks important truths that others--particularly those on the left--refuse to acknowledge. One of Trump's great strengths is that he cannot be cowed into accepting and/or paying lip service to wacko aspects of, as the Critical Drinker would say, "The Narrative." I wish his commitment to the truth were more thoroughgoing...but, as is so often the case, I plead comparative choice. At least Trump, unlike the other side, does manage to stumble across the facts with fair frequency.