Week 52
By 
The first year anniversary comes this week.
The government assault on Minnesota continues. In addition to concentrating 3000 ICE and CBP agents in the state, Trump is claiming to defund a number of programs.
The concentration is to convince us all that ICE is more powerful than it is so that we will give up. The good people in Minnesota are fighting back.
Will Stancil can be annoying on the microblog platforms. I deal with the problem of annoying people by not following them if they’re not targeting me. I see the occasional Stancil post anyway. But he’s ratcheted it up for ICE. He’s a Minnesotan and doesn’t like what they’re doing, so he’s doing something about it.
That’s eight minutes, possibly more, that the ICE agents in those cars aren’t beating or arresting someone. Throwing sand in the gears is good.
After an incident in which ICE ate in a Mexican restaurant and then arrested some of the workers, another Mexican restaurant refused them service.
I’ve seen reports that ICE activity may be slowing down in south Minneapolis. Other cities in Minnesota have been hit as well.
Here’s a gift link to the latest NYT analysis of videos of Renee Good’s murder.
The other big issue is Greenland. I can see the violence in Minnesota, but something in my brain rebels against anything so ridiculous as the US trying to take Greenland, but here we are. Several European (NATO) countries have sent military planners to Greenland, who also serve as a tripwire against the US. That latter may be important with Trump. He likes quick missions like bombing Iranian nuclear sites or kidnaping Nicolas Maduro, but he shies away from boots on the ground.
The US has a treaty with Greenland that allows us to station pretty much any military thing there, but Trump told the NYT that ownership is important to his psychology. He was quite clear that it was for his personal feel-good.
Early in the week, so buried under other news, Trump declared Biden pardons null and void. If that sticks, we can have a lot of fun with it later. In other news, Trump pardoned someone for the second time, for fraud both times.
Also early in the week, Revolution Wind won a court order to allow it to continue building off-shore windmills.
Virginia’s new governor, Abigail Spanberger, is being sworn in today. Yesterday she asked at least five members of the UVa boatd to resign, and I think they have, along with one administrator who seems to have been a part of the actions last year to bow to Trump’s edicts.
This was issued just last night.
Added later: This is important.
There seem to be more shit-stirrers and general bad actors on Bluesky than there have been. Or I’m getting more sensitive to them.
Follow the court-watchers for the details of the lawsuits. Chris Geidner (LawDork, Bluesky), Roger Parloff (Lawfare, Bluesky), and the Just Security tracker.
As usual, keep it to things that have actually happened, not hypotheticals. What is actually happening is plenty..
Caring for yourself and loved ones is resistance too. Post your pets.
156 more weeks to go. What are you doing? As Jane Goodall often put it: Do what you can, where you are, when you are able. It’s getting more important to participate.
Previous weeks: Week 10, Week 20, Week 30, Week 40, Week 50, Week 51