Tim Walz and Keith Ellison had another news conference yesterday and Walz’ anger and frustration were real, and so was Ellison’s. I recommend watching it if you missed it.

Because we’ve seen it happen again and again, I think we’re all expecting to be disappointed by the Senate’s action on ICE. Since Democrats are in the minority, it’s worth setting expectations. Here’s Greg Casar’s view:

I generally think Patty Murray is better than the average Democratic Senator, but I’m wondering why we can’t take money back from ICE as part of a deal.

Moving on to Trump’s response, I think he’s getting that ICE is very unpopular so there’s a possibility that he might pull the plug and move on to the next atrocity.

Alex Pretti was an ICU nurse at the VA, and this is disgusting:

In yesterday’s press conference, Keith Ellison mentioned that his son was a former combat medic who became a RN in Minnesota, and that his son and his son’s colleagues were very affected by Pretti’s death. Many were crying at work.

Pretti’s death seems to have precipitated a lot, but I wonder if one thing that it could precipitate is a long-overdue reckoning over the way that medical professionals, especially nurses, have been treated since COVID. MAGA has heaped scorn and abuse on one of the most widely respected (by non-weirdos) professions. Clearly, the fact that Pretti was by all accounts a great human being is a factor in the outcry over his death. Most nurses and medical professionals are the best of us. It’s time that MAGA is shamed and derided for the way they’ve treated nurses and other medical professions, because it’s disgusting.

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Argiope A9 months ago

Nurse here. I can confirm that many of us are incensed by the way our colleague Alex Pretti was executed and then slandered by this administration. The American Nurses Association is organizing calls and emails to Congress. I've called my congresscritters daily (rep and 2 senators), demanding a full independent investigation and the removal of Noem and Miller for lying to the American people about the circumstances and about our colleague. I used my Very Angry Nurse Voice, too, which I've been assured sounds like being addressed by your first, middle and last names-- even for grown people.

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Busted Knee9 months ago

Well ICE is going to Philly next it seems so that should be fun.

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TBone Dinosaur9 months ago

I loved Walz's "pro tip" about the Epstein files. Best served cold.

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TBone Dinosaur9 months ago

As seen at Atrios, the guy who ran on a rethug lawn order campaign:

Republican Chris Madel made a stunning exit from the Minnesota governor’s race on Jan. 26, saying he cannot support the national GOP’s “stated retribution on the citizens of our state, nor can I count myself a member of a party that would do so.”

In a surprise video announcement, the Minneapolis attorney said he supported the originally stated goals of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s operation in Minnesota, including the deportation of undocumented immigrants with serious criminal records, but the effort has “expanded far beyond its stated focus on true public safety threats.”

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TBone Dinosaur9 months ago

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Jeff C9 months ago

I’ve been a PA for 27+ years now, and I can tell you that the one group of people you do not want to piss off are nurses.

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TBone Dinosaur9 months ago

There is simply no reason for these bloodthirsty Nazis to be armed in the first place. Violations of immigration law are civil infractions, not crimes, and ICE detention is administrative custody, not criminal incarceration.

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Kay W.9 months ago

If I were a Senate Democrat I would condition ICE funding on an independent investigation of the murders by ICE, whether they killed a citizen or a non citizen. It has to be combined state and federal but the federal investigators cannot come out of current employees of either the DOJ or the FBI. I suggest the postal inspectors as the federal investigatory agency, along with state LEOs. The DOJ and FBI have collapsed.

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Kay W.9 months ago

It will never not be funny that marauding masked federal agents actually arrived and attacked and NONE of the loudmouth gun men on the Right showed up to protect anyone. Instead nurses and poets are the heroes. Absolute frauds. Also, liberals raise good men.

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C P9 months ago

Apparently, the NRA did a Susan Collins brow-furrowed thing, which is worth exactly what it sounds like, but is still extremely unusual for them.

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mister mixAuthor9 months ago

If the Pretti murder showed us one thing, it's that carrying a weapon is the ultimate It's OK if You're a Republican act. Democrats with guns are targets, Republicans with guns are patriots.

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Scott H9 months ago

Gee, where have we been down this route before? Oh yeah, Reagan, the Mulford Act and the Black Panthers.

Once black folks showed up with MOAR GUNZ! on the statehouse steps, Republicans led by that bastard and the NRA were suddenly all about gun control.

As Michael Harriot put it a couple of days ago:

Don't worry, guys

The streets of Minneapolis are about to be flooded with "pro-life" protesters waving "Don't Tread On Me" flags chanting "All Lives Matter."

I'm sure they're on the way, right?

Right?

Usual right-wing hypocrisy. This is my shocked face.

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TBone Dinosaur9 months ago

I pirated recent photos of Black Panthers at City Hall in Philly. While their current main mission is feeding and protecting all of our peeps, they DGAF and are heavily armed, ready to die for cause. Prepared. Wish I could post a photo here.

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C P9 months ago

TB completely F, my understanding is that the NRA was still a relatively normal sporting organization that supported gun control in 1967 - them coming out in support for it wasn't out of character for them at the time, nor a thing they restricted to blacks specifically. It's only from the 1970s onwards that it became completely taken over by fascists and turned "if a citizen can't walk into a Starbucks carrying an AK-47, the Constitution is dead!"

But I know what you mean and agree in general.

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r po9 months ago

My father and my grandfather before him were something like the largest firearms dealers in South Florida in the 60s and 70s. Both life members of the NRA. The toilet reading basket always had the last several American Rifleman magazines.

By the time I was ten I had learned to shoot just about everything you've ever heard of.

We did four things with the many guns we owned:

Practice, hunt, defense during robbery, and then always properly stow them. They were not for display.

It was deemed stupid and unseemly to characterize a gun as anything other than a tool. This is what the NRA was back then.

You go to a place like Prescott these days and you will never see those four things, but you will see guns, and the intent is very clear.

I taught my wife how to shoot clay targets from a wheelybird machine during The Pestilence. I can now shift her to more practical applications, if ever required. Family's got to eat.

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Kay W.9 months ago

Agree, mm, and it’s partly because of the woo-woo health grifters and MAHA dopes. I hear over and over about how medical professionals are only in it for money and how all one needs is apple cider vinegar and protein. It’s a smear job and it isn’t fair.

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Sepideh M9 months ago

I hate when they do that because what do these dummies think that the doctors like "Dr. Hyman" who are selling you quack supplements are in it for.

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Kay W.9 months ago

Exactly. Woo woo fake medicine is a huge industry.