Alfie Kohn

No doubt CBS will come to his rescue

Or on his U-boat

Every bit as gratifying as when an archdiocese moves Father Molester to a different parish

The surge of federal forces into Minneapolis (like smaller, earlier surges into Los Angeles; Portland, Ore.; Washington; and Chicago) isn’t about law enforcement at all. It is about an administration declaring — explicitly, at times — that the purpose of federal law enforcement isn’t to uphold the rule of law or promote public safety but to enforce the will of a single man.

In fact, nearly all of the administration’s responses to deaths in custody, shootings or other accusations of abuses have used maximalist language to venerate immigration officers, dehumanize their victims and villainize anyone who doesn’t support the Trump administration. There are no disinterested parties. No innocent bystanders. People are either criminal immigrants or radical leftists who deserve what happens to them, or they are heroic, patriotic federal cops incapable of mistakes. There is no humanity for th civilians and no humility for the officers.

The lies about ICE's murders aren't "part of a cover-up"; they're "meant to show you can get away with anything. They're a projection of power....This is no longer a conversation about law enforcement or immmigration policy. This is about authoritarianism."
Excellent essay: tinyurl.com/mr8rktfk

bsky.app/profile/alfi...

Or gun rights for everyone. Or free speech.

Over Trump's past year, what originally looked like an effort to make the government his personal plaything has drifted distinctly toward doctrinal and operational fascism. Trump’ appetite for Iebensraum, his claim of unlimited power, his support for the global far right, his politicization of the justice system, his deployment of performative brutality, his ostentatious violation of sights, his creation of a national paramilitary police —all of those developments bespeak something more purposeful and sinister than run-of-the-mill greed or gangsterism. WHEN THE FACTS CHANGE, I change my mind. Recent events have brought Trump's governing style into sharper focus. Fascist best describes it, and reluctance to use the term has now become perverse. That is not because of any onc or two things he and his administration have done but because of the totality. Fascism is not a territory with clearly marked boundaries but a constellation of characteristics. When you view the stars together, the constellation plainly appears.

It's meaningful when people who use words carefully and are specialists in the subject in question decide that a provocative term does, in fact, apply. That was true when experts concluded that Israel is guilty of genocide. And it's true in describing the Trump regime as fascistic: is.gd/tYgjcD

A must-read, particularly for college instructors - not just as a solution to the conundrum of students using AI to do their assignments but as an example of successful student-centered learning and decision-making vs. traditional classrooms in which teachers just lay down the law: is.gd/4Gf1Yp

NYT headline: "Calls Grow for Independent Inquiry of Minnesota Shooting"

Please tell me this isn't going to result in an inquiry that looks at the shooting in isolation - an unfortunate anomaly whose responsibility rests solely with the agent(s) who pulled the trigger.

Ultimately leaving only those countries run by autocrats (Russia, Turkey, Hungary, Israel, Argentina....)?

The operative phrase here is "have to." The lying is about enforced dominance, not persuasion.

2/2
Thus, there's only apparent irony in hearing the right justify killing a nurse because he had a gun. Or brutalizing Capitol cops on Jan. 6. They never meant for "gun rights" or "law & order" - or, for that matter, "free speech" - to apply universally.

1/2
"If you identify conservatism with any principle, you inevitably end up finding hypocrisy. But if you conceive of conservatism as efforts by dominant groups to maintain their dominance, with principles occasionally deployed instrumentally, the contradictions/hypocrisy fade away." -David Roberts

Putin pioneered this. No opposition is legitimate. Regular, decent, “ordinary” people cannot possibly be against us because only we represent “the real people.”

Tell-tale sign of authoritarianism.

And look! Here's Stephen Miller to point them out to him!

If they are doing this to white people in broad daylight imagine what they are doing to non-white people in detention facilities.

ABCNews: "Two children, including a 6-month-old, were hospitalized last night after federal agents deployed tear gas during Wednesday night's protests, according to the Minneapolis Office of Community Safety..." Official Homeland Security posting about it: "It is horrific to see radical agitators bring children to their violent riots. PLEASE STOP ENDANGERING YOUR CHILDREN." To which Matt Novak points out on Bluesky: "The 6-month-old that DHS is tweeting about here lived In the neighborhood and the baby's father was Just trying to evacuate his family after federal agents had shot someone."

The concept of blaming the victim is nothing new, but it has been elevated to a work of art by this regime.

Too true...

Every lie told by this regime, no matter how brazen, shocking, or dehumanizing, makes perfect sense when I think about their claim that immigrants were eating pets in Ohio. It's not about evidence or credibility, it's about pushing narratives to facilitate ethnic cleansing.

Or, more to the point, if they thought his victims weren't.

Autocratic regimes have always made absurd claims to justify their acts of violence against dissenters ("He jumped out the window"); people know they're lying but can't prove it.
What's infuriating (and terrifying) here is that they're lying just as brazenly even though we can see they're lying.

Autocratic regimes have always made absurd claims to justify their acts of violence against dissenters ("He jumped out the window"); people know they're lying but can't prove it.
What's infuriating (and terrifying) here is that they're lying just as brazenly even though we can see they're lying.

Just staggered by the complete moral void of not even *pretending* to wait for more information before pivoting to “the opponent of the state deserved it.” It is so insanely depraved. Soulless.

They meant an overreaching *liberal* government, not a far-right ethnonationalist government. And their support for unrestricted access to guns, like their support for "free speech" was meant all along to apply only to those on their side.

This is about immigration enforcement like Montgomery was about transit policy

Extrapolating from your summary of how the right views free speech, A.S., the Second Amendment means we're allowed to have guns and you're allowed to support our right to have guns.

It's like the right's demand for free speech: It's meant to apply only to those on their side.

Can't wait for the full-scale investigation of ... the victim