Lauren Beitler 🇵🇸

Happy birthday Chicago. To paraphrase Frankie Knuckes, I like to think that I was born and raised in St. Paul, but I grew up in Chicago. We each pale in significance compared to its vastness, and yet it lifts us each up.

The science on prevention and treatment of dementia is progressing! Hopefully it will get there before we do.

Deadline to Vote in Chicago’s Snowplow Naming Contest is Saturday; Will ‘Abolish ICE’ Win After Leading Nominations? “Abolish ICE” is now one of 25 finalists that Chicagoans can vote for through Saturday, with the top six vote-getters winning the honor of renaming one snowplow in each of Chicago’s six snow districts...

"Abolish ICE" should the name of every snowplow and salt truck and should be emblazoned on each one in six-foot tall letters. This is our opportunity to get the ball rolling.
to.wttw.com/4apYmkn

A long horizontal sign based on the ones at CTA stations that tell what stop you’re at. It’s gray with red, purple, and brown bands at either ends. Four pigeons are perched on the sign in various pigeon poses as a sunrise is seen in the background. The sign itself reads, ‘Maybe It will happen today’

Seems almost too inconsequential to talk about but curling commentary is so opaque. "Too thin," "Fore-foot," slower is somehow faster. They threw 8 stones and one team got one point. I am weirdly riveted.

ICE Is Circling Minnesota Schools, Looking For Children to Take Liam Ramos, 5, isn’t the only child in detention. Teachers and parents describe kids being hunted by federal agents.

NEW: School hallways are silent. Grandparents patrol outside in shifts. Two more kids taken from Liam Ramos' school.

Trump isn't deescalating ICE at all at MN schools.

“I stopped wearing my high heels to work. I wear my boots to work because I have had to run." www.huffpost.com/entry/ice-mi...

Minnesotans on Lake Bde Maka Ska (formerly Lake Calhoun) in Minneapolis. Jan. 30, 2026.

📷: WCCO-TV

Something I've been trying to impart on people is that the ICE occupation in Minnesota is both an ethnic cleansing and an ideological terror campaign. It's clear that the second part has utterly failed; the community is not terrified. But ICE is now desperately trying to salvage the first part.

Toughest congressperson in America rears back for a punch, and refuses to cut short townhall, after asshole sprays her with something.

He was legally observing
He was helping other legal observers
He was helping other potential victims
He was not brandishing a gun
May Alex Pretti’s memory be a blessing

This is the next chapter in the burgeoning civil war. The government is at war with the same community that participated in the uprising after George Floyd's murder. Fascism against multi-ethnic pluralism.

Furthermore, ICE is an organization predicated on violence.

What does "presumably" mean in this context? Who is presuming and for what reason? Leaving aside customs laws which I don't have a lot of knowledge about, immigration is a net good for our society.

What's your argument against abolishing ICE?

This kind of messaging is intended to drown moms in research, risk, and responsibility.

The goal is to keep them so anxious and so busy that they can't work for pay--especially not in high-powered "mens" jobs--or get involved in any kind of efforts to push for progressive change.

Saint Paul schools will be closed Tuesday and Wednesday to prepare for optional online learning.

I’ve seen schools close for snow, for pandemic, for natural disaster. I’ve never seen schools close because of threat from our own government.

👇🏽👇🏽👇🏽

And a lot of their aides aren’t safe working right now

We came close to doing this. The concentration of agents in Minneapolis is like 40 times as many though.

the best antidote to blackpilling is remembering that every video you see of an ICE thug abusing their power was recorded by an American who volunteered to put themselves in harm's way for the sake of people they've likely never met and never will

The sheer number of videos of the shooting is horrific, but in the vein of what @prisonculture.bsky.social has been saying, it proves how many people cared enough to show up where ICE was and record them. It wasn't just one or two legal observers, and when Good was shot, they didn't abandon her.

Is it time for the smelts?

I got invited to one of these today!

Turns out I still remember most of the words.

I haven’t listened to True Dreams of Wichita in probably 20 years so thank you for this.

Think much of the over-parenting we despise stems from the early on fear of the driver.
If parents weren't terrified of our streets kids would have so much more freedom and independence which might get them comfortable with their children's ability to navigate the world without them.

They should do MyChart Wrapped

A quote from an Axios story about a raccoon that got trashed at a North Carolina store that reads: "Why it matters: The intoxicated suspect was a raccoon."

Why it matters

A pyramid is a tomb. Death vibes.

The park side is much better than the street side. But in any case it is really out of scale with its surroundings and doesn‘t have enough windows.

The DC shooting story is really getting to me because we literally trained this man as a child soldier for a death squad in a forever war and Stephen Miller et al want to blame it on other cultures? It's our culture, American culture, that killed that woman.