Another day, another killing by the trigger-happy hooligans of ICE.
NY Times: Minneapolis Live Updates: Videos Appear to Contradict Federal Account of Killing
Subtitled: “An I.C.U. nurse shot by federal agents was an American citizen with no criminal record, the city police chief said. A New York Times video analysis shows he was holding a phone, not a gun.”
The official narrative is calling the victim a “domestic terrorist,” because he was carrying a gun — which is perfectly legal, as Republicans have made sure for decades — which somehow justified the killing, despite the video evidence showing the contrary. You can’t believe anything the administration says.
And this.
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And another day of the steady slide of the US into historical irrelevance. Headlines from the New York Times today, the print edition.
NY Times: China Wins as Trump Cedes Leadership of the Global Economy, subtitled “The president used a keynote speech at the World Economic Forum in Switzerland to renounce the last vestiges of the liberal democratic order.”
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NY Times, 23 Jan 2026: Rejecting Decades of Science, Vaccine Panel Chair Says Polio and Other Shots Should Be Optional, subtitled “Dr. Kirk Milhoan, a pediatric cardiologist who leads the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, said a person’s right to refuse a vaccine outweighed concerns about illness or death from infectious diseases.”
Does he not realize that the rejection of vaccines leads to the infections of others? It’s not all about you.
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NY Times, 21 Jan 2026: Trump’s E.P.A. Has Put a Value on Human Life: Zero Dollars, subtitled “The Environmental Protection Agency has stopped estimating the dollar value of lives saved in the cost-benefit analyses for new pollution rules.”
The photo shows LA smog in 1979. Which I remember.
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NY Times, 22 Jan 2026: National Park Service Dismantles Slavery Exhibit in Philadelphia, subtitled “The exhibit memorialized nine people enslaved by George Washington. The Park Service said it was being removed in accordance with a directive from President Trump.”
This is what we call Orwellian. Erase history that challenges the legitimacy of the current administration. White supremacy. Nothing was ever done wrong.
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There are several interesting items on today’s page at The Week. I’ll quote this one, from Kevin D. Williamson in The Dispatch.
Donald Trump aspires to be the sort of man Xi Jinping is, the sort of man Vladimir Putin is, the sort of man Li Peng was when he ruthlessly suppressed the Tiananmen Square demonstrations—a vicious act of repression that Trump has spoken of admiringly. The acts of unjustifiable violence and extralegal threats carried out by his agents are, manifestly, to Trump’s taste. He is an Iranian ayatollah at heart—fundamentally totalitarian. And he seems to desire violence. Why wouldn’t he? He has the guns and the gun thugs. Where there are genuine acts of violence being perpetrated against federal agents, those carrying out such acts are giving the Trump administration what it desires: a pretext for escalation.
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It’s only going to get worse.
