"When we did a search of the [fake police car], there was a manifesto that identified many lawmakers and other officials."

Said Police Chief Mark Bruley, of Brooklyn Park, Minnesota, quoted in From "'No Kings' protests in Minnesota canceled as authorities search for suspect who shot 2 lawmakers/Police in Minnesota are cautioning residents to avoid 'No Kings' protests after two state lawmakers and their spouses were shot early Saturday" (WaPo)(free-access link).

Melissa Hortman, a former Minnesota House Speaker, and her spouse were shot and killed early Saturday in their Brooklyn Park home. A second state lawmaker, Sen. John Hoffman and his wife, were shot multiple times in Champlin. Officials say both Hortman and Hoffman were mentioned in the suspect’s writings.....

State Patrol Col. Christina Bogojevic asked people “out of an abundance of caution” not to attend any of the “No Kings” protests that were scheduled for across the state on Saturday. Bogojevic said authorities didn’t have any direct evidence that the protests would be targeted, but said the suspect had some “No Kings” flyers in their car. Organizers announced that all of the protests across the state were canceled....

UPDATE: "A former appointee of Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz is being sought in connection with the assassination of a state lawmaker and the shooting of another, police sources said. Vance Luther Boelter...." (NY Post0).

"Democrats need a dad?"

Says Meade, when I read this headline out loud "Is Tim Walz the Midwestern Dad Democrats Need?" (NYT).

It's an episode of "The Ezra Klein Show." From the transcript, here's the "dad" part:

KLEIN: Let me ask you about political geography. There’s a sense of, particularly, the Midwest as “That’s where people are normal. Then they get weirder on the coast.” You’re a former Army guy, right? You’re a former football coach. You’ve got real good Midwestern dad vibes. And so you can talk about the weirdness of Trump and Vance in a way that I think a lot of Democrats would not feel they could and also in a way that they’re like, “Oh, right, maybe we’re not the weird ones.” But I always think this is a very unhealthy dimension of our politics, a sense that there are sort of “real” Americans here, not “real” Americans there, beyond the coast. I’m curious how you think about this, both from the perspective of what it’s allowed you to say — maybe that would not have landed coming from others — and also just, like, what you do about it.

The emphasis there is on the geography, the "Midwestern" part of "Midwestern dad." I wanted the "dad" part, but I'll soldier on: 

"Show us your cats."

the annual @WedgeLIVE cat tour is undoubtedly the greatest summer event in Minneapolis. i love my neighborhood and the cats that call it home!!! #catsofthewedge pic.twitter.com/95myvGFnAZ

— linnae 🐀 (@substantialrat) June 27, 2024

I'm reading "Minneapolis cat tour started as joke, now draws hundreds of admirers/'I love to do weird, goofy stuff like this,' said John Edwards, who organizes the yearly event" (WaPo).

On the evening of June 26, about 500 people of all ages congregated at a local park, ready to start the seventh annual cat tour. Many held signs saying “show us your cats,” and people also wore official “Cats of the Wedge” T-shirts, tank tops and totes. Local reporters were there to cover the tour.

"Show us your cats" struck a mystic chord of memory... ah!

"New Emerson College Polling/The Hill state polls find former President Donald Trump with a slight edge on President Joe Biden in..."

"... Arizona (47% to 43%), Georgia (45% to 41%), Wisconsin (47% to 44%) Nevada (46% to 43%), Pennsylvania (47% to 45%), and Michigan (46% to 45%), while Biden splits with Trump in Minnesota (45% to 45%)."

Emerson College Polling reports.

It's that last one that caught my eye: They're tied in Minnesota now?!

"The Trump campaign believes it can capitalize on — or foment — a backlash to the leftward march of the Twin Cities and still-fresh memories..."

"... of the unrest after the killing of George Floyd. 'Very sad what’s happened to your state,' Mr. Trump told a newscaster on the conservative website Alpha News on Thursday, attacking Minneapolis’s progressive Representative Ilhan Omar as a 'hater,' promising 'mass deportations' and vowing 'to bring back the law enforcement the way it was' before Mr. Floyd’s murder. 'Your state is out of control, and it’s this radical left philosophy that cannot be left to continue.' Recent polling has Mr. Biden clinging to a narrow lead in Minnesota, inside some polls’ margins of error. His tenuous position has been exacerbated by the war in Gaza. A protest campaign for 'uncommitted' in the Democratic presidential primary in March drew 19 percent.... Even Democrats in the state have their worries.... [Representative Dean Phillips, a Democrat who represents the affluent, educated suburbs west of Minneapolis that for years had voted Republican] said, 'I confess to have spoken to more people, and some remarkable people, who say they will vote for Trump. Many will, and many more than will admit it.'"

I'm reading "Trump Visits Minnesota, Hoping Its Political Divide Will Put It in Play/The Trump campaign says it can broaden the electoral battlefield with a play for Minnesota, but the state has disappointed Republicans for decades" (NYT).

Hoping to put it in play? Clearly, it is in play, and Trump is forcing Biden to defend. Meanwhile, Biden must win all of the battleground states — Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania — just to edge out Trump in the electoral college. Trump has so many more ways to win.

"In a matchup for the White House, President Joe Biden is virtually tied with former President Donald Trump among Minnesota voters...."

MinnPost reports.

There's a big gender gap: "Fifty-six percent of women polled, and just 35% of men, said they favor Biden. Meanwhile, just 32% of Minnesota women polled, and 53% of men, said they support Trump."

You have to go back to 1972 to find the last presidential election where Minnesota voted for the Republican:

"Minnesota Supreme Court dismisses effort to block Trump from state's primary ballot/A group of voters has been trying to ban Trump from the 2024 GOP primary and general election ballots based on 14th Amendment grounds."

NBC News reports.

This litigation was based on Section 3 of the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which says "No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same...."

"Out-of-Towners Head to 'Climate-Proof Duluth'/The former industrial town in Minnesota is coming to terms with its status as a refuge for people moving from across the country because of climate change."

A NYT article.

I took global warming seriously in 1984 when I decided to move to Madison, Wisconsin. I thought within about 10 years, everyone would notice the South had become unlivable, and a massive population shift would occur. Well, 40 years have passed, and it's just beginning to happen, this migration to the Upper Midwest. But I bet most people in the South will just laugh at this idea.

From the article:

Apple capital.

I've shown you my pictures of yesterday's sunrise, seen from a bluff in La Crescent, Minnesota. Here's one of the many pictures Meade took of me as I was waiting for the right moment: 

After the sun rose, we went into town to look for coffee, and one thing we found was this mural that let us know we were in the apple capital of Minnesota: 

 

We passed on a perfectly good breakfast spot, because we wanted WiFi, so we recrossed the Mississippi River, back to Wisconsin, trading The Crescent for The Crosse, and had our coffee at Grounded Patio Cafe. We loved the downtown. 

The La Crosse Commercial Historic District is in the National Register of Historic Places. Here are 2 pics I took in La Crosse:

This is yesterday's sunrise — October 23rd, at 7:33 and 7:36 — from a vantage point in La Crescent, Minnesota, looking out at La Crosse, Wisconsin, over the Mississippi River.

My phone company had me in "low data" mode, so I couldn't post at the end of the day, in my usual fashion. But we're home now, and I hope putting these 2 pictures here, they'll have some continuity with yesterday, and I'll have today's sunrise at the end of today, in the familiar location. We spent yesterday roaming around the Driftless Area of Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Iowa, so I have a few extra pictures to show you, but right now, what I want to do is move on to all the exciting Monday morning news, so stand by for normal blogging.

"As I talk closer to the family, they said that, 'Well, the real reason they stopped was because his tags had expired.' Well, I come to Minnesota to tell you your tags have expired."

"Your tags of racism has expired. Your tags of police brutality has expired. Your tags of white supremacy has expired. Your tags of looking at us different than everybody else, has expired. Your tags have expired. It’s time to renew and get some new tags. A tags of righteousness, tags of fairness, tags of treating everybody the same way. Tags of 'No justice. No peace.'... Those tags done expired... That ain’t going to happen no more.... I hope y’all are alive in Texas, we on the way. Because your tags have expired. We are going to stop by North Carolina where a young man was shot yesterday. We’re going to look in Columbus, Ohio, your tags have expired. We’re going wherever you show up, because your tags have expired.... God made a promise... He said, 'The first shall be last. And the last shall be first'.... God will take care of Daunte, now. Stand up and be what we were born to be. We’re not anyone’s slave. We’re the children of God! We’re the children of God! We’re the children of God."

Said the Reverend Al Sharpton, quoted in the Daunte Wright Funeral Service Transcript (misspellings corrected.)

FROM THE EMAIL: Paul writes:

Long-time reader, rare commenter here. Al Sharpton called for "A tags of righteousness, tags of fairness, tags of treating everybody the same way." Robin DiAngelo, in White Fragility, one of the books that has become part of the canon of the anti-racist religion, wrote "It is not possible to teach someone to treat everyone the same. We can be told, and often often are told, to treat everyone the same, but we cannot successfully be taught to do so because human beings are not objective." I think DiAngelo is deeply, profoundly wrong, and it is my sincere hope that the Al Sharpton view will become (return?) to the predominant view, and I think doing so will require pointing out quotes like hers whenever a black person of the left makes a statement like the one Sharpton made.

"Minneapolis police shot and killed a man who allegedly opened fire on officers during a traffic stop Wednesday night..."

".... sparking new tensions in a city still deeply on edge since the police killing of George Floyd in May and the fiery unrest that followed. Scores of protesters quickly arrived at the site of the shooting, a gas station parking lot in South Minneapolis, about a mile from the intersection where Floyd was killed, facing off in below-freezing temperatures with police officers clad in riot gear, some clutching batons and cans of pepper spray. The tense scene, reminiscent of clashes between police and demonstrators in the aftermath of Floyd’s death, continued into early Thursday and prompted calls for peace from Minneapolis officials anxious to avoid a repeat of the May unrest that left parts of the city burned and destroyed. On Thursday evening, dozens of people began gathering at the gas station again for a vigil.... The body-camera footage appears to show the driver fire a shot through his window.... Word of the shooting quickly spread on social media, including rumors about the race of the suspect and how many times he had been shot and where...." 

From "Fatal shooting by police sets off protest in Minneapolis, the city’s first police-involved death since George Floyd" (WaPo).

You have to read the long article carefully to see that we're not told the race of the man who was shot dead by the police. We're not told, even though the writer of the article seems to have watched the video — "The body-camera footage appears to show the driver fire a shot through his window." Can't we hear what the race the driver "appears" to be? Is it simply that it's a delicate matter, guessing what race a person is? Or is it that if they say he appears white, people will say different things that if they're told he appears black? 

We're not even told what the "rumors about the race of the suspect" were! It seems most likely that the rumors were that he was black, since people were drawn out to a protest. But what if the dead man turns out to have been white? Would protest leaders shift to saying the problem is police brutality against all races? I note that they could say the police only kill a white man when he's actually firing a shot right at them. 

At a Biden drive-in rally, "security involves not just a wand-and-pat-down, but a full sweep of the vehicle. For this reporter, that meant briefly being detained..."

"... and questioned by Secret Service agents after a pair of spent shotgun shell casings were discovered in the rear of the vehicle. (I’m a hunter. It’s hunting season. My car’s a little messy.) Applause lines in speeches are now honk lines. The car horn, of course, allows for limited expression. An outdoor event is also open to heckling, and a band of Trump supporters positioned themselves easily within earshot of the speakers. And they brought their own horns. At various points the heckling horns appeared to provide dramatic crescendos accompanying speeches, while at other times, they were distracting, with Biden remarking on them several times. Then, of course, there were times when the horns of jeer merged with the honks of cheer, creating an ambiguous cacophony." 

From "Election 2020 is so weird. Here’s what Biden’s drive-in rally was like" by Dave Orrick (Twin Cities Pioneer Press). Orrick attended yesterday's rally at the Minnesota State Fairground, which  was "essentially invite-only, with details sent to a relatively small list of party activists."

Of course, your car must be searched before you can get into a drive-in rally. You could have a weapon. Of course, it must be limited to party insiders: Cars themselves are potential weapons. And of course, the horn honking can make a cacophony of the speech.

 I see — in U.S. News — that the horns really bothered Biden:

A group close to the podium where he spoke blasted horns and shouted. Biden... shout[ed] to drown them out... “These guys are not very polite — but they’re like Trump.” [Advocating masks, he ad libbed], “This isn’t a political statement, like those ugly folks over there beeping the horns — it’s a patriotic duty.” 

It was an "essentially invite-only" event and he was reduced to calling people "ugly"? You're speaking to cars, you encourage some honking as an alternative to cheering, but then there's too much honking, and you have to insult people?

I listened to some of that rally on my car radio and watched some of it on TV. What was most notable to me was how much Biden garbled the words. He referred to "Amy Kobuchar" (and never corrected himself). He said a word that sounded like "pussy" (but wasn't, of course). I was saying out loud the things that it sounded like he was saying. Just for laughs. Was I making fun of the disabled, given that Biden is said to be a stutterer? No, I wasn't mocking stuttering. It was the articulation of wrong syllables and the mushing of strings of syllables into near incomprehensibility. 

Why was Biden spending time in Minnesota so few days before the election? The easiest answer is: to help Tina Smith win reelection to the U.S. Senate. It's a close race. She could lose, and it could make the difference in flipping the Senate. Or was he there because there's actually a risk that he could lose Minnesota? I see — in U.S. News — that "Joe Biden says he has learned from the mistakes that Hillary Clinton's campaign made four years ago in the Midwest." He needs at least to avoid a crushing defeat — which I would define as losing any state that Hillary won. He knows the erstwhile "blue wall" states of the Midwest can't be taken for granted. Imagine losing not just Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin — like Hillary — but losing Minnesota too. And failing to get the Democratic Senator reelected. 

But I don't know. Is Biden playing from such a desperate position? He's supposed to win, not just avoid humiliating loss. 

I see in that U.S. News article that Biden will rally in Detroit today — with assistance not only from Barack Obama but also Stevie Wonder. It's another drive-in rally, so people don't really have a chance to see the stars, except on TV.

ADDED: Here are the polls from Minnesota showing Trump gaining on Biden.

"In the wake of protests following the May 25 killing of George Floyd, a member of the 'Boogaloo Bois' opened fire on Minneapolis Police Third Precinct with an AK-47-style gun and screamed 'Justice for Floyd'..."

"... as he ran away, according to a federal complaint made public Friday. A sworn affidavit by the FBI underlying the complaint reveals new details about a far-right anti-government group’s coordinated role in the violence that roiled through civil unrest over Floyd’s death while in police custody. Ivan Harrison Hunter, a 26-year-old from Boerne, Texas, is charged with one count of interstate travel to incite a riot for his alleged role in ramping up violence during the protests in Minneapolis on May 27 and 28. According to charges, Hunter, wearing a skull mask and tactical gear, shot 13 rounds at the south Minneapolis police headquarters while people were inside. He also looted and helped set the building ablaze, according to the complaint, which was filed Monday under seal.... As police clashed with protesters, Hunter and other members of the Boogaloo Bois discussed in private Facebook messages their plans to travel to Minneapolis and rally... 'Lock and load boys. Boog flags are in the air, and the national network is going off,' the complaint states... 'Go for police buildings,' Hunter told [another Boogaloo member], according to charging documents.... Hunter had bragged about his role in the Minneapolis riots on Facebook, publicly proclaiming, 'I helped the community burn down that police station' and 'I didn’t’ protest peacefully Dude ... Want something to change? Start risking felonies for what is good.'"

From "Charges: Boogaloo Bois fired on Minneapolis police precinct, shouted 'Justice for Floyd'/Feds say Ivan Harrison Hunter helped burn and loot the Third Precinct building as part of a coordinated attack from the far-right group trying to ignite an American civil war" (Minneapolis Star Tribune).

To what extent are "Boogaloo Bois" associated with anti-racism? There are some useful links at Wikipedia article "Boogaloo Movement." Look for the footnotes at the line "There are also groups that condemn racism and white supremacy, although attempts by some individual elements of the movement to support anti-racist groups and movements such as Black Lives Matter have been met with wariness and skepticism as researchers are unsure if they are genuine or meant to obscure the movement's actual objectives."

A new poll has Biden and Trump tied in Minnesota.

Trafalgar Group has Biden at 46.9% and Trump at 46.5%.

I looked at FiveThirtyEight to see what kind of reputation Trafalgar Group has, and I found that "Trafalgar is a Republican pollster with a slight bias toward the GOP."

"Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez survived her primary. Rashida Tlaib did, too. Now it’s Ilhan Omar’s turn on Tuesday..."

"... and the Minnesota congresswoman faces the stiffest challenge of any member of the Squad.... Bankrolled by pro-Israel donors, Antone Melton-Meaux has spent more than twice as much as Omar on television ads, and outside groups have kicked in to increase his advantage.... Omar drew the ire of pro-Israel leaders this year when she made comments that many of them have deemed anti-Semitic. She tweeted once that Israel had 'hypnotized the world' and said that U.S. lawmakers supportive of Israel had a dual allegiance to that country and their own. Progressive groups, who spent big to help Tlaib in her primary last week, have not done much to back up Omar. The congresswoman’s internal polling from early July showed her with a big lead — but some operatives in the party fear this primary will be much closer than Tlaib’s...."

Politico reports.

"A masked man who was seen in a viral video smashing the windows of a south Minneapolis auto parts store during the George Floyd protests, earning him the moniker 'Umbrella Man,' is suspected to be a member of the Hell’s Angels biker gang..."

"... seeking to incite racial tension in a demonstration that until then had been peaceful, police said. A Minneapolis police arson investigator said the man’s actions at the AutoZone on East Lake Street set off a chain reaction that led to days of looting and rioting. The building was later burned to the ground.... Police have also connected the 32-year-old man to a widely-publicized incident in Stillwater late last month, in which a Muslim woman was confronted by a group of men wearing white supremacist garb.... Investigators finally caught a break when a tipster e-mailed the Minneapolis Police Department identifying the man as a member of the Hell’s Angels biker gang who 'wanted to sow discord and racial unrest by breaking out the windows and writing ['free (expletive) for everyone zone'] on the double red doors,' the [search warrant] affidavit said. A subsequent investigation revealed that the man was also an associate of the Aryan Cowboy Brotherhood, a small white supremacist prison and street gang based primarily in Minnesota and Kentucky."

From "Police: 'Umbrella Man' was a white supremacist trying to incite George Floyd rioting/Police say the suspect has been identified, but no charges had been filed as of Tuesday afternoon" (Minneapolis Star Tribune).

How shocking is "And they went in and it was like a knife cutting butter"?

Trump used that phrase yesterday at the Roundtable on Justice Disparities in America (transcript). Context:

In Minneapolis, they went through three nights of hell. And then I was insistent on having the National Guard go in and do their work. It was like a miracle. It’s just everything stopped. And I’ll never forget the scene. It’s not supposed to be a beautiful scene. But to me, it was after you watched policemen running out of a police precinct. And it wasn’t their fault. They wanted to do what they had to do, but they weren’t allowed to do anything.... I said, “I’m sorry. We have to have [the National Guard] go in.” And they went in and it was like a knife cutting butter, right through, boom. I’ll never forget. You saw the scene on that road wherever it may be in the city, Minneapolis. They were lined up. Boom. They just walked straight. And yes, there was some tear gas and probably some other things and the crowd dispersed. And they went through it by the end of that evening. And it was a short evening. Everything was fine.... So I just want to tell you that we’re working on a lot of different elements having to do with law, order, safety, comfort, control, but we want safety. We want compassion. We want everything.

As I drove home from my sunrise run this morning...



... I had "Morning Joe" on the satellite radio, and he was riffing emotively on that phrase "it was like a knife cutting butter." Joe acted as though the phrase connoted murderously cutting into human flesh, and Who talks like that?!! In Joe's vivid nightmare, Trump is unfathomably evil. Joe said it's as if Trump were "running for President of the Confederacy" and Trump has decided to speak only to "angry white men — angry old white men."

Joe is 57, by the way, so that's a bit old, and he is also white and angry, so maybe he knows whereof he speaks, and yet he does not mean that he hears the siren call of Donald Trump.

But let's look at this phrase "like a knife cutting butter." It's an idiomatic expression! It means it was easy. You see the context. It doesn't mean the National Guard was sadistically injuring people. It means all they had to do was show up and walk straight in and everything worked out just fine.

It wasn't even a hot knife....



The inability to understand metaphor is, of course, highly selective. A commentator like Joe has to use what Trump gives him. He must scan the transcripts every day, looking for something to pretend to be anguished about.

"A veto-proof majority of the Minneapolis City Council pledged on Sunday to dismantle the city’s Police Department."

The NYT reports.

Saying that the city’s current policing system could not be reformed, the council members stood before hundreds of people who gathered late in the day on a grassy hill, and signed a pledge to begin the process of taking apart the Police Department as it now exists.

I don't see how this can possibly be done. It sounds like madness. There is some ray of rationality in "to begin the process" and "taking apart the Police Department as it now exists."

Maybe it's a slow process and they take it apart but they put it back together again in a form that's just different from the way it now exists. Maybe it's just a new way to say reform.

Council members said in interviews on Sunday that they did not have specific plans to announce for what a new public safety system for the city would look like. They promised to develop plans by working with the community, and said they would draw on past studies, consent decrees and reforms to policing across the nation and the world.

So they have no plan or even a general idea of what it is, but they pledge to do it. I imagine a lot of Minneapolis people are alarmed and anxious but won't say too much about all this.

ADDED: "Dismantle" is an interesting word. Especially in this context, it makes me think of the famous essay title "The Master's Tools Will Never Dismantle the Master's House." And did you know that the original meaning of the word is "to divest of a mantle or cloak; to uncloak" (OED)? The extended meaning is "To render (fortifications, or the like) useless for their purpose; to pull down, take to pieces, destroy, raze."

"We cannot arrest people when we’re trying to hold ground because of the sheer size, the dynamics and the wanton violence that’s coming out there."

"There’s simply more of them than us," said Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, quoted in "George Floyd Updates: ‘Absolute Chaos’ in Minneapolis as Protests Grow Across U.S." (NYT).

Gunshots rang out near a different police precinct and flames streamed from businesses over several city blocks — a gas station, a post office, a bank, a restaurant — as residents asked where the police and firefighters had gone.

Gunshots rang out... and flames streamed.... The NYT is writing as if human individuals are not in the picture even as the Governor is speaking specifically about people and calling attention to the us-versus-them situation.

Commissioner John Harrington of the state’s Department of Public Safety said the police were preparing to be at the center of an “international event” on Saturday, pledging to "restore order” on the same Minneapolis block that was burning as he spoke. Mr. Harrington said he expected the largest crowds the state had ever seen.

What does that mean — an “international event”? Is he characterizing the rioters as foreigners?

ADDED: Some people in the comments are saying that all Harrington meant is that people in other countries are paying attention to what's happening in Minneapolis — something like the old Chicago 1968 chant "The whole world is watching." But now I am seeing that Governor Walz is saying things that make it sound as though there are international elements to the riots: "Furious Gov. of Minnesota says George Floyd protests are being manipulated by 'domestic terrorists' and international forces trying to destabilize the nation and fully mobilizes the National Guard as US descends into chaos" (Daily Mail):

The governor of Minnesota has called for full mobilization of the state's National Guard, as he suggested that foreign and extremist influences are fueling chaos as protests over the in-custody death devolve into violence in cities across the country....

'As you saw this expand across the United States, and you start to see whether it be domestic terrorism, whether it be ideological extremists to fan the group, or whether it be international destabilization of how our country works,' he continued....

'The cartels, who are wondering if there was a break in their drug transmissions, are trying to take advantage of the chaos. That's why this situation is on a federal level.'