U.S. Border Enforcement - ICE will get you

[Innula Zenovka]

How do countries get themselves out of these fascist and/or totalitarian messes? I'm not thinking of any great examples from history that don't involve the intervention of outside forces (WWII -- hey, remember when we were the good guys?) or near-total collapse of the apparatus of the state (USSR -- maybe not a great example since they jumped right back into another dictatorship.)

Spain after Franco, Portugal after Salazar, Greece after the Colonels, Chile after Pinochet, Argentina after Galtieri, all of central and eastern Europe after the collapse of Communism ...

 

[Free]

 

[Puretone]

That is far easier said than done. They're all tarted up in the latest in ballistic fashion. Even a behemoth pistol like the Desert Eagle .45 won't do much except make their ribs really sore. You need rifles, and big bore ones, at that.

Ever seen a .50 caliber sniper rifle? It's not something you keep handy as you drive to Piggly Wiggly. The ammo alone will just about sink your dinghy.

You are asking people to commit suicide.

Shooters would have to go for head shots. Harder to do but these washout warriors aren't disciplined enough to wear all the gear.

ETA: Not that I've thought about this at all...

 

[Free]

 

[Cristiano]

 

[Beebo Brink]

The video at this link is a bit longish but I think it's worth it to watch the whole thing to the end.

https://www.reddit.com/r/minnesota/s/xHJLmeaqla

Okay, this had me sobbing halfway through. Heartbreaking and scary.

We're going to an ICE protest here in town tomorrow at noon. Mrs. Beebo bought about a dozen whistles, which we're going to give away (keeping one for ourselves). I've heard of at least 2 or 3 ICE raids here in our community, one at a local Mexican restaurant.

 

[Katheryne Helendale]

It's absolutely a fair and timely question. I don't know.

I don't think we're quite at the point of suicide attacks being the only option, and, despite how one might interpret my post, I'm also not for posting snipers on roofs just yet. Besides, I don't think it is crazy to imagine that sniper attacks work way better and easier in movies than they do in real life. We're also not likely to have a whole army of trained snipers packing $5,000 rifles that are pretty much useless for any other purpose with $1,500 scopes (daytime only) firing ammo that costs $10 per round for a practice round. The really accurate stuff costs more. Much more. Each of those snipers needs a trained spotter ($1,000+ spotting scope for daytime operations or way, way more for night. Of course, that's the same for the sniper's scope.) Then those two need a whole highly trained, equipped, and conditioned support team, all of whom are on our side. Frankly, most of the folks who actually know how to do that voodoo stuff are on the other team.

So, I'm sorry, but armed conflict against these bubbas won't work for the same reason that the ammosexuals' "2nd 'mement gon' save us from tyrants" BS won't work. The tyrants have tanks, jets, missiles, the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, and Coast Guard plus all the National Guards and Reserves. ICE is just the first wave. We have already seen that there won't be any "I'm not obeying illegal orders" refusals from any of the services. Apparently, the armed forces command's motto is, "I have a career to think about, man! Semper Vulvae!" So that's what we're up against.

I do wish I knew something that would be both practical and effective. How do countries get themselves out of these fascist and/or totalitarian messes? I'm not thinking of any great examples from history that don't involve the intervention of outside forces (WWII -- hey, remember when we were the good guys?) or near-total collapse of the apparatus of the state (USSR -- maybe not a great example since they jumped right back into another dictatorship.)

I'm going to borrow a line from one of my favorite shows:

When in doubt, C-4.

 

[Sheera Khan]

I'm going to borrow a line from one of my favorite shows:

When in doubt, C-4.

Myth busted!

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Of course this isn't fascism...

So what is it?

davidaaronovitch.substack.com

Evernote Link

Lengthy and angry piece by David Aaronovitch

I can’t tell you for sure that he didn’t feel threatened and that it wasn't reflex. But there is a much more basic explanation available: I don’t believe he was scared, I believe he was enraged. If Good got away he was facing humiliation. Renee Good’s wife (out of the car) had taunted him mildly by saying to him, “You want to come at us? I say go get yourself some lunch, big boy. Go ahead.” The big boy went ahead.

He films Good saying (from the driver’s seat) that she’s not mad at him. Instead of getting out of the car, as he wants, she starts to drive away. She too — this no longer young gay woman — has belittled him. But not for long. After he has fired his three shots you hear someone that is almost certainly him say, “fucking bitch”, as Good’s car, now out of control, careers down the road and crashes into a stationary vehicle.

When a man calls a woman a “fucking bitch” I think most women know what’s being said, and what the subtext is.

Eco again:

It would be so easy for us if someone would look out onto the world’s stage and say: “I want to reopen Auschwitz, I want the blackshirts to march through the streets of Italy once more!” Alas, life is not so simple. Ur-fascism can still return in the most innocent of guises. Our duty is to unmask it and to point the finger at each of its new forms — every day, in every part of the world.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Family seeks answers after ICE deports man to Costa Rica in vegetative state

Randall Gamboa Esquivel had left Costa Rica in good health and crossed the United States-Mexico border in December 2024, according to his family. However, Gamboa was detained by the US authorities for re-entering American soil unlawfully, as he had previously lived there undocumented between 2002 and 2013.


Gamboa was initially held at the Webb county detention center in Laredo and then transferred to the Port Isabel detention center in Los Fresnos, both in south Texas. Nearly 10 months later, in September 2025, the Trump administration flew the 52-year-old to the Costa Rican capital of San José on an air ambulance.

He never came round and five weeks later Gamboa was pronounced dead at a hospital in Pérez Zeledón, his home town, around three hours north of the capital.

In an exclusive interview in Pérez Zeledón, [his sister[ Mata recounted that Gamboa had sounded and looked healthy when they talked via video calls while he was in detention, until 12 June, which marked their last conversation, after which he seemed to vanish. Mata waited for weeks to hear from him, but in fact Gamboa had fallen into a health crisis.

“My brother disappeared and we had to reach out to agencies, lawyers, consulates, anyone willing to help,” Mata said in Spanish, standing across the street from the hospital where Gamboa passed on 26 October.

“How is it possible that a man that left healthy, tall, chubby, robust, came back dirty, looked abandoned, with ulcers on his entire body, in a vegetative state?” she said.

More here: Costa Rican family demands answers after ICE deportation and death: ‘Have you ever smelled a cadaver?’

Much of what happened to Gamboa over his last weeks in federal custody in Texas remains a mystery to his family, Mata said. When the US government flew him back to Costa Rica, he was non-responsive, as detailed in US medical records shared with the Guardian.

“When I saw my brother at the airport, I thought he had been tortured in some type of way because he was ill-nourished, had skin ulcers and dried blood on his body and had a strong odor,” Mata said in Spanish, pausing to take deep breaths.

“Have you ever smelled a cadaver? That’s how my brother smelled when he was deported,” she said.

 

[Cindy Claveau]

 

[Cindy Claveau]

 

[Dakota Tebaldi]

Okay, this had me sobbing halfway through. Heartbreaking and scary.

When she opened the door though, and heard the whistles and saw her neighbors coming out to support her, you can see how quickly her hopelessness went away and became defiance. Community support makes such a difference!

I know there have been several protests in my city since all this stuff started and I think there have been vigils and protests every day since Good was killed.

 

[detrius]

Family seeks answers after ICE deports man to Costa Rica in vegetative state





More here: Costa Rican family demands answers after ICE deportation and death: ‘Have you ever smelled a cadaver?’

Through a door, it can smell like uncooked pork cutlet.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Notes on gangster states: why legitimacy matters when the state has a monopoly on coercive and lethal force.

12th January 2026 One priority for a modern state – perhaps the highest priority – is for it to keep its citizens safe from harm. And within that priority is the need for the state to t…

davidallengreen.com

 

[Soen Eber]

Legal Eagle believes there is sufficient evidence, statutes, and case law to find the Ice Agent who killed Good guilty of Murder

 

[Dakota Tebaldi]

So, um...thought this might interest a few of you



Photo courtesy of a Canadian Press photographer that he slipped right in front of.

Video, with sound

Man, that head-bounce tho. Real talk, he really ought to go in and have that at least looked at.

 

[Free]

So, um...thought this might interest a few of you

 

[Free]

 

[Free]

Death sentences are becoming normal operating procedure for ICE.

Four migrants die in US immigration custody over first 10 days of 2026

Four migrants died while in custody of U.S. immigration authorities over the first 10 days of 2026, according to government press releases, a loss of life that followed record detention deaths last year under President Donald Trump.

The deaths included two migrants from Honduras, one from Cuba and another from Cambodia, and occurred from January 3-9, according to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.