WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 25, 2026
Marimar Martinez as well: We plan to return to the State of the Union address—mainly, to the state of the union itself—starting tomorrow morning.
Within the next few days, we even plan to take you to the so-called "Greatest Track Meet of All Time"—the legendary US-Soviet Union meet, held right there, over two days, in jam-packed Stanford Stadium.
Thanks to one of our all-time best friends, we sat there, "just a kid like you," all through the course of that weekend. We were cheering the Americans on—though as it turned out, the most memorable and important part of that meet occurred after the whole thing was over.
In recent days, inane tribal warfare on "cable news" brought that event back to mind.
(Good God! Bob Hayes and Wilma Rudolph won the men's and women's 100! Those are legendary names in the annals of American sports. Rudolph's name is sacred.)
A great deal remains to be said about the dangerous state of our union. Today, we stumbled upon yesterday's report from The Mirror about two women who came to D.C. this week.
We wrote about Aliya Rahman in real time, back when she was ripped from her car and hauled away, in extremely rough fashion, by the boys who weren't in blue.
Rahman came to the District this week. Headline included, The Mirror's report starts as shown:
Disabled Minneapolis woman dragged from car by ICE reveals disturbing details of injuries
A woman who was dragged from her car by ICE agents in Minneapolis said she suffered severe damage in her shoulders.
Aliya Rahman was driving to an appointment at a traumatic brain injury clinic on January 13 when she was pulled from her car by ICE agents. Rahman, who has autism, found herself caught in a traffic jam and explained to agents who told her to move her car that she was unable to process their instructions. She was dragged from her vehicle, with footage of the incident quickly circulating online.
Rahman will accompany Minnesota Rep Ilhan Omar at the State of the Union address on Tuesday night. Rahman spoke to MS Now ahead of the event, and described the fallout from the violent incident last month.
“I have spent the last month learning the names of the tendons in my shoulder, because both of my shoulders are torn—cartilage and tendons. But what I haven't learned is the names of the people who did this to me,” Rahman said.
And so on from there. As the videotape made clear, her treatment was extremely rough on the day in question.
Rahman came to D.C. this week. So did Marimar Martinez, who somehow managed to survive despite being shot five times:
Marimar Martinez, a 30-year-old U.S. citizen who was shot five times by Border Patrol agents last October, will also be in attendance at the event on Tuesday night.
Martinez graciously accepted the invitation to accompany Illinois Rep Jesús “Chuy” García, writing in a statement, “I look forward to attending the State of the Union and hope the country can look at what happened to me and other victims of DHS’s unlawful behavior as a basis to call their elected representatives and demand accountability.”
So reported The Mirror. For the record, after Martinez was shot five times, the apparent lying began, given voice by the agent who shot her.
Martinez was shot five times; somehow, she survived. Rahman was ripped from her car—to appearances, she was stuck in traffic—and hauled off through the streets.
We saw The Mirror's report a day too late, but these events should not be forgotten. We leave you with the question we offered this morning:
How far will this administration possibly be willing to go in November of this year? To be honest, none of us has any idea how to answer that question.
We're living in a dangerous time. There's no way to answer that question.
ReplyDelete"Rahman, who has autism, found herself caught in a traffic jam"
How many cats does she have?
"but these events should not be forgotten"
And why not, Bob? Don't you know that shit happens? And I bet it wouldn't have happened if your cult's retarded cat-ladies weren't harassing immigration-control officers 24x7...
You don't know these women, yet you call them "retarded cat-ladies." You're really kind of despicable, do you realize that?
DeleteQuiet, piggy.
DeleteAnon, formerly knows as Mao, is a performance artist. The entire point is to demonstrate how despicable Trumpism is. He just add a little extra zest to make it a little more 'in your face'.
DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteActually we are living in less and less dangerous times, despite particular instances of ICE misbehavior. People are considerably safer on our streets than they were before Trump was President.
ReplyDeleteWhat is ICE accomplishing? And, how are they doing it. Put another way, is ICE doing things right or doing the right things?
ICE is not always doing things right. Events like the ones Bob describes shouldn't happen. Although I don't know how frequent or infrequent that conduct was, it should never happen at all.
OTOH ICE is very much doing the right things. Between deportations and voluntary deportations, almost 2 million illegal immigrants are gone from our shores. A certain percentage are murderers or otherwise bad people. Even if it's only 15%, that's 300,000 criminals no longer out on our streets. Having them gone is no doubt one reason there are so many fewer murders and other violent crimes.
First of all, the reduction in crime has nothing to do with Trump.
DeleteSecondly, as I explained earlier, crimes committed by individuals are not in the same category as violence committed by the state.
Thirdly -- and most saliently in your case, David -- you avoid reading about horrible, inhumane conditions in the ICE concentration camps. People have been killed and have died due to neglect. You, however, refuse to read about that.
Go fuck yourself, dickhead fascist freak
DeleteIlya - Trump's actions did reduce crime in three ways
Delete-- deporting a great many violent alien criminals
-- National Guard is Trump greatly reduce crime in a number of high-crime cities
-- Set an example of more vigorous law enforcement
Ilya - what is your evidence that the reduction in crime has nothing to do with Trump?
Ilya - II agree with you that crimes committed by individuals are different from crimes committed by government. And, I agree that it's horrible and unacceptable for such bad conditions to exist in government lockups.
DeleteHere's my concern: based on what people I talk to and what Bob has written, there seems to be a widespread belief that murder are increasing. That people are less safe. The exact opposite is true. The belief was fostered by media giving so much attention to ICE problems while ignoring all the good things happening.
-- deporting a great many violent alien criminals
DeleteFalse. Take the next step on this path, David: how do you know they were violent criminals? If they had been convicted of violent crimes, they would have been incarcerated already. By far, most immigrants in the ICE concentration camps have no criminal record of any kind. The ones that do, the crimes are either fairly minor or way in the distant past.
How do I know it has nothing to do with Trump? Look at any crime graph. Crime spikes in 2019-2020 and has been on a steep downward trajectory since about 2022. You are capable of doing your own internet search, I assume.
Ilya - you are arguing that crime last year followed the past pattern, so the drop happened independently of what Trump did. But, your premise is inaccurate. Crime did not follow the past pattern. Murders fell more than in any past year. It was the largest one-year drop in homicides ever recorded.
DeleteDickhead, you forgot to mention trump can leap tall buildings in a single bound. You fucking fascist freak. Get help
DeleteIt's not that Trump can leap tall buildings; it's that he has the courage or temerity to try to leap tall buildings. Look at all the things that Trump tried to accomplish that other Presidents just talked about:
DeleteAssassinating Soleimani. Moving our embassy to Jerusalem. Replacing DEI with merit-based personnel decisions. Closing the Southern border. Deporting large numbers of illegal immigrants who are already living here. Reducing the size of the federal workforce. Implementing lots of tariffs. Cutting trillions of dollars of waste and fraud. Destroying Iran's nuclear weapons capability. Ending birthright citizenship. Bring lasting peace to the middle east.
Now, some of these goals were wrong-headed. Some he failed to accomplish. Some he handled badly. Some he only partly accomplished. But, Trump did make real efforts, and he accomplished quite a few of them.
Trump was elected. Crime fell. Trump must be responsible.
DeleteWe did sacred dance. Then rain came. Dance must be responsible.
Thus does primitive man reason.
I fear that it's hopeless, Hector.
DeleteDavid, the man who claims to have worked as an actuary, does not grasp the basics of analyzing data. Single point statistics is nonsense. Between any two given days, murders can drop by as much as 100%!
Yes, violent crime rose under Trump, then it started dropping, and continued dropping.
Trump has delusions (temerity) to do horrible and delusional things. Trump is a conman. Everything makes sense if you look at him through the lens of grift. His billion dollar corruptions is where his temerity is most clearly demonstrated.
Dickhead, to use the word “courage” to describe Donald J Chickenshit is hilarious. He is a fucking coward in every possible way and the fact that you can’t see it makes you a delusional lickspittle. You hide your eyes when people present you with evidence that doesn’t fit your preferred narrative. The fucking National Guard deployed in DC had jack shit to do with crime in DC. I reported right here numerous times what I saw with my own eyes. the NG loitering around WMATA stations with nothing to or picking up trash . Yet you repeatedly come here ignorantly proclaiming NG lowered the murder rate.
DeleteIlya - As an actuary, my analyses were based on actual results rather than efforts or claims. If some large insured had had a lot of accidents, then they would be rated as a bad risk with a premium selected accordingly. Or, if they had few accidents, they'd be rewarded with lower renewal premiums.
DeleteIMO people should give more weight to results when evaluating politicians. IMO many pols wrongly conflate money with results. E.g., a pol might claim that the did something about crime because he spent money or started some program that was supposed to reduce crime. I'd be more impressed if crime had really gone down.
Crime in Texas, as measured by the authorities in Texas, went down year after year during the Biden administration. Therefore, the increased influx of immigrants during Biden's term resulted in lower Texas crime rates.
Delete"Even if it's only 15%,"
DeleteHaw.
her[Rahman's] treatment was extremely rough on the day in question.
ReplyDeleteThat's not a proper description of how she was brutalized by ICE. Bob has fallen into the NY Times pattern of sane-washing and white-washing the events. If you're going to assign an adjective, as opposed to just describing what happened, 'rough' is nowhere near accurate.
This is the funniest (poignant too…) thing I’ve seen in a long time.
ReplyDeletehttps://ace.mu.nu/archives/418661.php
Did you notice their tolerance?
DeletePeople don’t tolerate a person’s disease, they accept the fact of it as part and parcel of the individual.
DeleteLook up the definition of tolerance.
DeleteSteve M does some more media snalysis and concludes:
ReplyDelete“ But the Politico story ends the way so many of these stories end -- with a Democrat essentially telling the reporter that Democrats haven't done a very good job at messaging:
“We can’t communicate episodically. We need to be communicating constantly,” said Will Robinson, a Democratic consultant and ad-maker. “I think the theoretical thing about the Supreme Court and tariffs is less impactful than what’s actually going on in the grocery basket.”
Republicans don't do this! They don't say, Wow, we've sucked at messaging lately and we need to suck less. I know that it's always easy for mainstream reporters to get a Here's how Democrats are sucking now story published (or Here's how how Democrats are making a valiant effort not to suck), but if you're a Democrat, you don't have to give reporters quotes that reinforce the message of their stories. Just refuse to acknowledge the party's mistakes. The stories might still be written, but you don't need to make it easy.”
No more mister nice blog. Somerby is first on the list of people who need to hear this.
Chris Cuomo couldn’t hide it — he opened his segment by giving President Trump his dues for what he called a “winner” State of the Union.
ReplyDeleteCUOMO: “We saw a prodigious production last night.”
“POTUS was on his game.”
“He was looking to engage voters by presiding over a parade of patriotism and he was looking to enrage Democrats…and he succeeded at both.”
“Calling out amazing sacrifice, example after example. People who have suffered, families that have persevered through the unimaginable.”
“And yes, it was heartwarming to see them receive the accolades that the president announced.”
“And there were more of these examples and we’ve ever seen because showcasing the triumph of the American spirit is a winner for this president and any other and to be honest.”
Fuck Cuomo
DeleteThe New York Times says cancel the midterms.
ReplyDelete"There was a time when midterm elections made sense — at our nation’s founding, the Constitution represented a new form of republican government, and it was important for at least one body of Congress to be closely accountable to the people. But especially at a time when Americans’ confidence in the ability of their government to address pressing concerns is at a record low, two-year House terms no longer make any sense. We should get rid of federal midterm elections entirely.
There are few offices, at any level of government, with two-year terms. Here in Durham, we elect members of the school board and the county sheriff to terms that are double that length. Moreover, Twitter, ubiquitous video cameras, 24-hour cable news and a host of other technologies provide a level of hyper-accountability the framers could not possibly have imagined. In the modern age, we do not need an election every two years to communicate voters’ desires to their elected officials.
But the two-year cycle isn’t just unnecessary; it’s harmful to American politics."
They don’t make that decision.
DeleteThis isn't the first time you've posted this. You always "forget" to provide a link.
DeleteDon't worry. It was probably just a fanny burp.
ReplyDelete