Renee Good’s Time at Old Dominion Included an Award-Winning Poem by Jazmine Ulloa

The murder of Renee Good on a Minneapolis street by a reckless, irresponsible federal agent is a tragedy and an outage. The man who shot her at point blank range committed a criminal act and should be in jail right this second. Any other interpretation is morally vacant. Leading with anger is entirely appropriate. Instead, I’m trying to emphasize celebration of the person Renee Good was, operating in bravery on behalf of her community. She was a poet, and this piece, written by Jazmine Ulloa for The New York Times, details that part of her life. Good’s award-winning work is excerpted in the article. Here’s a direct link to that full poem.

ICE’s Killing of Renee Good Is Part of a Bigger Project by Christina Cauterucci

Writing for Slate, Christina Cauterucci makes the vitally important argument that the cold-blooded murder of Renee Good isn’t an operational mistake but instead a partial expression of a general worldview of the political right. For decades, the Republicans have clung to power by fomenting hatred of poor people, young people, immigrants, and really anyone with a little extra pigment in their skin. This hideous U.S. presidential administration has taken that longstanding tactic to abhorrent extremes. The man who sullies the Resolute desk possesses zero empathy, and so his pathetic adherents in the G.O.P. must be similarly psychopathic. Their strategy relies on the rest of the citizenry also following suit, and they’re trying there damnedest to make that happen.

How Hard Is It To Oppose Murder? by Albert Burneko

The photo above, taken by Ben Hovland of MPR News, is the one that haunts me. Again, I find it baffling that anyone who assesses this situation comes away with any reaction short of rage. Given that, it’s infuriating to me as resident of Minnesota that one of my Democratic senators, Amy Klobuchar, has been so tepid in her official responses, beginning with a statement issued right after the shooting that primarily lamented a lack of chumminess between ICE and the local police. Writing for Defector, Albert Burneko levels the right amount of exasperated umbrage at Klobuchar and her fellow centrist appeasers in Democratic leadership.

Call Trump’s power grab in Venezuela what it is by Marisa Kabas

Don’t forget that this past week also brought other illegal actions on the part of the White House, including the kidnapping of a foreign head of state. Writing for her own shingle, The Handbasket, Marisa Kabas offers cogent analysis of the situation, especially homing in on the mainstream news media’s irresponsible treatment of the incident as just another military action. As she notes, there’s an underlying problem that journalists continue to treat pronouncements from the federal government as if they’re being issued by individuals operating with integrity and in good faith when that’s clearly not the case.