YOUR SUNDAY MOMENT OF ZEN

 

FROM RACHEL HURLEY ON FACEBOOK

 

In 2013, the federal government commissioned an independent review of its own border agents. The Police Executive Research Forum examined 67 use-of-force incidents that resulted in 19 deaths. What they found was that agents were deliberately stepping in front of moving vehicles to manufacture justification for shooting the drivers.

Read that again. 

Federal law enforcement officers were intentionally creating the conditions that would allow them to kill people.

The PERF report didn’t mince words. It noted agents “intentionally put themselves into the exit path of the vehicle, thereby exposing themselves to additional risk and creating justification for the use of deadly force.” 

In plain English: they’d stand where the car was going, then claim self-defense when they pulled the trigger.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection tried to bury it. When Congress asked for the report, they got a summary with the vehicle-positioning findings conveniently omitted. It took a leak to the Los Angeles Times and an ACLU lawsuit to pry the full document loose. By May 2014, under enormous pressure, CBP finally released it publicly.

The agency also issued new guidelines. Agents should not use their body to block a vehicle’s path. They should not shoot at fleeing vehicles unless occupants pose an imminent lethal threat other than the vehicle itself. The policy was explicit: move out of the fucking way.

Now - pay attention to this part.

The Department of Homeland Security has had an official use-of-force policy on the books since 2018. Policy Statement 044-05, signed by the Acting Deputy Secretary, establishes department-wide standards. 

It requires force to be “objectively reasonable based on the facts and circumstances.” It cites the Supreme Court cases that set the legal standard. It looks professional and thorough on paper.

But I guess paper doesn’t change institutional culture. Training manuals don’t override what agents learned on the job a decade ago. And the people who were active agents during the period when stepping-in-front-of-vehicles was standard practice didn’t just disappear. They got promoted. They became instructors. They trained the next generation.

How long has Jonathan Ross - the ICE agent who shot and killed Renee Good - been working for Border Patrol and ICE?

Since 2007.

Oh. And the Department of Justice policy is even clearer. 

Firearms may not be discharged at a moving vehicle unless no other objectively reasonable means of defense exists - “which includes moving out of the path of the vehicle.” That’s the actual language. 

Moving out of the way is supposed to be the first option, not the last.

So when a federal agent positions himself in front of a car, pulls out his phone to record with one hand, draws his weapon with the other, and then fires - the question isn’t just whether he feared for his life. The question is why he was standing there in the first place.

Former ICE officials have been refreshingly honest in background quotes to reporters this week. “Why did you put yourself in front of the car? You’re staging the scene.” “At a certain point, you need to understand not to put yourself in these positions.” One veteran agent told CBS News he’d been conducting stops for 25 years and never, ever wanted to be intentionally in front of the vehicle.

Because that’s not tactics. That’s manufacturing a pretext.

The PERF report was supposed to fix this. The policy updates were supposed to change behavior. But here we are, twelve years later, watching video that looks exactly like what the independent reviewers described: an agent positioning himself to create the justification, then using it.

The agency’s own policy says force must be objectively reasonable. The DOJ policy says moving out of the way should be the first option. The 2014 guidelines explicitly told agents not to block vehicles with their bodies.

None of that matters if the people enforcing the policy are the same people who learned the old playbook.

The infrastructure for accountability doesn’t work when the FBI takes sole control of investigations and excludes state authorities. It doesn’t work when federal immunity shields agents from local prosecution. It doesn’t work when the same agency investigates itself.

What we’re watching isn’t a rogue agent or a tragic split-second decision. What we’re watching is a system designed to produce exactly this outcome - and documented evidence that the government knew about the problem over a decade ago.

They commissioned a report. They buried the report. They got caught. They changed the policy on paper. And twelve years later, the playbook is still running.

Here are all of the likely laws Jonathan Ross broke:

Most likely chargeable offenses:

 1. Third-Degree Murder (Minn. Stat. § 609.195)

 2. Second-Degree Manslaughter (Minn. Stat. § 609.205)

 3. Failure to Render Aid to Shooting Victim (Minn. Stat. § 609.662)

 4. Deprivation of Rights Under Color of Law (18 U.S.C. § 242)

Additional potential charges depending on investigation:

5. First-Degree Manslaughter (Minn. Stat. § 609.20)

6. Evidence tampering (leaving scene with weapon)

7. Obstruction charges if coordination to block investigation is proven

#ratcclips

Nicholas Kristof:

 

Nicholas Kristof 

There have been a couple more developments in the case of Renee Good, shot dead by an ICE officer in Minneapolis.

First, a new video has been released showing the perspective of the ICE officer who shot Good. Administration officials seem to think it's exculpatory, but to me it's the opposite.  The officer walks around the car, and Renee Good greets him cheerfully and says, twice, "I'm not mad at you." Her demeanor is friendly, not that of a person who poses a threat. Then the officer walks around the front of the car.

She is clearly visible turning the steering wheel to the right, away from the ICE officer, and she starts to drive off. There is no thump or movement that indicates that he was hit. But he fires three times in quick succession and then -- with her perhaps already dead -- he appears to say, "Fucking bitch."

In other words, nothing in any of the videos indicates that Good is a crazed leftist or has any intention to harm anyone. She seems to be trying to leave the scene. It is the ICE officer who seems menacing and out of control.

The other development is that we've learned more about both Good and her killer. The ICE officer was apparently once injured when a vehicle dragged him about 100 yards, and that obviously may have made him particularly sensitive to vehicular threats. Then again, that obviously cannot excuse an execution on the street.

As for Good, what we learn is the opposite of the "crazed leftist" narrative presented by Kristi Noem and by Vice President Vance. Good had just dropped off her child at school. She reportedly is a Christian, a poet and the widow of an Air Force veteran, now married to a woman. She is a US citizen and does not appear to have any history of violence or to have been anything but a model citizen.

I'd also note that the Trump administration claims that it was necessary to send in ICE officers to protect US citizens. But the only killing of a US citizen in Minneapolis so far in 2026 was not by an undocumented immigrant but by an ICE officer.

I understand that law enforcement officers feel under threat and make difficult life-and-death decisions. But that is not a license to execute a friendly driver as she leaves the scene of a confrontation. And it is outrageous that ICE refused to allow a man identified as a doctor to try to treat Good at the scene. I am particularly troubled by the way the administration has lied about this case from the beginning, presenting this as self-defense from a crazed leftist, defaming Good as well as killing her. I've spent a lot of time covering dictatorships, and that is straight out of the authoritarian playbook. It's what I expect in Iran or Venezuela, not in the US.

I have no confidence in the ability of the feds to investigate the case, so I hope the Minnesota prosecutors will pursue the case (even though the feds have withheld evidence so far) and take it to a grand jury if appropriate. I don't want to prejudge the evidence here, but we need to protect citizens and we can't grant impunity to federal officers who shoot drivers in the head as they try to leave.

Thoughts?

Trump says only his “own morality” limits his power

BREAKING: “I DON’T NEED INTERNATIONAL LAW” — Trump says only his “own morality” limits his power as America reacts with horror. 

In a jaw-dropping interview that sounded less like a democratic leader and more like a comic-book supervillain monologue, Donald Trump declared that the only thing restraining his power is “my own morality.” 

Not the Constitution. Not Congress. Not international law.

Just Donald Trump. 

Asked by The New York Times whether there were limits on his authority to strike, invade, or coerce other nations, Trump didn’t hesitate: “Yeah, there is one thing. My own morality. My own mind. It’s the only thing that can stop me.” --Occupy Democrats

*******************

This "morality" Trump claims to live by is what he has lived his entire life by:  The morality of a man who is a liar, cheat, fraudster, convicted felon, adjudicated sexual assaulter/rapist, a man known for cheating people who've worked for him out of money he's owed them; a man who scammed people who signed up for his Trump University; a serial adulterer who cheated on all his wives, who even cheated on his mistresses, and a man who talked about his own daughter's voluptuous figure and said if she wasn't his daughter, he'd be dating her!

A man who for decades partied and was close friends with Epstein and Maxwell who trafficked young girls to rich and powerful men for sex and who raped those children themselves. Trump knew what Epstein and Maxwell were up to, and did nothing. Trump even mitigated Maxwell's 20-year prison sentence by transferring her to a "club fed," where she gets massages and special meals. No pedophile in America was ever treated this way. Ever.

That's the Trump "morality" we now live under; That's what Trump wants us to trust.

RENEE NICOLE GOOD

From Title 1, U.S. DOJ Policy on Use of Force: “Firearms may not be discharged solely to disable moving vehicles. Specifically, firearms may not be discharged at a moving vehicle unless: (1) a person in the vehicle is threatening the officer or another person with deadly force by means other than the vehicle; or (2) the vehicle is operated in a manner that threatens to cause death or serious physical injury … and no other objectively reasonable means of defense appear to exist, which includes moving out of the path of the vehicle.” Also, placing oneself in the path of a moving vehicle constitutes officer-created jeopardy and undermines any claim that deadly force was necessary.From Title 1, U.S. DOJ Policy on Use of Force: “Firearms may not be discharged solely to disable moving vehicles. Specifically, firearms may not be discharged at a moving vehicle unless: (1) a person in the vehicle is threatening the officer or another person with deadly force by means other than the vehicle; or (2) the vehicle is operated in a manner that threatens to cause death or serious physical injury … and no other objectively reasonable means of defense appear to exist, which includes moving out of the path of the vehicle.” Also, placing oneself in the path of a moving vehicle constitutes officer-created jeopardy and undermines any claim that deadly force was necessary.

All Americans should be sickened by what happened to Renee Nicole Good yesterday in Minneapolis. ICE agents escalated a situation, and an American woman was shot dead on an American street.

From the information I've read, the ICE shooter left the scene of the killing, which, I believe, is also a crime.

I will not publish any comments that blame Ms. Good for her murder. 

I've watched the videos of the killing. Noem's and Trump's statements are inexcusable lies about what happened.

From "The Other 98%":

"Protests are erupting across America because Renee Nicole Good — a 37-year-old mom, a poet and writer — was murdered by ICE in Minneapolis, and the administration is blatantly lying about what happened. People have seen the video. They know the truth. And they’re refusing to let it be buried. 

 On Wednesday, during a sweeping ICE operation forced into a residential neighborhood, an officer fired into Good’s car and killed her.  

 Within hours, the Trump administration locked into a familiar script. They claimed “self-defense.” They said she tried to run officers over. They blamed “agitators.” They demanded the public stand down and trust them. 

But the video tells a different story. Everyone has seen it. 

The footage shows ICE agents swarming a stopped SUV, grabbing the door handle, shouting conflicting commands, escalating a situation that didn’t need escalation. As the car begins to move away, an officer fires multiple shots. There’s no mob. No charging vehicle. No imminent threat that justifies a bullet to the head. 

 And that’s why the lies are collapsing in real time."

 

BREAKING

BREAKING: The Netherlands just CANCELLED cooperation with the US, and BLASTED Trump for his crimes. Enjoy every word:

The Netherlands announced it is halting cooperation with U.S. counter-drug missions after American forces killed more than 100 people in attacks on boats accused of smuggling drugs.

This was not a quiet policy tweak. It was an unprecedented public rebuke of Trump and his administration's crimes.

Defense Minister Ruben Brekelmans made it clear that Dutch forces will only operate inside their own territorial waters and will no longer join U.S. high-seas missions tied to Operation Southern Spear.

His words were BRUTAL.

“We have worked together with the Americans on counter-narcotics for many years, but in a different way,” Brekelmans said. “When we see drug smuggling, we try to arrest and prosecute those responsible. Not by shooting ships.”

Brekelmans went further, saying the Netherlands will not provide ships, helicopters, facilities, or support if Washington asks for help with Southern Spear. “The method and the operation the United States is carrying out now, they are really doing that themselves,” he said. “We are not participating in that.”

Dutch officials confirmed their naval station ship is now being used only for monitoring regional security, not for U.S.-led drug missions. Any counter-drug support will be limited strictly to Dutch territorial waters.

This public break comes as outrage grows over Trump’s decision to use military force to seize Venezuela’s President Nicolás Maduro, an escalation condemned internationally as a violation of sovereignty and international law. Brekelmans warned that rising tensions threaten regional stability, airspace, and security even if there is no immediate military threat to the Dutch Caribbean.

Every Western nation is finding a way to abandon Trump. Even the UK reportedly suspended intelligence sharing after the U.S. began launching lethal strikes on boats in the Caribbean.

This is what Trump’s authoritarian foreign policy looks like in practice: allies refusing to participate, democratic governments drawing lines in public, and the United States isolated because its president prefers violence over law.

he Netherlands didn’t whisper this. They said it out loud. And Trump has never looked weaker.

THANK YOU to The Netherlands, for standing up to our pathetic thug president.

WILL TRUMP DRAG THE US INTO A WAR WITH EUROPE?

From MeidasTouch: 

Read this joint statement by France, Germany, Italy, Poland, Spain, the United Kingdom, and the Kingdom of Denmark on Greenland: "Greenland belongs to its people. It is for Denmark and Greenland, and them only, to decide on matters concerning Denmark and Greenland."