Lieutenant, governor Flanigan – who is known to wear an Anishanabe costume when it suits her, politically – was crowing about Minnesota being on the brink of adopting, the most radical abortion law in the country., and one of the worst in the world:

Former senator Matt Dean caught her on the facts.

But Representative Donna Bergstrom – also an Ojibwe – had the burn that we’ve been looking for:

I bet the Ojibwe had words for “murder”, “outsider who’s not supposed to be among us without some scrutiny”, and “petty tyrant”.

Noticed a lot more people shooting at silhouettes waaaaaay down at the other end of the range lately?

Blame Elisha Dicken, the hero of last summer’s attempted spree killing in Indiana, who put eight out of ten shots into a would-be mass murderer at a range of 40 yards, under the stress of shooting at someone out to murder everyone he could see.

Massood Ayoob comments on the episode, the drill – and comments on some other attempted spree killings ended by good guys with guns….

…at ranges that seem like they’re from Davy Crockett tales.

In my 20s, I had a section of my bookshelf that I called my “Know Thy Enemy” section.

It had an assortment of books that, broadly, are antithetical to Western Civliization: Marx, Mein Kampf (in German and translation), even a copy of “The Turner Diaries” at one point (although that last one got tossed along the way).

Point being, while I don’t still literally have that bookshelf, I find it useful to know our enemies.

So I listen to NPR. Not all the time. Mostly when I’m stuck on a long drive. I seek out the blinkered, the entitled and the depraved.

The New Yorker Radio Hour rarely disappoints on any of those counts. Like it’s fellow WNYC production, NYRH is a reliable stenographer for the inner id of eastern transatlantic progressive reflexes.

This past weekend? The etymology of word “woke”…

…which, we are reminded, doesn’t really exist:

Lately, conservatives have blamed “wokeness” for everything from deadly mass shootings to lower military recruitment. Still, few have a ready definition for what the word means. 

The episode then goes on to provide its etymology (I’m a linguistics geek, I live for that stuff) and several working definitions and its history of use on the “progressive” left…

…on the way toward telling us the whole thing is a conservative messaging scam.

This is, of course, the leftist pattern:

1. Coin a term – “Politically Correct”, “CRT” “Woke”, “Mostly Peaceful” – to describe one of the left’s activities or goals
2. Use it.
3. Turn it into a social cliche.
4. When conservatives turn the cliche against them, declare it never existed and that that it’s all right-wing messaging (leaving behind a residue of people who didn’t get the memo, and continue to use the term in its original form with dogged, entitled obstinacy).
5. Move on to the next term, lather, rinse, repeat.

My project for the coming year: do my little bit to push “white supremacy” down into Step 4.

You might look at Minneapolis, and silently wonder to yourself “how did that city become like it is? How do people like Jacob Frey and Alondra Cano and the City Council keep getting elected? What is with those voters“?

And then you read…:

And you turn your mind to productive things.

I was down at the State Capitol yesterday morning for the Gun Owners Lobby Day.

While there, I ran into a bunch of legislator friends, including former Representative, now Senator Eric Lucero.

Who told me this story, which I’m pleased to pass on to all of you now.

Anyone get the impression Senator Mitchell was a “Meteorologist” at a failing small-market TV station before becoming part of the DFL machine?

Maybe Steve Carell studied her before doing “Anchorman?”

Police departments nationwide reportedly bracing for riots after yet another police shooting…

…in yet another Democrat-run city, which yet another wave of “protesters” will turn into yet another wave exploitation of another wave of, what the heck, let’s call it “anger”.

“Anger” that feels more and more like a Democrat party campaign-prep operation. .

A quote:

“A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves largesse from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most benefits from the public treasury with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy, always followed by a dictatorship. The average age of the world’s greatest civilizations has been 200 years. These nations have progressed through this sequence: From bondage to spiritual faith; From spiritual faith to great courage; From courage to liberty; From liberty to abundance; From abundance to selfishness; From selfishness to apathy; From apathy to dependence; From dependence back into bondage.”

Alexander Fraser Tytler

In completely unrelated news, Governor Klink proposes a budget that is 21% larger than the previous budget.

As predicted by yours truly, it turns the entire “surplus” [1] into permanent spending, giving a pittance back to those earning less than $75,000 – in other words, the ones that didn’t pay the taxes – and calls the payments “Walz Checks”.

I’m a little amazed they’re not called “Walz/Flanagan Checks”.

Not sure why I thought those two things at precisely the same time.

[1] Which is not only the usual overtaxation, but heavily comprising one-time federal money, and spending driven by federal stimulus and inflated a solid 8%. Only the inflation is going to remain.

After twenty years on Eat Street, “Bad Waitress” – as perfect a metaphor for life in a city run by Democrats – has abused its last customer.

“When we opened The Bad Waitress, we set out to serve our friends and neighbors better food with a fresh approach. We’ve believed since the start that brunch makes everything better – but this time, it couldn’t save the day,” the Cohens wrote. “We hope you’ll join us for one last lunch date, boozy brunch, mid-morning coffee, or to use your Bad Waitress gift card before we close our doors on Sunday, January 29.”  

They actually had two locations. The other one, up in Northeast, closed…

…oh, just you guess when. 2020. You got it.

But remember – don’t you dare say Minneapolis is in a death spiral.

While I wish the folks at Hell’s Kitchen all the best, after some of their wokiness, I can’t help but wonder if the wolves aren’t circling the door.

During the debate on the state’s #1 priority, Rep. Peggy Scott asked Rep. Skeletor when a baby becomes human.

Liebling’s response:

I’m going to park this is a post for 2024. The media will try to memory-hole this entire shameful episode. I may not be able to fix that, but in the little corner of the world I influence, this is going to be a topic in about 18 months.

Ask a vocal pro-choicer this question:

“At what point in your mother’s pregnancy with you would it have become unacceptable for her to abort you?”

Not some abstract “woman” excercising “reproductive rights”. Your mother.

Not some abstract “Fetus” or “clump of cells” or “tissue mass”. You. The person you were born as, and became.

When would you, Mr/Ms. Pro-Choicer celebrating legislature considering abortion through 40 weeks of gestation on demand, tell your mother the life you’re living now had enough worth to consider it human?

Mohammed Ali in his prime didn’t duck and weave and gyrate like what you’re about to see.

Nikole Hanna-Jones grift continues.

I caught her segment on “All Things Considered” over the weekend (so you don’t have to):

I think there is a segment of America that you will never reach. They don’t care what the facts are. They don’t care what the history is. They don’t want to hear it. But I don’t actually think that’s most Americans. As I say, you know, in the preface for the original project, we all suffer for the poor history we’ve been taught. And I couldn’t be a journalist – I wouldn’t have chosen this as my profession if I didn’t believe that if you can inform people, if you can provide people with the correct information, that that has the ability to be transformative.

One of the segments Hanna-Jones will never reach are people who prefer their history to tell the complete story, without being altered to drive a political agenda. People like those notorious conservative tools at The Atlantic, Forbes, Politico, and collections of Civil War academics and economists and on and on.

She’ll never reach those of us who object to her completely rewriting and slandering entire swathes of American history, while slathering herself in the strawman that critiqueing her project (or, merely, her) means shutting down the study of the history of slavery.

Somehow – unexpectedly – none of that made it into Michelle Martin’s fawning “interview”, which was more a matter of mutual toenail-painting than news.

Governor Klink released his gun control proposals yesterday.

Did he propose to push metro prosecutors to use the sentence enhancement for using guns to commit crime?

Perish the thought, simple peasant.

No, the usual California-stye gruel: magazine capacity limits, age limits, and most importantly gun registration [1].

It’s time to turn out.

The Minnesota Gun Owners Caucus is holding its annual “Lobby Day” on Thursday morning. Come on down to the Capitol. Members of the Caucus will meet you, show you how to find your Rep and Senator in the various office buildings, and help you represent gun owners, face to face, to our legislature.

The legislature takes these days seriously since they know that unlike the astroturf clutches of biddies with ELCA Hair that ProtectMN and Moms Want Action sends waddling around the place, we represent a hell of a lot of actual voters that consider the 2nd Amendment a litmus test. And there are a lot of us out there. Enough to flip a chamber or two in 2024? Yep.

Hope to see you there on Thursday morning!

[1] They’re called “Universal Background Checks” – but the only way to make them “universal” is to keep track of which guns have been background-checked. This creates a set of linked data points – or, as they’re called in the information management business, a “database” . Ringing a bell, yet?

Amy Klobuchar should be thankful to the feminist goddess that Tina Smith is in Congress.

Because as long as she is, A-Klo is not the dumbest Senator in our delegation.

Shot:

Chaser:

To be fair, Smith says it because she knows Democrat voters don’t do critical thought.

A shooting outside a police training center sparked riots in Atlanta Saturday night.

The police say the deceased was an anti-facility activist who shot a State Patrolman before getting killed by the return fire. The decedent’s, er, colleagues claim he was feeding puppies and getting old women across the street.

Either way, it was mostly peaceful:

No, really:

Although I’m old enough to remember when “Freelance journalist” wasn’t shorthand for “itinerant leftist journalism grad student with a Twitter account”, he may have a point; there may not have been a visible leader. But leaders don’t need to be visible to lead; in fact, that’s probably a serious tactical advantage; ask any platoon leader when snipers are expected.

They’re baaack.

Over the weekend, “Anti”-Fa rioted in Atlanta.

First: Governor Klink and Mayor Mompants McDreamy could learn a thing or two from Brian Kemp about how to handle communist guerrilla uprisings. But of course, if either of them did the “progressive” wing of the DFL would get upset: Peggy Flanagan would yank the leash on Governor Walz’s dog collar so hard he’d fly out of his shoes.

Among the arrested – the daughter of House Majority Whip Katherine Clark:

Yep. Daughter. One of those “menstruation is a state of mind”-kind of daughters:

Because of course, and what did. you expect?

My first thought, by the way, was that the arrest of the child of a high-profile progressive would work out about the same as the handling of Woody Kaine, the son of Senator Tim Kaine, Hillary’s Veep candidate and “Anti”-Fa member who was arrested for attacking a Republican gathering in the MN State Capitol in March 2017.

But the arrest may have been state jurisdiction. Which may just mean “no woke Soros prosecutor”.

A friend of the blog emails regarding the “Muhammad” flap at Hamline that I wrote about last week:

It is entirely possible that Aram Wedatalla read the syllabus for the course last summer, saw that there was a warning about the image of the Prophet and signed up for the course with an eye toward kickstarting her political career by manufacturing this incident. Aram Wedatalla is after all President of the Muslim Student Association at Hamline. This is a great resume builder for someone who sees their future in the NGO/Nonprofit universe and eventually following in the footsteps of Ilhan Omar into public office. The mind positively boggles at the thought that she was “blindsided” by the picture of the prophet, Aram Wedatalla is not an Innocent.

It’s very entirely plausible.

In fact, it’s entirely possible this entire situation has resulted in no victims whatsoever.

Wedatalla may have launched her career – no mean feat for a “-studies” major at an also-ran university.

Professor Lopez Prater? She became a national cause celebre, perhaps the most famous adjunct professor in the country, and got herself a gig at a more viable school.

The U of M Art Department profs that spoke out on her behalf? They got to thread that needle between being keeping their “woke academic” card and still defending free speech (by one of their own, natch).

There were no losers!

Other than Hamline.

Cara Schulz is the proprietor of Flower Pot Holistic Wellness in Burnsville – stop by and say hi! She urges you to contact your reps and Senators and urge them to exempt small farmers and businesses from the most draconican, Big-Pharma-driven regulations. MN is Ready is the closest thing there is to an advocacy group.

Here’s Walter Hudson’s thread on the drive to build a database of “hate speech”, and – I think, by extension, the beginnings of a social credit index.

This is what infant totalitarianism looks like.

Here’s today’s music list:

Most Illinois counties say they will refuse to enforce Governor Pritzker’s unconstitutional “assault weapon” ban:

Edwards County Sheriff Darby Boewe wrote in a statement that part of his duty is to protect the right to keep and bear arms.

“The right to keep and bear arms for defense of life, liberty, and property is regarded as an inalienable right by the people,” Boewe wrote. “Therefore, as the custodian of the jail and chief law enforcement officer for Edwards County, that neither myself or my office will be checking to ensure that lawful gun owners register their weapons with the State, nor will we be arresting or housing individuals that have been charged solely with noncompliance of this act.”

The statement was drafted by Illinois Sheriffs’ Association Executive Director Jim Kaitschuk, according to ABC News, and sent out to sheriff’s departments to use or make edits if desired.

DuPage, Sangamon, and Iroquois counties are among the 74 departments that have released similarly modified statements. Iroquois County Sheriff Clinton Perzee said he would not use his jails to detain people exercising their civil rights, according to the Lake and McHenry County Scanner.

Just your periodic reminder that, outside America’s moldy blue core cities, gun control is largely dead.

Largely .

Like the villain in “Scream”, it will keep bouncing back until we finally cut the head off.

…but I get the impression someone is sliding ever so slowly back toward conservatorship.

Big Left will flip the tables, declare that Trump’s push to develop a vaccine was a huge mistake.

New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern announced her departure from office on Wednesday (US time).

Socialists and eggheads golf-clapped the end of her regime, filled with some of the most draconian and ill-advised Covid responses in the world, atop years of socialist knob-jiggling. .

I know, the video below is a fake. I don’t care. It reflects my feelings exactly.

Why is she leaving?

I don’t care. For right now, it’s sufficient that she is leaving.

Hamline University – my neighbor here in the MIdway, a university with almost as much hamfisted woke cred as Saint Thomas and Macalester, recently fired an art professor for showing an artistic representation of Mohammed.

Here’s a quick rundown:

López Prater, an adjunct professor, showed a picture of the Prophet Muhammad in an art history class-causing an uproar back in October. Since, many Muslims viewing visual representations of the prophet are prohibited, some thought the professor’s actions as highly “Islamaphobic”. Take a look:

Despite a “trigger warning”, it appears the student was triggered when Dr. López Prater, showed the classroom a medieval depiction of Muhammad, an “incident of hate and discrimination“, apparently. Hell, even the university’s associate vice president of inclusive excellence (AVPIE) found it to be “undeniably inconsiderate, disrespectful and Islamophobic“.

It sent the message for all to hear: “triggered students are more important than academic, or really all, freedom.”

The story got some national play – which couldn’t have helped the struggling little university.

Of course, Hamline’s concern for diversity of academic opinion, or for that matter the less fashionable consitutional rights, is just as dismal.

But let’s stick with today’s controversy. Hamline is trying to back-track. Ellen Watters, chair of Hamline’s board of trustees, wrote:

In the interest of hearing from and supporting our Muslim students, language was used that does not reflect our sentiments on academic freedom. Based on all that we have learned, we have determined that our usage of the term ‘Islamophobic’ was therefore flawed…It was never our intent to suggest that academic freedom is of lower concern or value than our students — care does not ‘supersede’ academic freedom, the two coexist.

But it may be too late. Lopez Prater has filed suit:

The lawsuit filed on behalf of López Prate states the professor suffered loss of income from her adjunct position, emotional distress and damage to her professional reputation and job prospects.

David Redden, a lawyer for Dr. López Prater, says the university’s change of heart on the “islamaphobia” accusations does not change the lawsuit and that he, and his client, will pursue legal action against the university.

And other academics have risen to the defense…

…of their fellow academic.

So the good news is, even some academics have reached a point where they won’t spontaneously erupt into a Maoist struggle session on command. Provided it’s their freedom at stake.

It’s a tiny, tiny start.

Children can decide they are any gender or orientation they want…

…but adults can not, and indeed must not be allowed to.

DFL representative Sandra Feist, from the moldy blue suburbs of Henco, speaking on behalf of a bill that would, uh…

…put tampons in boys restrooms in Minnesota schools:

Remember – there is no such thing as “woke culture“, peasants!

While not a single tampon in will be used to deal with a “period” in a bio-boy, I do predict this will lead to a golden age of practical jokes played with tampons.

BTW, the Moe Howard estate called. There will be a cease and desist coming from their lawyers about that hairdo.

SCENE: Mitch BERG Is shopping for a new stove at the appliance store. Focusing on spec sheets, he doesn’t notice Avery LIBRELLE, who makes a beeline for BERG.

LIBRELLE: Merg!

BERG: Oh, whyyyyyhi, there, Avery. What’s…

LIBRELLE: Shut up. The paranoia of you wingnuts is hilarious. Now you’re saying “big bad gummint” is coming for your gas stoves.

BERG: Yeah – I hard NPR saying that, last week.

It’s the latest tempest in a teapot on the internet and in Washington politics – what some have dubbed StoveGate. That is the idea of banning natural gas cooking stoves. The controversy started with a remark from Richard Trumka, a commissioner on the Consumer Product Safety Commission, last month before a consumer advocacy group. He cited health studies about gas stoves.

LIBRELLE: Exactly. Nobody’s coming for your gas stove.

BERG: But they’ve been talking about wanting to ban them for years.

LIBRELLE: (Theatrical sigh). OK, Merg. Are they coming for your gas stove right now?

BERG: You people do this with everything. With CRT in schools…

LIBRELLE: Are they literally teaching your kids a law-school level sociology class, right this second?

BERG: …and bespoke gender…

LIBRELLE: Are they booking your kid for gender reassignment surgery right this second as we speak?

BERG: …or socialism…

LIBRELLE? Are they nationalizing your busienss right now?

BERG: Or gun control.

LIBRELLE: Is there a SWAT team beating down your door, not your neighbor’s door but your front door, looking for your guns right this second?

BERG: …then you call us hysterical.

LIBRELLE: Heeeyyyyy! Hysterical is anti-feminist, and implies that insanity is a feminine trait.

BERG: (Seeing a golden opportunity) Am I telling a woman she’s hysterical right this second?

LIBRELLE: Why, as a matter of fact…

(Gas oven lights off with an exaggerated roar. LIBRELLE walks away by the time the sound dies down).

BERG (to clerk). Did you catch that?

CLERK: I was wondering myself.

BERG: Guess we’ll never know.

And SCENE.