While the shocking sea change in Minnesota politics – the inversion of political power in the cities and the suburbs due to the free-market politics of St. Paul’s Mayor Lopez (joined, in 2017, by Republican Minneapolis Mayor Anatolii Dolokhov, elected after Green Party mayor Loaf Beziers was indicted for attempting to donate an entire Minneapolis neighborhood and its residents to Greenpeace) and the growing DFL-centricity of the suburbs – snuck up on Minnesota, the events of 2039 came more suddenly – and were more shocking.

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August 22, 2039
Blaine Cleans Up After Riots
Tylenol Harris, Minnesota Democrats Exposed On IMax

The city of Eden Prairie is cleaning up after three days of the worst rioting in Minnesota history.

Some say the emotional damage will take a lot longer to clean up.

The streets of this troubled southwest metro suburb exploded in rage after Eden Prairie Police Sgt. Thai O’Riordan and Patrolman Jeff “Lumpy” Al-Khalid were acquitted in the beating of Justin Prince-Adddams and Tylenol Lundgren.

“For the millionth time”, says defense attorney Cassandra Blodgett, “It wasn’t a beating.  It wasn’t a beating.  It was NOT A BEATING!”.

Blodgett notes that the video seems to confirm the officers’ defense – that they merely pushed the men up against the side of their squad car after they were caught huffing paint and butane while skateboarding with bags of stolen clothing.

However, a new Eden Prairie law didn’t allow police to touch suspects; the seven-member Eden Prairie City Parliament, which had been merged with the 75-member School Board, had passed a law to adopt school disciplinary rules for the city as a whole.  As a result, the officers were not legally allowed to impart physical force in arresting suspects.  A Grand Jury refused to indict the officers on charges of Sexual Abuse and Molestation, but returned charges of Aggravated Assault and Larceny of Self-Esteem.

Community groups started posturing long before the trial began.  White liberals complained of systematic discrimination.  “Look at where we live!”, exclaimed Fidel Klempfer, leader of “Eden Prairie Needs Money For The Children”.  “Moldy McMansions!  Man-made lakes lined with tenements!  Streets crawling with unemployed anthropology majors, social networking life coaches and vegan consultants!  This city needs help!”

“There are two Minnesotas” proclaimed Ed Johnson of “Give Us What We Need” “The part of Minnesota that won life’s lottery, and the part that is still waiting at the track for their number to come up”.

As the verdicts were read, Eden Prairie riot police stood by, awaiting the worst.

They got it.

As the “not guilty” verdicts trailed out, one by one, the gathered crowd fell silent.

Then, someone in the gathered crowd from the Barrista’s Union threw a brick, hitting someone from “Vegans For Emotional Justice”.

“That was all it took”, said Lieutenant Phong Leung of the State Patrol.

What started as a scuffle between Vegans and Barristas morphed into a city-wide riot, as other disaffected overeducated young white liberals crowded mass transit to get to the city.

At the end of three days of rioting, 4,000 houses and businesses were burned.  Anderson Lakes Parkway – the epicenter of Eden Prairie’s drug trade – lay in ruins.  Eden Prairie Center, a former shopping center than had been converted into a Kabbala center and had lain vacant for a decade attracting drug addicts and intellectual navel-gazers, became a charnel-house before it collapsed.  Hundreds were injured.  Police reported no injuries to law-enforcment; “Oddly”, said Lt. Leung, “Police weren’t targeted.  They were all going after each other.  Like crabs in a pot, pulling in the ones that tried to get out”.

Standing in the ruins of William Kling High School, School Board/Parliament member Alabassah Mortenssen shakes her head.

“There were signs of a rebirth in Eden Prairie; last fall, we actually beat back some free-market, low-tax challengers!  This time, we coulda done it, but for those damn Republicans!”

She shakes her head.

“And the barristas”.

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Tomorrow – as Eden Prairie rebuilds, Minnesota tries to heal in that way that places with big nasty political divides always “heal”.