“In the shadows of President Donald Trump’s mass deportation blitz, a lethal pattern has emerged. Since July, immigration agents have shot at least six people behind the wheel of a vehicle (two of them fatal, including Wednesday’s shooting). In each instance, the playbook is the same: the agent claims self-defense, asserting they ‘feared for their life’ as a vehicle was ‘weaponized’ against them.” (01/09/26)
“Government agencies inevitably turn enforcement responsibilities into opportunities to extend the security state. Every initiative to document, monitor, track, or otherwise spy on Americans starts with a mandate to ensure that people are obeying some rule or law. So it is with immigration policies, which fuel government efforts to gather biometric information not just on those who want to enter the country, but on citizens born and raised here. Fortunately, the scheme is getting pushback.” (01/09/26)
“Bob Weir, the singer, songwriter and guitarist who co-founded the Grateful Dead and helped define the sound of the San Francisco rock scene, died Saturday, Jan. 10, after a prolonged battle with cancer and underlying health issues, his family said. He was 78.” [editor’s note: In 1983, I was sitting in a high school science classroom reading the newspaper, when I had occasion to look across at my friend Victor Weir and ask him if he was related to Bob Weir of the Grateful Dead, who had just died of a drug overdose. I’m not sure when the Matrix’s programmers changed the timeline to undo that; I didn’t notice until the early 2000s when I married a Deadhead – TLK] (01/10/26)
Source: Future of Freedom Foundation
by Jacob G Hornberger
“In the aftermath of President Trump’s deadly military attack on Venezuela and his abduction and rendition of Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro and his wife Cilia, Trump is now giving the Venezuelan Chavista regime a simple choice: Obey my commands and give me your oil, or die from death by starvation and illness. … After all, who cares about the U.S. assassinations of those hundred defenseless people in those little boats who were accused of violating U.S. drug laws hundreds of miles away from American shores? Who cares about those 100 people who were killed as part of Trump’s abduction raid against Maduro? Who cares about the 8 million Venezuelans who have fled the country in the effort to survive the vise of Chavista socialism and brutal and deadly U.S. sanctions?” (01/09/26)
“Sudan’s military-led government has returned to the country’s capital after nearly three years of operating from its wartime base in the eastern city of Port Sudan. Sudan’s Prime Minister Kamil Idris told reporters on Sunday that the ‘government of hope’ was officially back in Khartoum and would begin efforts to improve services for the city’s beleaguered residents. The military was forced out by the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) when civil war erupted between the two sides in 2023. The army recaptured it in a significant breakthrough last March.” (01/11/26)
“We tend to analyze foreign policy in terms of doctrines or ideologies. But from The Art of the Deal to his first primary campaign, Trump has always been more defined by a way of doing things than by a firmly held set of commitments or objectives about what to achieve in the world (other than to look out for Number One). That same mindset can help us make sense of Trump’s actions in Venezuela, and perhaps even to get some kind of handle on what kinds of actions the White House might pursue next.” (01/09/26)
“Nicaragua’s left-wing [sic] government has announced the release of dozens of prisoners following pressure from United States President Donald Trump’s administration. The government of President Daniel Ortega said in a statement on Saturday that ‘tens of people who were in the national penitentiary system have gone home to their families.’ … While the government described the move as a gesture to commemorate 19 years of Ortega’s government, Nicaragua is under considerable pressure from the US over its human rights record and a years-long crackdown on opposition leaders and activists.” (01/10/26)
“Nicolas Maduro is brought to court in the United States; Minnesota officials seek to investigate the Minneapolis ICE shooting; Trump loses on the shadow docket.” (01/09/26)
