"What separates us from the animals, what separates us from the chaos, is our ability to mourn people we've never met." ~ David Levithan
I'm gutted.
Can we just have a break? The news comes so fast and furious that our emotions are beyond rattled. I want it to be boring, when we didn't have to worry about our government murdering its citizens and menacing the world.
One of my last texts of 2025, in wishing Sister Resister Anne a Happy New Year, we both had high feelings, that 2026 would be great.
Big Sister Resister Peg shared this:
A couple days later, we are at war, and a woman was murdered by a masked gestapo thug. Emotions back in the toilet.
I've been avoiding writing because I feel I can't capture the depths of my feelings, nor even the depths of the facts. It's a lot.
I swear a lot here. Sorry not sorry.
The War
It's not a war in the traditional sense. No, there had been no imminent threat to any allied country's citizenry or sovereignty. No. No invasion into our country or any other. No, no. The Dick-tator saw shiny baubles of black gold and decided that the United States should unlawfully invade another nation, kidnap its leader, and begin the rape of its resources.
Are we great yet?
I read the news in a moment of wee-hour insomnia when I checked my news feed on Saturday, January 3. Holy fucking hell. The specter of war is overwhelmingly gut-wrenching.
We're only a week in, and I feel like it's been a year. It took me a while to get the gumption to face this page and clack.
In the wee hours of that Saturday night, the United States mounted an attack on a sovereign nation, going in full force, and dragged Venezuela's dictator leader, Nicolás Maduro, from his bed in Caracas. They loaded him and his wife, Cilia Flores, onto the U.S.S. Iwo Jima and then flew them to a prison in New York. The whole attack lasted less than three hours.
Dozens of people were killed, including 24 Venezuelans in Maduro's security forces and 32 Cuban nationals, who were also tasked to protect Maduro.
If you were like me, you reeled at the news. Like the night of November 5, 2024, the thoughts of the ramifications of this event went out in waves, which crashed into other waves, which caused tidal waves, which combined with other tidal waves.
It was a lot. There are so many fucked up aspects to this war.
The Illegality
This invasion and kidnapping was hugely illegal.
Congress did not give their authorization, which is mandatory. In fact, they weren't even told in advance. The Orange Menace said that they were untrustworthy, saying "Congress has a tendency to leak."
What the actual fucking hell. The members of committees that should be in the know have high security clearances, which is more than we can say for the fucking president of the United States!
It was framed as a law enforcement operation, an arrest for the indictment that was levied against Maduro in 2020. The DEA was involved; in fact you can see a DEA officer in the first photo of a blindfolded and handcuffed Maduro shortly after the raid. Yes, he had been indicted on drug and weapons charges in 2020.
True, he is an illegitimate leader who was "elected" in sham elections. He rules as a dictator. He's a bad guy. Does this mean the full force of the U.S. military can be brought to invade a sovereign nation?
No.
The Hypocrisy
The blather was about drugs; Adderall McSniffypants said he was fighting a righteous battle to allegedly protect the United States from smuggled narcotics.
But this was after he pardoned Honduran president Juan Orlando Hernández, who was convicted in 2024 for trafficking hundreds of tons of cocaine – about 4.5 billion individual does of cocaine – into the United States.
Maduro has similar drug charges pending against him. And he is a dictator. He is a bad, bad guy. His drug trafficking is different, though. The Felon lies about Venezuela trafficking fentanyl, but that's not it; Venezuela traffics cocaine, and it goes to Europe, not the U.S.
Anyone with any ounce of brain material knows that the invasion of Venezuela is all about oil, oil, and oil.
Venezuela has the largest oil reserves in the world.
In his announcement, he said that Venezuela had "stolen" our oil. As Stephen Colbert said, "That was really poor planning for someone to put our oil under Venezuela."
The Shortsightedness
In his announcement, he stated that "we" are going to "run the country."
What the fuck does that mean and how is that to happen?
No one seems to know.
Marco Rubio walked the tightrope when he seemed to contradict Dear Leader's fever dream of "running" the country of Venezuela. He framed it as directing policies concerning their oil.
In an interview with ABC's George Stephanopoulos, Marco said, "What’s going to happen here is we have a quarantine on their oil, that means their economy will not be able to move forward until the conditions that are in the national interest of the United States and the interests of the Venezuelan people are met, and that’s what we intend to do. ...That leverage remains, that leverage is ongoing and we expect that it’s going to lead to results here."
In another interview, he described the "running" as "It’s running policy, the policy with regard to this. We want Venezuela to move in a certain direction."
So who is actually running Venezuela? Is there a regime change, away from the dictatorship?
No.
In the first moments, SCROTUS stated that Venezuela's vice president would take over, saying, "she’s essentially willing to do what we think is necessary to make Venezuela great again." Later he walked that back, saying that she had better "do what's right" and if not, she would "pay a very big price."
What about María Corina Machado, the person who leads the resistance and who won the Nobel Peace Prize?
Well, for a transactional narcissist asshole, the very fact that Machado "stole" the Prize from him means she is to be shunned and left to the tigers.
Side note: Machado is ready for the orange rear end, cuz she's put on her lipstick and is puckering up. News is that she is wants to "give" him her Peace Prize.
If she can get power, there may be hope for the people of Venezuela to regain their agency. And maybe if she's realllly good at ass-kissing, she can keep them safe.
As for the oil? No one really knows what is going on there either.
Shitler thinks he is going to divert all the oil and manage it himself. He has asserted that Venezuela is giving the U.S. a bunch of oil. In a non-tweet he wrote: "I am pleased to announce that the Interim Authorities in Venezuela will be turning over between 30 and 50 MILLION Barrels of High Quality, Sanctioned Oil, to the United States of America. This Oil will be sold at its Market Price, and that money will be controlled by me, as President of the United States of America, to ensure it is used to benefit the people of Venezuela and the United States!"
Ummm yeah, ok. You do that, grandpa.
So far, five Venezuelan oil tankers have been stolen.
A Message
Venezuelans, please know that 50% of Americans do not want to be "running" your country. We do not want to steal your resources. We do not want to interfere in your sovereignty.
And to the rest of the world, as much as we detest Dear Leader, he is our problem to solve. We do not want anyone coming in and taking away our rights to make our decisions about our country, no matter how fraught our situation is. We are a nation of laws, and I'll shout that from the rooftops until my dying day.
NO WAR!
The Don-roe Doctrine. Are you effing kidding me?
You may be like me, who haven't thought about the Monroe Doctrine since 11th grade Civics class with Dr. Goetzinger.
A refresher: The Monroe Doctrine, first verbalized by President Monroe in 1823 and formalized in 1850, basically says, "Hey, Europe! You're no longer welcome over here in the Western Hemisphere. The Americas are AMERCIAN and so stay away!" Learn more from Wikipedia.
In any case, Dumb Don invoked the Doctrine, renaming it the "Don-roe Doctrine" as he explained the invasion. 🤮
The (Lack of) Adrenaline
When you confront your boss, or ask to see the manager, or contest your received class marks, don't you get a jolt of adrenaline?
What if you were to invade another country and kidnap its leader? Pretty exciting, don't you think? Wouldn't you be a bit hyped?
Not this obtunded piece of derangement.
He slurred his way through 30 minutes of remarks, and then while Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Dan Caine described the raid, DonOld took a little stand-up snooze.
Watch him during General Caine's remarks:
The Toadies
Kegstand
Ugh. I tried watching the whole press conference above. I managed to get through Grampa's slobbery spiel, but I physically could not watch Smarmy Whiskey Pete puff his chest and talk about the glories of war, using 4th grade language like, "He effed around and found out."
Please. It's closing time, Petey. Time to go home.
Where is JD?
I dunno. He wasn't at this press conference and hasn't been around (late: he appeared on TV to comment on the murder, more below). Maybe he was on another vacation, forcing the powers that be to reverse the tides so he can go surfing.
Little Marco
Marco Rubio is the saddest of the sad. At every announcement and press conference, he looks like he wants to sink into the wallpaper. He stands stone-faced, wishing invisibility to visit him. At one point, Little Marco was a reasonable member of the GOP. For years he spoke out against Darth Traitor, calling him a "con artist," likening him to a "third-world strongman," warning that he could fracture the Republican Party, and saying "For years to come, there are many people on the right... that are going to be having to explain and justify how they fell into this trap of supporting Donald Trump."
You've got some 'splainin to do, Marco.
Congress
They were out of session when the attack happened. They have been slow to respond. Finally, the Senate voted in a bipartisan way to try to limit his war powers.
The Venezuelans
Some are cheering, some are steaming mad.
From The Conversation: Venezuelans are reacting to Maduro’s capture with anger, fear, hope and joy
The Alarm
Now that Venezuela has been conquered, the attention has been turned to other targets. There has been chatter about invading:
Greenland
Cuba
Colombia
Mexico
Iran
Holy Maniac, Batman!
This is shit.
All of it is shit, but what is perhaps shittiest is the notion of invading Greenland, owned by Denmark, which is a fellow member of NATO. Does that mean we will have to fight ourselves in the defense of a NATO ally? What the living hell is this all about?
The World
The world must hate us. Using might for wrong. It just ain't right!
Read about the global reaction in the New York Times (gift article).
And then this.
"When asked if there were any limits on his global powers, T**** said: 'Yeah, there is one thing. My own morality. My own mind. It’s the only thing that can stop me.'"
The fuck you say.
Friends, I don't have to convince you that this is so so so terribly wrong. Are we now to let any yeehaw decide what they can do based on their own individual morality? Guess what? That's called anarchy.
Plus, and I know you won't disagree, if there was any one person to lead in power according to their own morality, the last one on Earth would be Donald Jessica Tramp.
We. Are. A. Nation. Of. Laws.
The Distraction
Remember this? We mustn't forget.
The Murder
ICE Barbie got it right when she characterized the event in Minneapolis on Wednesday "an act of domestic terrorism." There is no better descriptor for the state-sanctioned murderous masked gestapo that is creating chaos, confusion, fear, and terror.
The details of the events leading up to the murder of Renee Nicole Good, a 37-year-old mother of three, is still hazy. But what happened at the scene was laid bare for all of us to witness.
Renee had dropped her youngest child at school and then, as part of her resistance, reportedly started following ICE agents' vehicles around her neighborhood. Her wife, a passenger, got out of the car. Good situated her Honda Pilot diagonally across the two-lane one-way street. She sat there for about three minutes, at one point waving a car to go around hers.
ICE officers didn't take kindly to her actions. After they parked their large vehicle in a similar position across the road, one officer approached her car aggressively, reaching for the door handle as well as reaching in the open window, yelling for her to "Get the fuck out of the car."
Another few officers were surrounding the vehicle. As the one was reaching into her window, another one, at the front and to the side of her vehicle, started drawing his weapon.
She backed up a bit, and pulled forward, wheels turned away from the officers and toward her escape. As she did, the murderer shot three times: once through he left lower side of her windshield and twice through her open window, killing her. He finished by saying, "Fucking bitch."
I can only imagine her terror as armed, masked thugs were surrounding her vehicle. She just wanted to get away from them. I have no doubt she was in fear for her life.
There are several videos from different angles of the incident. More videos have come out of the woodwork, including today a video from the murderer's viewpoint, recorded on his cellphone, which is #3 below. It's disturbing, all of it. Take care in watching.
I won't embed them here. But you can see some of them below.
You can clearly see that her wheels were turned away from the shooter, and he was to the side of her vehicle when he began shooting. He had opportunity to remove himself from danger; in fact he put himself in danger by walking around the front of a running vehicle.
I'm not a trained officer, and I have the common sense not to walk in front of a vehicle with its engine on. I barely have the courage to cross the street in front of a car that's running.
Moments after the shooting, a Good Samaritan physician ran toward the scene but was stopped by the heavily armed officers. When he identified himself as a physician, he was told, "I don't care," and then, "We have our own medics."
WHERE ARE THEY?! someone yelled.
It took 15 minutes for medics to arrive. It's unconscionable that they prevented a medical professional to render aid.
The whole incident was extremely disturbing. This tragedy was completely avoidable and is the very definition of tragic.
I'm still numb about it.
The 43-year-old murderer is a 10-year veteran of ICE. He is also an Iraq War veteran. He was injured in June, 2025 when a car driven by a fleeing suspect dragged him.
An angry man, no doubt.
If he has 10 years experience, he should know that a fleeing suspect does not require deadly force. She was a U.S. citizen and not part of their mission. There was no threat.
AltNPS shared this about his previous incident:
Immediately after the shooting, those in power began vilifying the victim, Renee Good. Like true abusers, they are blaming her for her own death. The Secretary of Homeland Security, the Vice President, and the President all passed judgment on the event before the caution tape was even able to be placed at the scene.
Their words are odious. They are vilifying this young mother, characterizing her as a left-wing lunatic. They want to pour gasoline on the fire. They are panicking; they want people rieled up so that they can have an excuse to add more troops, more anger, more volatility, and, they hope, more violence, so that they can justify their actions even more.
Cosplay Barbie's press conference was sickening. Here it is. She is an odious human being.
Everything she said is a lie.
TACO was equally odious. He LIED about the incident, saying that Good ran the officer over. No. He can clearly be seen walking away. And notice, it was away. He did not run toward the crashed vehicle with the dying woman inside.
Doughnold said that the murderer was recovering in the hospital. No. He didn't suffer a scratch. Here's his non-tweet, where he plays judge, jury, and executioner.
JD DI-VANce was angry, loud, and putrid in his remarks. He spat (literally) more lies.
"Absolute immunity?" No. What is that even? That's not a thing, JD. For anyone (even Dear Leader – let us all remember that). Study up, bub.
It's outrageous for top government officials – all the way to the effing president – to weigh in, let alone tell us that what we can see with our own eyes is not what we see.
The Investigation
The Feds have tried to stop state and local authorities from participating in the investigation.
It angers me so much that the blasted president has weighed in on the matter, before we had a smidge of evidence. What does that do to the investigation? It sullies it beyond any credibility. The investigators will do what everyone everywhere has done: they will capitulate. Any federal investigation is not to be trusted.
And that is so sad.
The State of Minnesota has started gathering its own evidence, and you can bet your booty that there will be civil lawsuits with their own investigations. Let the facts commence.
Any investigation should have this in mind. The DOJ policy on use of force:
What can stop this?
We can. We must.
Every day we read the news and the only thing to say is "Holy fuck!" and the next thought is, "Is THIS the thing that will move the MAGAts?"
But it never is.
So, we double and triple our efforts. Don't let up, resisters!
Today, my local Indivisible is launching a protest. Is there one in your area? There are surely to be more nationwide protests soon.
Call your Members of Congress. Demand they act to stop war and to reign in ICE.
We Gotta Laugh to Keep From Crying
I don't know how many of these are light. It's all just dark, dark shit my friends.
Jesse Welles, modern day Woody Guthrie?
Here's mine.
Life, liberty and
the pursuit of happiness.
ICE rots all our rights.
Do you have a 2025/2026 Haiku to share? Drop it in the comments.
And finally, from gifted poet Amanda Gorman.
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