I rarely ask people to sign petitions but this one is worthwhile — on the merits and on the politics:
The editors of In These Times are joining the editors of The Nation in formally nominating the city of Minneapolis and its people for the 2026 Nobel Peace Prize.
Please sign this petition right away to join us in amplifying that nomination and demonstrating mass public support.
In recent months, the Trump administration’s deployment of thousands of armed federal agents to the Twin Cities and indiscriminate raids under “Operation Metro Surge” have brought horrific state violence to Minnesota’s streets. Local residents, ICU nurse Alex Pretti and mother, Renée Nicole Good, were murdered by federal officers, sparking outrage and accelerating a movement of resistance across Minneapolis and beyond.
In the face of these attacks, the people of Minneapolis have stood their ground with nonviolent protest, mutual aid, and solidarity, confronting fear and authoritarianism with dignity and resolve. Thousands marched in freezing temperatures; communities have organized legal observers, delivered groceries to those in hiding, and whistled warnings in demand for human rights and constitutional freedoms.
Also this week, his department’s assault on medical research has led Moderna to withdraw from MRNA stage three trials for a whole range of diseases because it’s pointless. And the FDA decided not to approve the new flu vaccine.
But not to worry. They’re telling us all to drink beef tallow to be healthy again so we won’t need those vaccines anyway.
Aleksei A. Navalny was most likely poisoned by a toxin found in a South American frog, five European countries said on Saturday, making the most concrete Western accusation yet that Russia’s leading opposition figure was murdered by his government in an Arctic prison two years ago.
Samples taken from Mr. Navalny’s body showed the presence of a toxic substance, epibatidine, according to a statement released by the foreign ministries of Britain, France, Germany, Sweden and the Netherlands.
“Epibatidine is a toxin found in poison dart frogs in South America. It is not found naturally in Russia,” the statement read.
“Only the Russian government had the means, motive and opportunity to deploy this lethal toxin against Alexei Navalny during his imprisonment in Russia,” it read.
Remember Viktor Yuschenko? They poisoned him with Dioxin:
Before and after
Trump loves to get revenge on his enemies but he’s a piker compared to Putin. (I’m sure he wishes he could get away with what Vlad gets away with but then he’d have to pretend that he didn’t do it and that’s just no fun.)
Remember that Trump thinks the world of Putin — the man who does that to his political enemies. He’s a monster and our president eagerly sucks up to him every chance he gets.
“The conclave that elected Pope Leo was more rigged against Donald Trump than the 2020 presidential election.” — Steve Bannon pic.twitter.com/y1tiZBkh4q
He didn’t like Pope Francis either. Get a load of this excerpt from the Vanity Fair article about Bannon and Jeffrey Epstein’s very close friendship, which is a real mind-blower:
In November 2018, as Bannon was hatching a plot to export MAGA-flavored nationalism abroad after his success storming Washington with Trump, Epstein suggested he build his campaign around a media company, not an NGO. The latter would afford less privacy and invite more scrutiny. “Press. Private. Protected,” Epstein told Bannon. “Think of it as a battle plan. You have made great strides. Forged ahead. [At] some time you stop and build a fort to protect your gains.”
Within a year, Bannon launched War Room, a live podcast beamed out daily from a basement studio near Capitol Hill. He styled himself as a general barking orders to the shock troops of the MAGA movement. The extent to which Epstein inspired the launch of War Room, which The Washington Post once described as “a far‐right Meet the Press,” is unclear, and Bannon hardly mentions his old friend anymore. The crimes of Epstein—who a medical examiner determined died by suicide as he awaited trial—have been a fixation of Trump’s base for years, yet these days they barely merit a mention on War Room.
One possible reason for that came into focus last year as Trump’s Justice Department, under pressure from Congress, began to dump out millions of documents from their cache of files related to the Epstein case. These documents further illuminated the extent of the friendship between Bannon and Epstein, whose private exchanges are jocular, even affectionate at times.
Epstein sent Bannon caring messages about his health and offered him stays at his properties and trips on his plane. After organizing a flight for Bannon, Epstein joked that he was “the most highly paid travel agent in history,” and added: “Massages. Not included.” In one text from 2018, Bannon actually messaged Epstein, “You up???” In another, he told Epstein that a Fox Business anchor who had him on her show was “so wet” during their interview. When prosecutors upheld Epstein’s 2008 plea deal, the two celebrated: “Dude!!!!!!” Bannon messaged. “Tell me this is real.” They seemed to relish in confiding in each other about Trump’s struggles in office, including in one exchange where Bannon called Trump “stupid” and another where he mocked him as a “stable genius.” Epstein once messaged Bannon, “Now you can understand why trump wakes up in the middle of the night sweating when he hears you and I are friends.”
And yet Bannon remains in very good graces with the MAGA set. In fact, he’s one of their most respected intellectual strategists.
I love this part:
For Bannon, Epstein was a conduit to an international network of elites. For Epstein, Bannon offered insight into Trump, an old friend he remained fascinated by. “They were both using each other,” the source who knows both men explained. “Jeffrey would introduce people together a lot, as a way of making himself useful for his patrons.” (The files also demonstrate that despite Bannon’s frequent diatribes against “the ruling class,” he remains a Barbour-clad member of the cosmopolitan elite himself. This is a man who stays at The Pierre when he visits New York and Le Bristol when he’s in Paris. His quest to spread populist nationalism across the globe was aided by private jet travel. In one exchange, eager to get to Paris from Rome, Bannon asks Epstein: “Is it possible to get your plane here to collect me[?]”)
FFS…
As for the Pope, Bannon and Epstein apparently plotted against Pope Francis:
Steve Bannon, a former White House adviser to Trump, told Epstein that he wished to “take down” the leader of the Catholic Church. In June 2019, Bannon wrote to Epstein: “Will take down Francis. The Clintons, Xi, Francis, EU – come on brother.”
In the text exchange, Bannon references the book In the Closet of the Vatican, which exposed much of the secrecy and hypocrisy at the highest levels of the Catholic Church. Another text exchange from April 2019 shows Epstein emailing himself “in the closet of the vatican.” He then sent Bannon an article titled “Pope Francis or Steve Bannon? Catholics must choose.” Bannon responded: “Easy choice.”
Rome and the Vatican were once a very important priority for Bannon. In 2014, the former Trump adviser established a Rome bureau while he was running the right-wing outlet Breitbart News. He also wanted to set up a “gladiator school” for Judeo-Christian political training near the city. Those plans were blocked by the Italian government in 2021; Bannon reportedly was furious.
If you get the chance to read the Vanity Fair article it’s a really great distillation of all the evidence that’s come out about the Bannon Epstein friendship. He was talking to him and making plans to hang out all the way up until the day he was arrested in 2019.
And it’s all good in Trump world. No big deal at all.
Remember how Donald Trump tore up the Iran nuclear deal and then four years later bombed their alleged nuclear program and Trump said it was “completely and totally obliterated? ”
President Trump’s top advisors reportedly warned him that making a deal with Iran on its nuclear program is historically “difficult to impossible.”
Trump asked special envoy Steve Witkoff and son-in-law Jared Kushner what the chances were of reaching an agreement with Tehran, according to a senior US official, Israel’s Channel 12’s Barak Ravid said on Telegram Saturday.
The pair told the president history shows the West has never been able to strike a positive deal with the Islamic Republic leaders, but that they would continue to “take a tough line” during negotiations, Ravid reported.
U.S. President Donald Trump on Friday embraced potential regime change in Iran and declared that “tremendous power” will soon be in the Middle East, as the Pentagon sent a second aircraft carrier to the region.
[…]
Asked if he wanted regime change in Iran, Trump responded that it “seems like that would be the best thing that could happen.” He declined to share who he wanted to take over Iran, but said “there are people…For 47 years, they’ve been talking and talking and talking,” Trump said after a military event at Fort Bragg, North Carolina. “In the meantime, we’ve lost a lot of lives while they talk. Legs blown off, arms blown off, faces blown off. We’ve been going on for a long time.”
Trump has threatened strikes on Iran if no agreement is reached, while Tehran has vowed to retaliate, stoking fears of a wider war as the U.S. amasses forces in the Middle East. The U.S. targeted Iran’s nuclear facilities in strikes last year. When asked what was left to be targeted at the nuclear sites, Trump said the “dust.” He added: “If we do it, that would be the least of the mission, but we probably grab whatever is left.”
[…]
The Gerald R. Ford, the United States’ newest and the world’s largest carrier, has been operating in the Caribbean with its escort ships and took part in operations in Venezuela earlier this year. Asked earlier on Friday why a second aircraft carrier was headed to the Middle East, Trump said: “In case we don’t make a deal, we’ll need it … if we need it, we’ll have it ready.”
He’s really working that Nobel Prize Committee, isn’t he?
Remember, kids, when Republican-controlled states passed photo ID laws then began closing down DMV offices where people could apply for them? Now Republicans want to require you to present a passport for voting and they’re stopping some libraries from processing passport applications:
The U.S. State Department has ordered certain public libraries nationwide to cease processing passport applications, disrupting a long-standing service that librarians say their communities have come to rely on and that has run smoothly for years.
The agency, which regulates U.S. passports, began issuing cease and desist orders to not-for-profit libraries in late fall, informing them they were no longer authorized to participate in the Passport Acceptance Facility program as of Friday.
“We still get calls daily seeking that service,” said Cathleen Special, executive director of the Otis Library in Norwich, Connecticut, where passport services were offered for 18 years but ceased in November after receiving the letter. “Our community was so used to us offering this.”
A State Department spokesperson said the order was given because federal law and regulations “clearly prohibit non-governmental organizations” from collecting and retaining fees for a passport application. Government-run libraries are not impacted.
The spokesperson did not respond to questions as to why it has become an issue now and exactly how many libraries are impacted by the cease and desist order. In a statement, they said, “passport services has over 7,500 acceptance facilities nationwide and the number of libraries found ineligible makes up less than one percent of our total network.”
But then elections are often about narrow percentages, aren’t they?
The State Department has ordered some libraries to stop processing passport applications, as Republicans in Congress push a Trump-backed bill requiring a passport or similar proof of citizenship, beyond a Real ID, to register to vote in the upcoming midterms. pic.twitter.com/7JDSxgEBOh
Public libraries are organized differently in each state. In Pennsylvania 85% of public libraries are non-profit organizations, versus being a department of a local municipal government. In Maine, it’s 56%; Rhode Island, 54%, New York, 47% and Connecticut, 46%, according to the American Library Association.
Pennsylvania Reps. Madeleine Dean, a Democrat, and John Joyce, a Republican, have proposed bipartisan legislation that would allow 501(c)(3) non-profit public libraries to continue to serve as passport acceptance facilities by amending the Passport Act of 1920. A similar companion bill is pending in the Senate.
Dean, who first learned about the policy change from a library in her district that has provided passport services for 20 years, called the State Department’s interpretation of the law “nonsense.”
Donald Trump, Stephen Miller, and their wilding DHS brownshirts are pissing off Americans from north to south, from east to west, and from South Texas to New Jersey. They are pissing off Americans uncomfortable with being pissed off enough at their government to stand up and do anything about it. Until they do.
ICE stopped a U.S. citizen. Smashed her car window. Dragged her out. Threw her U.S. passport into the street. Agents wore masks and refused to identify themselves.
Let that sink in.
We asked http://PAXIS.app what the law says and what should come next:
ICE enforces immigration law under Title 8. It has no authority over U.S. citizens. The Fourth Amendment protects every person from unreasonable seizures and excessive force. An administrative ICE warrant does NOT authorize breaking windows. It does NOT authorize assault. It does NOT suspend the Constitution.
This is not routine enforcement. It is a potential constitutional violation.
This should be reported.
File a police report for the property damage. Create an official record. Report it to the DHS Office of Inspector General and the DHS Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties. Preserve photos, video, medical records, and witness names.
Federal power is not above the Constitution. Document everything. Demand accountability.
Help support PAXIS and get it into the hands of every immigrant and ally in the USA: https://gofundme.com/f/PAXIS
ICE stopped a U.S. citizen. Smashed her car window. Dragged her out. Threw her U.S. passport into the street. Agents wore masks and refused to identify themselves.
There is a tradition in this country (or at least a popular myth) about Americans as a people being slow to anger. Don’t get them angry. Let’s hope Trump, Miller, Bondi, Vought, Noem, Hegseth, and the rest of the Trump bootlickers get to find out what happens when you do.
Apropos to Valentine’s Day, I thought that I would share my 12 favorite romantic comedies with you. In non-ranking alphabetical order:
Amelie-I know this one has its share of detractors-but writer-director Jean-Pierre Juenet’s beautifully realized film (co-written with Gillaume Laurant) has stolen my heart for life. Audrey Tautou literally lights up the screen as a gregarious loner who decides to become a guardian angel (sometimes benign devil) and commit random acts of anonymous kindness. The plight of Amelie’s people in need is suspiciously like her own…those who need a little push to come out of self-imposed exiles and revel in life’s simple pleasures. Of course, our heroine is really in search of her own happiness and fulfillment. Does she find it? You will have to see for yourself. Whimsical, inventive, life-affirming, and wholly original, Amelie should melt the most cynical of hearts (if it fails to do so…I beg you to get some therapy).
Gregory’s Girl– Scottish writer-director Bill Forsyth’s delightful examination of first love follows gawky teenager Gregory (John Gordon Sinclair) as he goes gaga over Dorothy (Dee Hepburn), a fellow soccer player on the school team. Gregory receives advice from an unlikely mentor, his little sister (Allison Forster). While his male classmates put on airs about having deep insights about the opposite sex, they are just as clueless as he.
Forsyth gets a lot of mileage out of a basic truth about adolescence-the girls are usually light years ahead of the boys in getting a handle on the mysteries of love. Not as precious as you might think, as Forsyth is a master of low-key anarchy and understated irony. You may have trouble navigating those Scottish accents, but it’s worth the effort. Also with Clare Grogan, whom music fans may recall as the lead singer of 80s new wavers Altered Images, and Red Dwarf fans may recognize as “Kristine Kochanski”.
Modern Romance (1981) – In his best romantic comedy (co-written by frequent collaborator Monica Johnson), writer-director Albert Brooks (the inventor of “cringe” comedy) casts himself as a film editor who works for American International Pictures. His obsessive-compulsiveness makes him great at his job, but a pain-in-the-ass to his devoted girlfriend (Kathryn Harrold), who is becoming exasperated with his penchant to impulsively break up with her one day, then beg her to take him back the next.
There are many inspired scenes, particularly a sequence where a depressed Brooks takes Quaaludes and drunk dials every woman he’s ever dated (like Bob Newhart, Brooks is a master of “the phone bit”). Another great scene features Brooks and his assistant editor (the late Bruno Kirby, in one of his best roles) laying down Foley tracks in the post-production sessions for a cheesy sci-fi movie. Brooks’ brother, the late Bob Einstein (a regular on Curb Your Enthusiasm) has a wry cameo as a sportswear clerk. Also with George Kennedy (as “himself”) and real-life film director James L. Brooks (no relation) playing Brooks’ boss.
Next Stop, Wonderland – Writer/director Brad Anderson’s intelligent and easygoing fable about love and serendipity made me a Hope Davis fan for life. Davis plays a laid back Bostonian who finds her love life set adrift after her pompous environmental activist boyfriend (Philip Seymour Hoffman) suddenly decides that dashing off to save the earth is more important than sustaining their relationship.
Her story is paralleled with that of a charming and unassuming single fellow (Alan Gelfant) who aspires to become a marine biologist. Both parties find themselves politely deferring to well-meaning friends and relatives who are constantly trying to fix them up with dates. I don’t think it’s a spoiler to tell you that these two may be destined to end up together. The film seems to have been inspired by A Man and a Woman, right down to its breezy bossa nova/samba soundtrack.
Play it Again, Sam – I don’t know what it is about this particular Woody Allen vehicle (directed by Herbert Ross), but no matter how many times I have viewed it over the years, I laugh just as hard at all the one-liners as I did the first time I saw it. Annie Hall and Manhattan may be his most highly lauded and artistically accomplished projects, but for pure “laughs per minute”, I would nominate this 1972 entry, with a screenplay adapted by Allen from his own original stage version.
Allen portrays a film buff with a Humphrey Bogart obsession. He fantasizes that he’s getting pointers from Bogie’s ghost (played to perfection by Jerry Lacy) who advises him on how to “be a man” and attract the perfect mate. He receives some more pragmatic assistance from his best friends, a married couple (Diane Keaton and Tony Roberts) who fix him up with a series of women (the depictions of the various dating disasters are hilarious beyond description). A classic.
She’s Gotta Have It – “Please baby please baby please baby please!” One of writer-director Spike Lee’s earlier, funny films (his debut, actually). A sexy, hip, and fiercely independent young woman (Tracy Camilla Johns) juggles relationships with three men, who are all quite aware of each other’s existence.
Lee steals his own film by casting himself as the goofiest and most memorable of the three suitors- “Mars”, a trash-talking version of the classic Woody Allen nebbish. Lee milks laughs from the huffing and puffing by the competing paramours, as each jockeys for the alpha position (and makes some keen observations regarding sexist machismo and male vanity). Spike’s dad Bill Lee composed a lovely jazz-pop score. A milestone for modern indie cinema.
Sherman’s March – Documentary filmmaker Ross McElwee is truly one of America’s hidden treasures. A genteel Southern neurotic (Woody Allen meets Tennessee Williams), McElwee has been documenting his personal life since the mid 70’s and managed to turn all that footage into some of the funniest and most thought-provoking films that most people have never seen. Viewers weaned on reality TV and Snapchat may wonder “what’s the big deal about one more schmuck making glorified home movies?” but they would be missing an enriching glimpse into the human condition.
Sherman’s March actually began as a history piece, a project aiming to retrace the Union general’s path of destruction through the South during the Civil War, but somehow ended up as rumination on the eternal human quest for love and acceptance, filtered through McElwee’s personal search for the perfect mate. Despite its daunting 3 hour length, I’ve found myself returning to this film for repeat viewings over the years, and enjoying it just as much as the first time I saw it. The unofficial “sequel”, Time Indefinite, is worth a peek as well.
Smiles of a Summer Night– “Lighthearted romp” and “Ingmar Bergman” are not usually mentioned in the same breath, but it applies to this wise, drolly amusing morality tale from the director whose name is synonymous with somber dramas.
Gunnar Bjornstrand heads a fine ensemble, as an amorous middle-aged attorney with a young wife (whose “virtue” remains intact) and a free-spirited mistress, who juggles a few lovers herself. Love in all its guises is represented by a bevy of richly drawn characters, who converge in a third act set on a sultry summer’s eve at a country estate (the inspiration for Bergman admirer Woody Allen’s A Midsummer Night’s Sex Comedy).
Fast-paced, literate, and sensuous, Smiles of a Summer Night has a muted cry here and a whisper there of that patented Bergman “darkness”, but compared to most of his oeuvre, this one is a veritable screwball comedy. Gorgeously photographed by Gunnar Fischer (he was also cinematographer for Bergman’s classics Wild Strawberries and The Seventh Seal).
The Tall Guy –Deftly directed by British TV comic Mel Smith with a high-brow/low-brow blend of sophisticated cleverness and riotous vulgarity (somehow he makes it work), this is the stuff cult followings are made of.
Jeff Goldblum is an American actor working on the London stage, who is love struck by an English nurse (Emma Thompson). Rowan Atkinson is a hoot as Goldblum’s employer, a London stage comic beloved by his audience but an absolute backstage terror to cast and crew. The most hilariously choreographed sex scene ever put on film alone is worth the price of admission; and the extended set-piece, a staged musical version of The Elephant Man (a brilliant takeoff on Andrew Lloyd Webber) had me on the floor. An underrated gem.
Tampopo – Self billed as “The first Japanese noodle western”, this 1987 entry from writer-director Juzo Itami is all that and more. Nobuko Niyamoto is superb as the eponymous character, a widow who has inherited her late husband’s noodle house. Despite her dedication and effort to please customers, Tampopo struggles to keep the business afloat, until a deux ex machina arrives-a truck driver named Goro (Tsutomo Yamazaki).
After one taste, Goro pinpoints the problem-bland noodles. No worries-like the magnanimous stranger who blows into an old western town (think Alan Ladd in Shane). Goro takes Tampopo on as a personal project, mentoring her on the Zen of creating the perfect noodle bowl. A delight from start to finish, offering keen insight on the relationship between food, sex and love.
A Touch of Class – Directed by Melvin Frank (The Court Jester, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum) this 1973 film was co-written by the director with Jack Rose and Marvin Frank. George Segal and Glenda Jackson make a great comedy tag team as a married American businessman and British divorcee (respectively) who, following two chance encounters in London, quickly realize there’s a mutual attraction and embark on an affair.
The story falters a bit in the third act, when it begins to vacillate a little clumsily between comedy and morality tale, but when it’s funny, it’s very funny. The best part of the film concerns the clandestine lovers’ first romantic getaway on a trip to Spain. Segal has always shown a genius for screen comedy, but I think Jackson steals the film (and gets off some of the best zingers, with her impeccably droll “English-ness”).
Two for the Road – A swinging 60s version of Scenes from a Marriage. Director Stanley Donen (Singin’ in the Rain) whips up a cinematic soufflé; folding in a sophisticated script by Frederick Raphael, a generous helping of Albert Finney and Audrey Hepburn, a dash of colorful European locales, and topping it with a cherry of a score by Henry Mancini.
Donen follows the travails of a married couple over the years of their relationship, by constructing a series of non-linear flashbacks and flash-forwards (a structural device that has been utilized since by other filmmakers, but rarely as effectively). While there are a lot of laughs, Two For the Road is, at its heart, a thoughtful meditation on the nature of love and true, lasting commitment. Finney and Hepburn have an electric on-screen chemistry.
Hundreds of judges across the nation have ruled over 4,400 times that President Donald Trump’s immigration enforcement arm is detaining people unlawfully, according to a new Reuters review of court documents. And that’s just since October.
The Trump administration’s immense increase in detainments rests, in part, on their decision to detain people while their immigration cases are moving through the system—a departure from previous administrations’ interpretation of immigration law. This has led to a steep increase in immigrants petitioning the courts to be released, as Reuters reports, and the thousands of rulings finding that these prolonged detainments were unlawful.
Tricia McLaughlin, a Department of Homeland Security spokesperson, told Reuters that the increase in lawsuits came as “no surprise” because “many activist judges have attempted to thwart President Trump from fulfilling the American people’s mandate for mass deportations.” But not all of the judges challenging the Trump administration’s mass deportation mechanism were appointed by Democrats.
It’s always rigged when it goes against them. The greateest whiners in world history.
Construction executives have held multiple meetings over the last month with the White House and Congress to discuss how immigration busts on job sites and in communities are scaring away employees, making it more expensive to build homes in a market desperate for new supply. Beyond the affordability issue, the executives made an electability argument, raising concerns to GOP leaders that support among Hispanic voters is eroding, particularly in regions that swung to Trump in 2024.
[…]
“I told [lawmakers] straight up: South Texas will never be red again,” said Mario Guerrero, the CEO of the South Texas Builders Association, a Trump voter who traveled to Washington last week. He urged the administration and lawmakers to ease up on enforcement at construction sites, warning that employees are afraid to go to work.
The construction industry is one of the latest and clearest examples of how the president’s mass deportation agenda continues to clash with his economic goals of bringing down prices and political aims of keeping control of Congress. Even the president’s allies fear disruptions to labor-heavy industries will undermine the gains with Latino voters Republicans have made in recent years, in large part because of Trump’s economic agenda.
These concerns were the central focus of a White House meeting this week between chief of staff Susie Wiles, Speaker Mike Johnson, and a group of Republican lawmakers, according to three people with knowledge of the meeting, granted anonymity to discuss it. The group talked about growing concerns that Hispanic voters are abandoning the Republican Party in droves, as well as the policies driving these losses — immigration and affordability concerns.
I guess nobody mentioned the economic effects of Miller’s draconian deportation plans. And Trump is too distracted by his hideous ballroom and quest for the Nobel Peace Prize to care. (Not to mention he’s too dumb and addled to think beyond the last phone call he got from some bootlicker.)
They may very well begin to ease up on the industries that Trump values like farming and building. It is the Democrats job to keep this albatross tied around their necks and then set it a fire for the next three years. They must be relentless in their condemnation with endless visual reminders of what these people have done to the immigrant population in this country, whether they pull back from their most extreme policies or not.
Never forget. This is the ugliest policy the U.S. government has undertaken since Jim Crow and the Republican Party cannot be allowed to run from what they’ve done.
