I think focusing on Alex Pretti's actions is a very human defense mechanism. We tell ourselves that X happened because of Y, so if we avoid X we can avoid Y. In Saturday's New York Times [ gift link ] Masha Gessen has an opinion piece on why this is based on a false premise.
But that’s not how state terror works.
In the 1990s, when I talked to people in the former Soviet Union about their families’ experiences of Stalinist terror, I was repeatedly struck by how much people seemed to know about their circumstances. Time and time again, people would tell me exactly what had led to their family members’ arrests or executions. Jealous neighbors had reported them to the authorities, or colleagues who had been arrested named them under duress. These stories had been passed on from generation to generation. How could they come to know so much, I wondered. They couldn’t. People crafted narratives out of suspicions, rumors and hints, to fill a desperate need for an explanation.
My favorite book about state terror is Lydia Chukovskaya’s “Sofia Petrovna,” a short Russian novel that has been translated into English. The protagonist, a middle-aged woman loyal to Stalin’s Communist Party, loses her mind trying to make sense of her son’s arrest. My own family history contains a corollary. After the secret police arrested most of the senior staff at the newspaper where my grandfather was a deputy editor, he waited for the knock on his door. When the secret police failed to show up night after night, week after week, he became so distressed that he checked himself into a mental institution. It could be that was how he avoided arrest. Or it could be that the secret police had filled their quota of arrests for that month.
For this was the secret about the secret police that became clear when the K.G.B. archives were opened (briefly) in the 1990s: They were ruled by quotas. Local squadrons had to arrest a certain number of citizens so they could be designated enemies of the people. That the officers often swept up groups of colleagues, friends and family members was probably a matter of convenience more than anything else. Fundamentally, the terror was random. That is, in fact, how state terror works.
The randomness is the difference between a regime based on terror and a regime that is plainly repressive. Even in brutally repressive regimes, including those of the Soviet colonies in Eastern Europe, one knew where the boundaries of acceptable behavior lay. Open protest would get one arrested; kitchen conversation would not. Writing subversive essays or novels or editing underground journals would get one arrested; reading these banned works and quietly passing them on to friends probably would not. A regime based on terror, on the other hand, deploys violence precisely to reinforce the message that anyone can be subjected to it.
At some point we have to ask whether random killings of civilians are the desired outcome. According to Greg Bovino the agents involved in the shooting of Pretti are not on administrative leave and have been re-assigned to other cities. This sends a pretty clear message to ICE and CBP that shooting American citizens is going to be a regular part of their duties and that the agency will protect them from any consequences.
It's a big mistake, though, for those around him who want an authoritarian take-over of the US, because to do that successfully, they can't just other a minority within the population -- they need to buy off the rest of the population. There have been no bread and circuses, no carrot, just the stick, or jackboot really.
Do authoritarians always need the carrot? Sometimes propaganda can fill the gap. "Guns not butter" is the slogan that springs to mind.
I've always heard it as "guns AND butter". And used by outside observers of the regime to describe its policies, not by the regime itself.
There was an interesting conversation on the New Yorker Radio Hour yesterday about the type of people that are being recruited as ICE/Border Patrol agents. Homeland security is basically appealing to gun owners and--hate to say it--white supremacists. They will give out recruiting information at gun shows and they are using fascist slogans. The person that was being interviewed has written rather negatively about ICE recruitment in the past. She decided to see what would happen if she applied through an online app. She said ICE called her for a six minute interview. A short time later, she got an email directing her to get a drug test. She ignored that direction, but about a week later she got a list of those recently hired and her name was on that list. She claims there was no real background check. No eyes on interview at all. Of course, she did not accept the job.
I wonder if there is any mileage in painting the idea of shooting people like Renee Good, Alex Pretti and the 30 so others they’ve killed recently as weakness - if that’s what puts them in fear of their life they must be cowards, weak, losers etc. Turning the Trumpest belief that the worst vice is weakness against them ?
Bret Devereaux has a Bluesky thread about the distinction Hannah Arendt made between violence and power.
For those unfamiliar, in On Violence, Arendt points out that the ability to dish out violence is often confused for power - the ability to get compliance without violence.
Successful governance relies almost entirely on power, because violence is expensive and limited.
We're seeing this very clearly in Minneapolis and other cities 'raided' by DHS: they do not have enough agents, enough sources of violence, to hold even a medium-sized city by force of arms.
They rely on the cooperation of the populace (power); when that is gone, they're cooked.
In other words, the resort to violence is a clear indication that power has failed. Read the rest.
NBC News cited a Trump administration official and a law enforcement official who said Customs and Border Patrol is planning to reduce the number of Border Patrol agents in the Twin Cities "sometime this week."
CNN cited an official who said Bovino's departure was a "mutual decision." According to CNN's reporting, administration officials were "deeply frustrated" with Bovino and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem's handling of the shooting of Alex Pretti by federal agents on Saturday, with Bovino alleging that Pretti was planning to "massacre" federal agents.
The reported development comes following a shift in strategy by the Trump Administration on Monday. President Trump posted on social media that he would be sending Border Czar Tom Homan to manage the ICE operations in Minnesota.
It's a big mistake, though, for those around him who want an authoritarian take-over of the US, because to do that successfully, they can't just other a minority within the population -- they need to buy off the rest of the population. There have been no bread and circuses, no carrot, just the stick, or jackboot really.
Do authoritarians always need the carrot? Sometimes propaganda can fill the gap. "Guns not butter" is the slogan that springs to mind.
I've always heard it as "guns AND butter". And used by outside observers of the regime to describe its policies, not by the regime itself.
The term first appeared in American politics when Williams Jennings Byran coined it in opposition to Woodrow Wilsons shift to arms production leading up to WWI.
I believe Lyndon Baines Johnson also used it as he was promoting the welfare program he was envisioning in his Great Society while he was building up or involvement in Vietnam.
Goring said "Guns will make us powerful; butter will only make us fat."
I would counter every gun we make takes food away from the poor. (to paraphrase Ike Eisenhower).
Comments
At some point we have to ask whether random killings of civilians are the desired outcome. According to Greg Bovino the agents involved in the shooting of Pretti are not on administrative leave and have been re-assigned to other cities. This sends a pretty clear message to ICE and CBP that shooting American citizens is going to be a regular part of their duties and that the agency will protect them from any consequences.
I've always heard it as "guns AND butter". And used by outside observers of the regime to describe its policies, not by the regime itself.
Bret Devereaux has a Bluesky thread about the distinction Hannah Arendt made between violence and power.
In other words, the resort to violence is a clear indication that power has failed. Read the rest.
Remember Minnesota, Homan likes his "gifts" in a Cava takeout bag.
To the point as to whether this could be a turning point, I think Michelle and Barrack Obama said the same in their recent post.
There's this from Göring, which is the context I was thinking of:
https://www.azquotes.com/quote/596608
I believe Lyndon Baines Johnson also used it as he was promoting the welfare program he was envisioning in his Great Society while he was building up or involvement in Vietnam.
Goring said "Guns will make us powerful; butter will only make us fat."
I would counter every gun we make takes food away from the poor. (to paraphrase Ike Eisenhower).