Tuesday: Hili dialogue

January 27, 2026 • 6:45 am

Welcome to The Cruelest Day: Tuesday, January 27, 2026, and Holocaust Remembrance Day, marking the liberation of Auschwitz in 1945.  Here’s a 15-minute movie showing the liberation of the camps and giving interviews with the liberators and survivors:

I visited Auschwitz in 2013, and a visit there will affect you forever.  Here is a display of suitcases discarded by people who were transported to the camp in cattle cars. Note that the owners carefully put their addresses on the suitcases, assuming they’d get them back. They never did; most of the owners were gassed as soon as they arrived at the camp:

It’s also International Port Wine Day, National Chocolate Cake Day, National Geographic Day (the society was founded on this day in 1888), and Thomas Crapper Day, celebrating the man who helped perfect the toilet (he invented the ballcock, for example, and died on this day in 1888).

Readers are welcome to mark notable events, births, or deaths on this day by consulting the January 26 Wikipedia page.

Da Nooz

* Current and former immigration officials in the government are beginning to publicly express frustration about law enforcement’s role in the chaos in Minnesota.

Oscar Hagelsieb spent nearly 25 years as an immigration officer and special agent, proud of his work enforcing federal laws.

But watching the chaos unfolding in Minneapolis, and the fatal shooting of a U.S. citizen there on Saturday, Mr. Hagelsieb said he felt anger and despair at how the Trump administration was deploying his former agency.

“You’re not addressing the problem by throwing a 500-pound gorilla into these inner cities,” said Mr. Hagelsieb, 52, who said he voted three times for President Trump and retired from the Department of Homeland Security in 2023. “It’s completely unfair to the agents who have been put in this position.”

“They’re causing chaos, and unfortunately it’s costing lives,” he added. “There’s only so much they can handle before bad things start to happen.”

Mr. Hagelsieb’s comments reflect a growing sense of fear, frustration and disillusionment among some current and former immigration officials at the department, which is leading Mr. Trump’s push to arrest and deport millions of people. In interviews with The New York Times, more than 20 of them expressed anxieties that the administration was sending federal agents into situations in Minneapolis and other major cities that were increasingly dangerous both for them and civilians they encountered. They said that long hours, arrest quotas and public vitriol were taking a significant toll on morale.

Many also worried that the fallout would irreparably damage how the public perceived the two main homeland security agencies involved in Mr. Trump’s crackdown, Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the U.S. Border Patrol, hurting long-term recruitment and retention. Several said they worried that Democrats would draw on voter outrage to shut down ICE, which has been the most publicly visible arm of the immigration operation, if they returned to power.

That damage has already been done, as evidenced in the bill described below.

The WSJ has a good moment-by-moment video analysis of the shooting showing that the government’s descriptions are clearly wrong. The gun had been taken from Pretti before he was shot, and at least ten shots were fired. This also irreparably damages any credibility that the government has when making statements about specific crimes.

UPDATE: Tom Homan, Trump’s “border czar,” is headed to Minneapolis to take control of federal enforcement of immigration enforcement. Trump said, in an interview with the WSJ, that he had no comment on the Pretti case but added “We’re looking, we’re reviewing everything and will come out with a determination.” The NYT link also says that a federal judge is considering whether the influx of federal law-enforcement agents into Minnesota violates that state’s sovereignty.

*Barry Friedman and Stephen Vladek, law professors at NYU and Georgetown respectively, relate in a NYT op-ed, “This may be the only path to accountability for the Minneapolis shootings.”  It’s the courts, Jake: prosecution not for federal but for state crimes.

In the wake of another fatal shooting by federal immigration officers in Minneapolis, many people are wondering what can be done. The answer has been right in front of us all along.

Despite the incredulity with which some legal observers meet the idea, state and local prosecutors can prosecute federal officials for violating state criminal laws. Prosecutors should be gathering and securing evidence and seriously considering filing charges — sooner rather than later.

Not every prosecution will succeed, and all will face obstacles that are built into our legal system. But critically, bringing these state and local prosecutions could produce deterrent effects that are so desperately needed now.

U.S. law, at least theoretically, provides a range of options for holding government officers accountable; the problem is that many of those options are unavailable in practice where federal officers are concerned.

. . . .a series of decisions by the Supreme Court has made it all but impossible to hold federal officers liable for damages in federal lawsuits for violating our constitutional rights — such as in a February 2020 decision involving a Border Patrol agent who shot and killed an unarmed teenager without provocation.

Instead, the historical backstop for a lack of federal accountability, going all the way back to the founding, has been state law. States prosecuting federal officers for crimes committed in the course of their federal duties would certainly face complications, but those hurdles would not be insurmountable.

One such complication: The federal officer charged by state prosecutors for a crime committed while on duty could move any such case to a federal court. But that would simply change the courthouse (and the judge and the jury pool). State prosecutors would still be seeking to enforce state law — which, among other things, means that any conviction would not be subject to the president’s pardon power.

In other words, the ability to prosecute federal law enforcement officers who commit state crimes in the course of their duties would turn on whether a reasonable officer in their position would have believed that their actions were necessary to fulfill their duties. That standard may be appropriately strict, to maintain federal authority when it is needed (think of federal protection for civil rights protesters in the 1960s), but at least based on the videos so many of us have seen, it should not be impossible.

Nor should state and local prosecutors think this power to bring charges under state law exists — or should exist — only when the offense results in a death. Every day, Americans are seeing an unending stream of videos showing federal officers destroying property, pepper-spraying individuals on a whim and using what at least appear to be excessive degrees of force. Many, if not most, of these acts are potential violations of state criminal laws. If those crimes are not “reasonable and well-founded” in light of federal duties, the officers can be convicted and penalized, even jailed.

And the solution:

What prosecutors should be doing now is what Minnesota prosecutors did after the murder of Renee Good: establishing online portals to which individuals can upload their videos and other evidence. Will there be a flood of evidence? Yes. Will it all justify prosecution? No. Will some offenders be charged? We can’t say for sure, but it looks to us like the answer ought to be yes, and that’s true even if the final result is not a conviction. (That, after all, is why we have trials and juries.)

If the federal government won’t investigate the Minneapolis convictions, the state should, though I’m not sure whether the feds are required to hand over to the state all the evidence they have.  I sure looks as if Pretti was murdered, but we should still presume innocence before a trial, and in that trial guilt has to be determined beyond a reasonable doubt.  But we need real courts, not the court of public opinion. The latter is useful for pressuring change on the way the authorities apprehend people.

*Finally, in Congress, Democrats have vowed to veto a new spending bill if it includes any funds for ICE.  This could lead to another government shutdown.

Bipartisan legislation to fund a broad swath of the government and avert a shutdown at the end of the week appeared to be in grave danger on Saturday, as key Senate Democrats vowed to oppose it after federal agents shot and killed a Minneapolis resident.

The rapidly escalating opposition to the measure, which includes $64.4 billion for the Department of Homeland Security, including $10 billion for ICE, amplified the likelihood of a partial government shutdown at the end of the month. The legislation requires the support of Democrats to muster the 60 votes needed to avoid a filibuster and advance in the Senate.

“Senate Democrats will not provide the votes to proceed to the appropriations bill if the D.H.S. funding bill is included,” Senator Chuck Schumer, Democrat of New York and the minority leader, said in a statement, calling what is unfolding in Minnesota “appalling” and “unacceptable in any American city.”

Recognizing the depth of Democratic outrage, Senate Republicans immediately began examining whether they could separate the homeland security funding from the rest of the package and preserve the bulk of what had been a bipartisan deal to fund a large chunk of the government. The measure also funds the Pentagon and State Department, as well as health, education, labor and transportation programs.

“I’m exploring all options,” said Senator Susan Collins, the Maine Republican who is the chairwoman of the Appropriations Committee, adding that she had been in touch with Senator John Thune, the South Dakota Republican and majority leader. “We have five other bills that are really vital, and I’m relatively confident they would pass.”

The new bill is not going to get 60 votes assuming that the Democrats vote as a bloc, for the Republicans have only 53 seats. If some compromise can’t be effected, once again we’ll be faced with a government shutdown.

*The Times of Israel, quoting Time Magazine, says that Iranian officials now admit that the death toll of protestors could top 30,000. From Time:

As many as 30,000 people could have been killed in the streets of Iran on Jan. 8 and 9 alone, two senior officials of the country’s Ministry of Health told TIME—indicating a dramatic surge in the death toll. So many people were slaughtered by Iranian security services on that Thursday and Friday, it overwhelmed the state’s capacity to dispose of the dead. Stocks of body bags were exhausted, the officials said, and eighteen-wheel semi-trailers replaced ambulances.

The government’s internal count of the dead, not previously revealed, far surpasses the toll of 3,117 announced on Jan. 21 by regime hardliners who report directly to Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. (Ministries report to the elected President.) The 30,000 figure is also far beyond tallies being compiled by activists methodically assigning names to the dead. As of Saturday, the U.S.-based Human Rights Activists News Agency said it had confirmed 5,459 deaths and is investigating 17,031 more.

TIME has been unable to independently verify these figures.

The Health Ministry’s two-day figure roughly aligns with a count gathered by physicians and first responders, and also shared with TIME. That surreptitious tally of deaths recorded by hospitals stood at 30,304 as of Friday, according to Dr. Amir Parasta, a German-Iranian eye surgeon who prepared a report of the data. Parasta said that number does not reflect protest-related deaths of people registered at military hospitals, whose bodies were taken directly to morgues, or that happened in locales the inquiry did not reach. Iran’s National Security Council has said protests took place in around 4,000 locations across the country.

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“We are getting closer to reality,” Dr. Parasta said. “But I guess the real figures are still way higher.”

The death toll is huge, and is approaching the population of the small city of Davis, California, where I used to live (I think of death tolls as analogous to the extermination of cities).  I am still guessing that the U.S. and Israel are going to attack Iran within two weeks with the aim of toppling the regime, and the silence of the U.S. about Iran right now may be merely a ploy.

Also, the last Israeli hostage killed by the IDF has been found, and his body is being returned to his family. The subheading is “[Ran] Gvili’s remains ID’d by dental, fingerprint match; 250 bodies were checked, all being returned to their graves * PM: We promised to bring everyone back, and we did * Hamas says return of Gvili’s body shows it is committed to ceasefire.” Yeah, but Hamas won’t lay down their arms and disband.

From NBC News:

The remains of the last hostage held in Gaza have been identified, the Israeli military said Monday, ending a more than two-year saga for captives’ families in Israel — and paving the way for the second phase of the ceasefire in the war-torn enclave.

For months, only one hostage body remained in Gaza, that of Ran Gvili, a 24-year-old police officer killed during the Hamas-led attack Oct. 7, 2023.

The Israel Defense Forces said in a statement Monday that Gvili’s family had been informed “that their loved one has been identified and will be returned for burial.”

“With this, all hostages from the Gaza Strip have been returned,” it said.

*The WaPo describes the best meals you can get on an airplane, and by that they mean which flights and which meals have stood out.

In the photo, the tray table meal was supposed to be first class, but the traveler who received it called it a “bowl of sadness.”

Shiny layers of meat, squares of cheese and a bruised whole tomato are visible in the X post that has more than 15 million views since it was posted Jan. 4

The robust response included commenters sharing photos of their own sad airline meals. A few compared the food to the famously paltry offerings at Fyre Festival. Many suggested flying private or a BYO meal approach.

Or fly business class (QSuite) on Qatar Airways, which I almost got to do.  Or Emirates.  Here are a few tweets about great meals:

And two more (I suggest you look at YouTube for business-class flights on Qatar Airways and Emirates. I’ve watched a lot of those:

Caviar service and lobster on Qatar Airways

Charmaine Lamsin, a physician from Washington state and frequent traveler, said she loves the caviar service in first class on Qatar Airways, part of the appetizer course. She has had it twice, in 2024 and 2025.

“It includes the accoutrements with blinis, diced red onion, eggs and chives and sour cream and lemon,” she said in an email. She said more courses follow, so she’s never hungry. Actually, she gets “so full I can’t eat most of it.”

She said she will also get lobster when she sees it on the menu. She loves seafood, but said most airlines offer dry salmon or bland shrimp.

Sashimi on All Nippon Airways

Freelance travel reporter Chris Dong said Japanese carriers Japan Airlines and All Nippon Airways have served his favorite in-flight meals.

One standout during a first-class flight on ANA a few years ago was the sashimi as part of a multicourse meal: “a dedicated raw fish course, which was insane.”

It was followed by an entrée of “super tender” beef, Japanese rice and pickles. “It was delightful,” he said.

In economy, he remembers an “amazing” version of the Malaysian dish nasi lemak — coconut rice with sambal, chicken, hard-boiled egg, fried anchovies and peanuts — that he preordered on the budget carrier AirAsia.

Note that the best food is on long-haul foreign flights with foreign carriers, and in business and first class. If I could choose (and somebody else paid), I’d go on Qatar Airways or Emirates.

Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Hili is (surprise!) thinking about food:

In Polish:

Hili: jestem bardzo ostrożna w moich sądach.
Ja: Zawsze?
Hili: No nie, mam stanowcze sądy w sprawach kulinarnych.

*******************

From CinEmma:

From Cole & Marmalade:

From Now That’s Wild (I love this one):

Screenshot

From Masih; a woman cuts her hair at her sister’s funeral (her sister was shot in a protest in Iran). Sound up:

My response to a “pro-compatibism” tweet by Michael Shermer. Why are all the cool kids compatibilists? Can’t they just say that we feel that we have libertarian free will but we really don’t?

From John Cleese:

The Number Ten Cat is almost as arrogant as Hili the Queen:

One from my feed; look at this d*g go!

One I reposted from the Auschwitz Memorial, celebrating the liberation of Auschwitz:

. . . and two from Dr. Cobb, who’s flogging his book in Brighton:

Matthew says that this will restore my faith in humanity. I’m not so sure. . .

The 19th century Struve Geodetic Arc is, to me, one of the most extraordinary properties on the World Heritage List. It crosses 10 countries and was used to determine the size and shape of the world. 🧪 🏺 #ContemporaryArchaeology

— Dr Space Junk (Alice Gorman) (@drspacejunk.bsky.social) 2026-01-26T00:01:02.854Z

Look at this fossil! Read more about it here.

An astounding fossil of a crocodile-like Ikechosaurus (Inner Mongolia)

— Natalia Jagielska (娜塔莉) (@nataliajagielska.bsky.social) 2026-01-26T08:50:37.161Z

25 thoughts on “Tuesday: Hili dialogue”

  1. A BIRTHDAY THOUGHT:
    I will remember that what has brought us up from savagery is a loyalty to truth, and truth cannot emerge unless it is subjected to the utmost scrutiny — will you not agree that a society which has lost sight of that, cannot survive? -Learned Hand, jurist (27 Jan 1872-1961

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  3. Cogressional Dems are really going to be on the horns of a dilemma with this spending bill. Blocking it is the only way that they can show they are “doing something” to oppose Trump, but there is no way Republicans will agree to defund ICE. If the Dems are forced to back down, it’s going to be even worse for them than backing down on Obamacare subsidies. There is talk, however, of changing the rules to suspend the filibuster on bills of this type, short-sighted though that is.

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    1. I think open borders is the de facto position of the Democratic Party now as they won’t tolerate any amount of force being used by ICE, and force will need to be used against people who don’t want to leave.

      My how things have changed. Here is Amy Klobuchar in 2006 speaking in support of a border wall:

      https://youtu.be/skykMC0H-nY?si=vjt0_prQ-okRUPM2

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      1. Yes Lysander – totally changed. Recall the (greater) rate/number of deportations by Obama, and Hillary’s harsh line on that all the way back in 2008. An awful lot has changed regarding the Dem Party and you can see it in the unhappiness (“leftugees”) of “1990s leftists” or moderates like PCC(E), James Carville, Pinker, Shermer.. and me in the past decade. all the best,
        D.A.
        NYC

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    2. hmmmm. I dunno Dr. I’m willing to bet the Republicans will find a way to separate the DHS funding and the omnibus bill will pass. The fight will then be about a separate bill to fund DHS, a fight the Democrats will lose.

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  4. The Minnesota events have notably resulted in the left-leaning media caring about the deaths, in interactions with law enforcement, of white people!

    Previously they’ve only cared if the deceased was black (compare the media coverage, riots, soul-searching and society-wide meltdown over Michael Brown and George Floyd to the collective shrug over Daniel Shaver and Tony Timpa).

    As academics such as Roland Fryer have shown, there never was good evidence that the police were biased against blacks, the greater number of blacks killed by police was entirely explained by the much higher crime rate among blacks, plus their greater tendency to resist arrest.

    PS:

    Can’t [compatibilists] just say that we feel that we have libertarian free will but we really don’t?

    Compatibilists do say that we do not have libertarian free will. That’s the starting point of compatibilism. From there, compatibilists are just trying to understand concepts of choice, agency, responsibility and morality in a deterministic world.

    And do people really feel that they have libertarian free will, that is , that their choices are uncaused, coming out of a thin air or a soul? I don’t, I think that my choices are being computed by my brain (what else is it there for?), which is then the product of the prior state. Why, just for example, would choices (aka “computations”) be affected by alcohol, other than that it is affecting the low-level whizzing around of ions between neurons?

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    1. Not a scintilla about the importance of creating a gun-free population either.

      The explanation is that dialectic is the operating system of Leftism :

      “And so the dialectic continues.”

      -Delgado and Stefancic
      Critical Race Theory – An Introduction, p.66, 3rd Ed., 2017

      And apropos, as Communist Herbert Marcuse expressed it in A Critique of Pure Tolerance (1965) :

      Repressive tolerance

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      1. Found an example to add from a flyer posted below (bold preserved, but not the all-capital font):

        “Ask white witnesses to put their bodies in front of the person that’s being kidnapped”

        Dialectic negates race for the powerless and marginalized, then negates and dehumanizes the race at the center of power (“bodies”) — sublating that power for sociognostic praxis :

        https://i0.wp.com/whyevolutionistrue.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/ICE-Watch-Minnesota-Instagram.webp?ssl=1

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    2. Many people who reject libertarian free will are compatibilists in the way that you describe above. And it looks to me like Jerry is too. Now I’m wondering why compatibilism is controversial. Surely choice, agency, morality, and responsibility are concepts that most of us (all?) acknowledge. If they were historically understood in the context of free will, we need to reformulate their meaning in the absence of free will.

      Perhaps the people who reject compatibilism have a different idea of what it means.

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      1. Arguments against compatibilism seem to usually amount to: “Although you say that you reject libertarian free will, you’re really still hankering after it, and trying to kid yourself that you do have libertarian free will in some fashion”.

        Long-standing ex-poster on this site, Ben Goren, wrote endless replies to compatibilists saying pretty much that. I never could convince him, that, no, that’s not how I feel. 🙁

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    3. From a woke perspective, PCC(E) is a Trumpist. The woke believe in the following things (and more)

      Merit does not exist, indeed merit is another word for white racism
      No one is illegal. Borders should not exist.
      TWAW.

      If you don’t wholeheartedly support these propositions, you are a Trumpist (in the minds of the woke)

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    4. Google “proves” that Tony Timpa was a bad guy and George Floyd was a good guy. Tony Timpa get 66K hits in Google. George Floyd get 99M. But don’t worry. Michael Brown get 2.4 billion hits. Some lives matter. Some don’t.

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  5. Love those border collies – they’re similar genetically and behaviorally to (my) Australian shepherd.
    On that topic I’m intending on flying to NC soon to pick up a new (“toy”, 20 lbs, Manhattan apartment sized) Aussie Shepherd puppy in the next few weeks. Pretty damn psyched about the whole idea. I have learned living in NYC is entirely different/ better with a dog than without. Like Will Smith’s “I am legend”. 🙂
    D.A.
    NYC

    D.A.
    NYC

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  6. The problems in Minnesota are leadership-driven. Local “sanctuary” jurisdictions largely refuse to transfer to federal custody any illegal aliens who have been charged, convicted, or sentenced for crimes. When you won’t even notify the feds that you are releasing a convict from his prison or jail term on Monday and that they can pick him up at the prison door, then that gives the lie to “nobody opposes deporting criminals.” It also forces ICE to then try to track and detain that individual after he is released to the community—a prospect that heightens the danger for all involved, as well as innocent bystanders.

    That said, it is hard to get objective numbers validating the degree to which this is happening. What is clear is that federal officials are detaining and deporting illegal aliens from across the country—in far larger numbers in Texas, for instance, than in Minnesota. Yet the type of chaos we have seen in MN—both from locals and from federal officers—has been largely restricted to a very small handful of self-proclaimed “sanctuary” jurisdictions. Why is that?

    On the federal side, Trump needs to get rid of the showboating, TV tough guys. Yes, they are simply aping the boss, but they lack his skill in knowing when to quickly shift gears and abandon a position as though he never took it at all. I’m looking at Kristi Noem, Stephen Miller, and Border Patrol commander Bovino. I know others might name Hegseth or Kennedy for the distinction, but I have always seen Noem as the real cabinet lightweight and train wreck waiting to happen. Trump needs to release that stranglehold from the throat of his Administration.

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  7. Contrary to some commenters above, I think most Democrats don’t want open borders. That is a red herring promoted by the right. Also I think this time the outrage is shared by many Republicans, since the facts are so clear, and the Administration’s lies and forceful cover-up (even excluding local authorities from the scene, in spite of them having a search warrant) are so obvious. Also I think some gun-rights Republicans are bothered by this case because the Administration (especially Greg Bovino) criticized the victim for carrying a legal gun.

    It is interesting that those comments above do not address the details of the shootings, which are the real reason for the now-bipartisan anger over ICE’s behavior.

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    1. Axios (not exactly a right-wing source) has an article on this. The title should tell you what it is about. The title is “Exclusive: How Biden botched the border”. Axios has also has charts showing that Biden did not enforce the border.

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        1. A border that is not enforced is an Open Border (de facto). Biden did not enforce the border and the Democrats suffered the consequences.

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  8. On NPR / BBC News this morning, reports that doctors who had treated injured protesters have been arrested, and that patients who had been treated for injuries have been hauled off. Also, the Rial (Ryal?) exchange rated has dropped to a new low of 1.5M R/1 USD as a big US gunboat draws nearer to Iran.

    I didn’t catch the full report, but this from Reuters seems to cover the first part.

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  10. I don’t want to mix my input into the discussion about free will with the politics of the day, so I make a separate post here.

    The issue of free will is being unnecessarily obfuscated by vague definitions of what it means to “make” a decision. When compatibilists discuss the process of decision making, they do not touch the issue of free will at all. They look at the process but not the causes that make it proceed a certain way.

    The outcome of every decision is pre-determined, plus or minus quantum uncertainty, because all its causes already exist at the time the decision begins to be made, either as configuration of everything within the person, or even as air currents on the other side of the Earth. Compatibilists do not want to seriously consider the fact that all actions have causes that already exist, or when cause-less like quantum fluctuations, then they still cannot be influenced at all.

    The Universe is a sea of causes that become effects, and we still think we are somehow special and can make causes out of nothing.

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  11. Re; airline comforts. Qatar and Emirates are the best, for sure, in terms of food and amenities. But that’s because they have no need to make a profit.

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