RIP Dave Hat

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

When I “divorced” the late Annie Shapiro at the end of my version of ROKon Magazine, she got “Talking Crap.”

Talking Crap was a little group of would-be Algonquin Roundtable expats who drank a lot and did really funny, interesting things. They were way ahead of the curve in these little videos they used to make with their digital cameras.

Me with the late Dave Hat a long time ago in Seoul.

In hindsight, Talking Crap would probably have been huge during the social media age.

We lost a member of Talking Crap recently, Dave Hat.

Dave Hat was a great guy. He and I were, at least in my view, two sides of the same coin. And his unexpected death has really gotten me thinking about my own mortality. I’m not going to live forever and I really need to put up or shut up.

Everything Is So Dumb & Curious

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

At the moment, at least, I kind of live in an idyllic bubble where nothing really happens to me. This is both good and bad. It’s good because who wouldn’t want such a situation, and it’s bad because even the smallest blip in my life is enough to give me pause for thought.

Cara babe, I’m nuts like you. Grin.

With the latter in mind, something weird is going on with one of my posts about Cara Delevingne being my “celebrity crush.” I posted this a long time ago and haven’t thought much about it until recently when I started getting a tiny little uptick of people reading it on this blog.

It just makes no sense.

I didn’t really write anything all that provocative, and yet, for some reason, people out of the blue are reading it specifically. It’s not like they’ve found it via search, they go to it directly.

Anyway. I have no idea what is going on. It’s probably nothing. But, like I said, even the smallest thing can get me riles up (just a little bit.)

‘The Battle of Minneapolis’ — Lyrics To A Pop-Punk Song In The Style Of Rage Against The Machine Written By ChatGPT

🎤 The Battle of Minneapolis 🎤

(Verse 1)
The streets are burning snow, the flags are flying high,
Three thousand fed agents, watch the city cry.
They say they came for law and order,
But the air is full of tear gas smoke,
Shot Renée in her SUV — three live rounds in the glass,
They painted her a threat — now her name’s carved in the past.
Then Pretti tried to lift a fallen soul,
They sprayed him down, pinned him low,
Ten shots rang out where his courage stood bold.

(Pre-Chorus)
Riot shields and swat boots boot stomps,
The city shakes while the system romps.
Can’t bury truth in a federal lie,
Can’t cage a movement that’s ready to rise!

(Chorus — shouted)
The battle’s on in Minneapolis,
We’re not afraid — we’re rising up!
They kill our neighbors with no remorse,
We push back harder — take back our streets!
The battle’s on — The battle’s on!

(Verse 2)
From Nicollet to Powderhorn, the chants are loud,
Signs held high, we’re not backing down.
“ICE OUT NOW!” digits burn like fire,
Minnesota hearts stoked into righteous ire.
A VA nurse, a mother gone —
These aren’t headlines, these are sons.
They told us they were securing borders —
But they’re tearing apart our homes!

(Pre-Chorus)
Wave after wave, we stand defiant,
United people — we are giants!
Force can break flesh, not spirit, not will,
We send their lies straight down the kill!

(Chorus — louder)
The battle’s on in Minneapolis,
We’re not afraid — we’re rising up!
They kill our neighbors with no remorse,
We push back harder — take back our streets!
The battle’s on — The battle’s on!

(Bridge — echoed)
No justice, no peace!
No justice, no peace!
Can’t bury those we love!
Can’t silence cries for truth!

(Outro — screamed)
You march in armor, we march in hearts,
You shoot our citizens — we tear you apart!
The battle’s on — you hear our names!
Renée! Alex! We won’t be tamed!

The Battle Of Minneapolis & The Monoculture

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

The interesting thing about what’s going on in Minneapolis is it’s actually managed to seep into the broader culture to the point that we’re all on the same page for once: there’s a monoculture, again, at least when it comes to this event.

So, if nothing else, it’s part of the broader “vibe shift” that we’ve experienced since the turn of the year. At least, that’s what it seems to be.

But I’ve learned my lesson — there just isn’t anything we can do about Trump. We’re stuck with him for the time being, maybe forever (at least the implications of his rule).

As an aside, this particular photo of the Kevin Pretti murder really sticks in my craw because it’s obviously doctored and, yet, people keep falling for it.

The guy on the bottom right has neither a head nor a hand. And, yet, I keep seeing some otherwise creditable people reposting it as if it was real. Ugh.

We Have Got To Stop Appeasing Trump

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

The thing about Trump that a lot of people seem to forget is he’s not a Great Man of History. He’s a symptom, not a cause. Hitler, while very similar to Trump in the beginning, was definitely a Great Man. He bent history to his will, especially during the war specifically.

Meanwhile, Trump is too lazy and too big of a wussy to do what he was initially elected to do: turn the US into an autocracy. While he’s gotten far, far worse in his second term, he still just doesn’t — to date — have the backbone necessary to truly transform the US into a white Christian ethnostate.

That’s why, I think, if we really collectively stood up to Trump in some demonstrative manner that we could at least maintain some of our basic rights. And, yet I’ve learned, at last, that people are just too distracted playing video games or making money to give a shit about Trump’s tyranny.

Now, there is one specific issue that might change that: the economy.

In a paradoxical way, because the economy has been doing so well (in a K-shaped kind of way) Trump has been given free reign to do whatever the fuck he wants. But if that should change, then, maybe, just maybe, some people who otherwise wouldn’t care might sit up and take notice.

Remember, Watergate only really started to get worse because the economy sucked. There’s a decent chance that had Nixon had Trump’s economy (and Fox News) that lulz, he would have never had any problems, no matter how tyrannical he got.

Anyway, I have no hope anymore. I just need to finish my novel, sell it and hope that’s it a big enough success that I can flee the country.

‘ICE Out’ — Lyrics To A Pop-Punk RATM-Like Song About ICE In Minneapolis, Minnesota Written By ChatGPT

🎸 ICE Out 🎸

(Verse 1)
Black boots on the pavement, radios blasting lies,
Cameras flash the truth that they’re trying to disguise.
Downtown they move like an army of the crown,
In the city where the people try to stand their ground.
Shot a mother in her car, three rounds in the frame,
Called it self-defense but theirs is all the blame.
Blood on cold pavement, we remember every name,
Renée Good’s not a number, she’s the start of this flame.

(Chorus)
ICE out, ICE out, tear their stories down,
We’re not just targets for your badges and your rounds.
ICE out, ICE out, can you hear the shout?
Two dead in Minneapolis — and we’re fighting back now.

(Verse 2)
See the nurse with a heart bigger than their force,
Filming for peace, unarmed on their crooked course.
Pulled to the ground, pepper-sprayed and pinned so cold,
Shot for trying to help — the truth they never told.
They paint the narrative, they twist each damn account,
But the videos don’t lie — we see what really went down.
No more escape routes through your shiny black SUV,
Justice don’t come easy when you’re knee-deep in conspiracy.

(Bridge)
Operation surge, paramilitarized,
We raise our fists while they hide behind their lies.
Sirens wail but the righteous won’t relent,
From Powderhorn to North Side — we’re raising hell again!

(Chorus — heavy)
ICE out, ICE out, let the sirens scream,
Not another mother’s son caught in your war machine.
ICE out, ICE out, feel the masses shout,
Two dead in Minneapolis — we’re raging, we’re loud.

(Breakdown / Solo)
Rhythmic spit and snarl — guitars drive like protest chants:
“No more deaths! No more lies!”
“ICE out! ICE out!”

(Outro — shouted)
Stand up, stay loud, no retreat, no surrender,
Two dead in Minnesota — we remember,
We remember.

Minneapolis Is Not Trump’s Stalingrad

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I saw on Twitter someone compared what’s going on politically relative to the reaction to the murder of Alex Pretti as “Trump’s Stalingrad.” As you may know, the battle for Stalingrad was the moment that Hitler’s hold on the German fatherland began to falter.

I just don’t see that at the moment.

I do think that Pretti’s murder is a major turning point in Trump’s second term, but it’s not something that will actually harm the regime politically. If anything, it will just make the two sides farther apart from each other.

I say this in the context that something similar happened in the post January-6th Insurrection world.

I know the issue hasn’t gotten the play in MAGA land that maybe we would like because none of the MAGA people in my life have made a point of mentioning it to ME. When THAT happens, then, well, something big has happened.

But as it stands, it seems like things aren’t going to get any better. All that will have changed is the context of events that happen later.

What MAGA Is Really Saying About The Anti-ICE Protests In Minnesota

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

From what I can tell, essentially what MAGA is saying about the protests in Minnesota is all the protestors murdered shouldn’t have been there in the first place and they deserved what they got.

They say this in the context of MAGA storming the Capitol just because they were butt hurt over the results of a free-and-fair election.

I don’t know what to tell you. The hypocrisy of all of this is ignored by MAGA because they have their narrative and people like me have ours.

Now, the issue that at the moment at least, is Trump is too big a wussy to do what might otherwise be logical — use the Insurrection Act. The fact that this hasn’t happened yet is kind of curious.

I wonder what happens next.

We Are All Alex Pretti

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

One reason why the thuggish murder of Alex Pretti by border control agents really gets to me is that could have been me. What he did is exactly the type of thing I would do.

I would totally just stand there with my camera phone and record ICE abuse. So, I can totally imagine a situation where I might find myself facing the same fate as Pretti.

(I wouldn’t have been armed though.)

It really makes you wonder if there’s anything ICE et al could do and it be recorded that might be too much even for MAGA to handle. I’m beginning to think there isn’t.

I think once we gave MAGA a pass for the January 6th Insurrection that that was the moment when we would no longer agree on the facts going forward. So, even if ICE et al shot up a few dozen people who were just standing around observing, THAT would STILL not be enough for MAGA.

They have a narrative — Trump good — and they’re sticking to it, no matter what going forward.

Tik-Tok Is Useless Since Its Sale

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Yesterday, for one brief moment, Tik-Tok was a really good source of information about about the murder of Alex Pretti at the hands of a thuggish border control agent.

But since then, it’s almost as if the owners of the service have freaked out and tweaked the algorithm. Tik-Tok is now useless. There is a growing amount of MAGA disinformation on there to the point that I don’t even want to use it any.

It is curious that for a few hours there, Tik-Tok actually was, like, good at disseminating information. My fear, of course, is the whole point of MAGA thugs owning Tik-Tok is to warp the media landscape to the point that people maybe not as clued-in will fall for MAGA disinformation as we enter the 2026 midterm elections.

This is another sign that we probably will not have free-and-fair elections ever again in my lifetime. We’re going to become a “managed democracy” like they have in Hungary and Turkey and, lulz, that’s it.