Dem
47
GOP
53
Pop quiz: What is the last wide-release film in the U.S. to feature an intermission? They used to do them a lot, in the "golden age." And they still do them today in Bollywood and some other foreign nations. But the practice has been gone from U.S. cinemas for a fair bit of time, because longer runtime means fewer showings means less money. We will tell you that Spartacus, which is on TV right now, definitely has an intermission, so the correct answer is a film made sometime after 1960. We'll give the correct answer at the end.
Anyhow, we have 8,000+ words of non-Minneapolis content today. That's quite a lot, and even one of the two remaining planned segments in the Minneapolis series would push it well into the five figures. So, as readers can see from the headline, we're going to do the written version of an intermission, and just have a little bit of content on this subject today.
To start, we'd like to briefly address an apparent inconsistency in our write-ups. We have written, several times, that Donald Trump does not generally back down from things like this. We have also written, many, many times, that Trump always chickens out. Those two assertions would seem to be in conflict, but our gut feel tells us they are not.
We've thought about it, and tried to figure out what distinguishes TACO from "no surrender," and what we came up with is this: He often tends to back down on economic stuff, like tariffs. We suspect that anytime he tries something really stupid, economy-wise, he gets many earfuls from both big-time business tycoons and from Republican politicians and operatives. And we suspect he listens to at least some of them, because if there is anything he respects at all, it's an ability to make money.
On the other hand, he does not generally back down on stuff that involves his personal needs and emotions, particularly his need for revenge and his need to have his ego boosted. He's never given up on Hillary Clinton's evils, or Barack Obama's birth certificate, or that weather map, or the 2020 election, or the Nobel Peace Prize (and keep reading). We think the Minnesota stuff is much more personal than it is business for him, because he hates (brown) immigrants, he hates Gov. Tim Walz (DFL-MN), he hates Rep. Ilhan Omar (DFL-MN), and he wants to be "right" about ICE, and to be right about blue cities being hellholes.
This is just the best we've come up with; we're not sure if we're on the mark or not. If readers have thoughts, we are happy to hear them at comments@electoral-vote.com. We'll also note that this framework offers little help in what will happen with Fed Chair Jerome Powell, since that is both business AND personal.
Whatever the underlying dynamics are, Trump is clearly not backing down on Minneapolis. He is now threatening to invoke one of his two or three favorite laws, the Insurrection Act, which would allow him to even more fully militarize the state. In other words, instead of trying to put the fire out, he's thinking about pouring gas all over it.
Meanwhile, an important part of this story is the experience of people in Minnesota. We have a number of very compelling e-mails from Minnesota-based readers, like this one from reader D.G. in St. Paul, MN:
I just had to write this after what we just experienced. Maybe you will share this in one of this week's stories or maybe in the weekend reader letters. It does not matter. What matters is that people know what is going on here in Minnesota.
I am a person of faith (Roman Catholic, to be precise), fortunate to have a faith community dedicated to justice. ISAIAH is a Minnesota statewide organization composed of churches, mosques and other faith-based organizations. For decades ordinary people of faith have organized around shared values of justice and love, so as to effect real change in our state and the nation.
Recently, we attended an ISAIAH press conference in Richfield, MN, where community members shared their experiences of the ICE presence in Minnesota. It was heartbreaking and angering. We made demands of Target, Inc. (headquartered in Minnesota) to protect their workers. But despite the somber mood, there was an air of joy in the crowd because we were living out our faith values in the service of others, of those who cannot fight for themselves. My family and I left feeling uplifted.
We decided to patronize one of the many Latino restaurants in Richfield for lunch. On the way there, we ran straight into an ICE raid. Right in front of our eyes, a group of masked men grabbed someone off the platform of a major bus stop in the area. In broad daylight. In front of probably 50 people at the gas station and intersection right by the stop. Community members blew whistles, got out their phones and used their voices to both alert others to the danger and to call out what was happening.
It was incredibly frightening. These are things we only read about or see in movies. I literally saw someone kidnapped this afternoon. There was no identification from the men who shoved their victim into a van. In fact, I did not hear them say a word. The whole thing lasted less than a minute. Then they and one of our community members were gone.
We have lost our way as a country. This is not law and order, this is lawlessness. I am hearing multiple reports about similar incidents in other areas of the metro area and state, just today. There is a noticeable uptick in this since the murder (and it WAS murder) of Renee Good. ICE has verbally threatened community members with violence. I saw a video in which an "agent" told a protester, "Did you learn nothing from what happened?" The Constitution is being shredded before our eyes.
This is a five-alarm fire in Minnesota. We are contacting our members of Congress, our state leaders, our city leaders. Please do the same with yours. We need your help!
Thank you, D.G. We are going to run some additional messages next week; if any Minnesota reader cares to chime in, please do at comments@electoral-vote.com.
Anyhow, Parts IV and V will run next week. (Z)
P.S.: The last mainstream U.S.-released film to feature an intermission is... Gandhi (1982). Again, it happens in foreign films sometimes (e.g., RRR). And it's sometimes done with roadshow-style presentations, like when a theater shows both halves of the 2007 Quentin Tarantino/Robert Rodriguez presentation Grindhouse. But Gandhi is the last major U.S. release to include an intermission as part of all first-release public showings (though it was removed for re-releases).