You know the night is falling and the music’s calling, and we’ve got to get down to Tab Town …
If American governance was was “never supposed to be about the whims and the ego of a single person” — why is Joe Biden completely off the hook for unilaterally letting 10-20 million illegal immigrants into the country? https://t.co/DHh5lMdy0F
— Mark Hemingway (@Heminator) January 17, 2026
Ed: Good question. Also: how does enforcing laws passed by Congress amount to the whims and ego of a single person? We had a national election that centered in significant part on immigration-law enforcement, and voters elected the “single person” who advocated for aggressive enforcement.
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Jonathan Turley: Notably, his past convictions for business and tax fraud were not taken in Trump’s interest but in his own. When he admitted on the stand that he lied during his prior plea agreement, it was to advance his own interests.
Cohen has now continued this pattern of shifting loyalties and turned on New York Attorney General Letitia James and Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, accusing them of pressuring him to frame his testimony to guarantee Trump’s conviction.
After Trump’s recent court victories and the remanding of his federal case, Cohen is claiming that the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office and the New York Attorney General’s Office “pressured and coerced” him into tailoring testimony: “I felt pressured and coerced only to provide information and testimony that would satisfy the government’s desire to build the cases against and secure a judgment and convictions against President Trump.”
Ed: If Michael Cohen said good morning to me, I would feel compelled to check both my watch and a nearby window for confirmation. I seriously doubt that either James or Bragg are worried about the accusations of a perjurer. I’d bet even Trump doesn’t take this seriously.
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I just spoke to a friend in Iran who just got back online. He said the Islamic Republic hired terrorist militias—Hashd al-Shaabi and Fatemiyoun Division—professional killers shooting people indiscriminately in the streets and in front of their homes. The death toll is far higher…
— Tahmineh Dehbozorgi (@DeTahmineh) January 17, 2026
… The death toll is far higher than 20,000. Body bags everywhere. Families can’t even bury their dead. Now they’re bracing for the next wave of executions.
He told me that he watched so many people get gunned down in front of him that he wishes he’d died too so he doesn’t have to live with these images.
Ed: Trump will be forced to take some sort of action as this emerges.
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Reuters: Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Saturday blamed President Donald Trump for weeks of demonstrations that rights groups said have led to more than 3,000 deaths.
“We consider the U.S. president criminal for the casualties, damages and slander he inflicted on the Iranian nation,” Khamenei said, according to Iranian state media.
Ed: They know that something’s coming, and it will be something they will neither like nor have any defense against.
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🔴 I have more reports from Tehran as well as Southern Iran.
• People are trapped in their homes almost all day.
• They’re allowed a small window to go outside to buy essential household items. Groups of foreign terrorists escort them to shops.
• These terrorists observe…
— 𝐍𝐢𝐨𝐡 𝐁𝐞𝐫𝐠 ✡︎ 🇮🇷 (@NiohBerg) January 17, 2026
Ed: Click through to read it all. The secrets of the last couple of weeks will be impossible to keep for long, and this level of police state is unsustainable for any significant period of time.
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Politico: “We find the US President guilty due to the casualties, damages and slander he inflicted upon the Iranian nation,” Khamenei wrote.
In another post, he said Trump had mischaracterized violent groups as representing the Iranian people, calling it “an appalling slander.”
Trump, after being read the posts, said Tehran’s rulers rely on repression and violence to govern. “What he is guilty of, as the leader of a country, is the complete destruction of the country and the use of violence at levels never seen before,” Trump said. “In order to keep the country functioning — even though that function is a very low level — the leadership should focus on running his country properly, like I do with the United States, and not killing people by the thousands in order to keep control.” …
“It’s time to look for new leadership in Iran,” Trump told POLITICO, as widespread protests calling for an end to the regime appear to have waned.
Ed: Say, when does the USS Abraham Lincoln arrive in the Persian Gulf?
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Hostile media has been in the tank against everything Bari Weiss from day 1 — not even reading this. No idea what the argument says. Ignore it. Keep going https://t.co/nWPMeiWHXj
— Jon Levine (@LevineJonathan) January 17, 2026
Ed: Yes, because CBS News was firing on all cylinders pre-Weiss, right? That’s why Paramount had to settle a lawsuit by paying Trump $16 million after hacking up a 60 Minutes puff piece with Kamala Harris in an attempt to unduly influence the election through fraud. I don’t know if the Tony Dokoupil Era will prove a success, but CBS News has been politically corrupt for decades. It has nowhere to go but up.
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WSJ: President Trump, in a social-media post on Saturday, said the 10% tariffs would go into effect on Feb. 1 and would apply to all goods sent to the U.S. from Denmark, Norway, Sweden, France, Germany, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands and Finland. The tariffs will increase to 25% on June 1 and remain in place until a deal is reached for what he called the “complete and total purchase” of Greenland, Trump said.
Trump’s announcement comes after European nations sent military and diplomatic assets to Greenland to deter the U.S. from acquiring the territory.
“These Countries, who are playing this very dangerous game, have put a level of risk in play that is not tenable or sustainable,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “Therefore, it is imperative that, in order to protect Global Peace and Security, strong measures be taken so that this potentially perilous situation end quickly, and without question.”
Ed: How smart is this while the Supreme Court is still considering the challenge on tariffs? I get the interest in Greenland; we’ve been trying to buy it for more than half the history of our country, starting shortly after the Civil War. The security interests in it are legitimate. But this is not the best method of addressing it. We could do just as well with a lease arrangement, or by diplomatically love-bombing the Danes and/or Greenlanders.
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Big clash between Jake Lang, pro-ICE demonstrators and anti-ICE, black bloc counter protesters outside Minneapolis City Hall.
People are throwing water balloons at Lang, though most are missing him. pic.twitter.com/0tR1Q3OTg7
— Julio Rosas (@Julio_Rosas11) January 17, 2026
Ed: Oh, the stars at night are big and bright …
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SUBMITTED: Email sent to Hennepin Healthcare employees Friday warns of “dire fiscal position.”
“For months, cash on hand has hovered around zero, and in early January the system’s cash position went negative – requiring use of a county line of credit to meet payroll.”
“We are… pic.twitter.com/WCxKlKq4jf
— Liz Collin (@lizcollin) January 17, 2026
“We are now fully in crisis mode and must act decisively.”
Ed: Looks like the erosion of commerce in Minneapolis has had a harsh impact on its healthcare system. I would not be surprised if the county government is in a similar position.
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Hollywood in Toto: Last week’s ninth episode made those “View” wisecracks look tame by comparison.
Randolph’s Ainsley has a rough first meeting with her new college roommate, Paigyn. The two are studying similar topics, but they couldn’t be more different.
Ainsley is vapid, obsessed with fashion and generally upbeat. Paigyn has short, cropped hair and insists her new roommate use They/Them pronouns to address her.
You can imagine what happens next.
“Landman” has every right to introduce material like this. The sequence reflects the harsh reality of college life, and it shows how the woke among us can be cold and dictatorial.
Ed: I haven’t yet watched much of Landman, but I should give it more of a try. I found the opening episode to be contrived and didactic, clearly intended to provide a platform for conservative diatribes by its main character. That’s fine as far as it goes as a pushback to practically everything else Hollywood does with politics, but it still felt tiresome to me. Christian Toto apparently has the same problem with it. However, any TV show that has the wit to name an AWFL character “Paigyn” is one I should give at least some effort to enjoy.
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A couple of months ago this billboard was rejected. At that time, we had 16,000 subscribers. Today we have 164,000. Power to the people 👊 https://t.co/1stbtsNZG1 pic.twitter.com/Sm36rodPUu
— Ricky Gervais (@rickygervais) January 17, 2026
Ed: Are these for sale? Maybe I can just use the image as wallpaper for my computer.
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Voter ID is key to a healthy Democracy and enforced most everywhere in the world. Help save California by joining me in signing the petition. https://t.co/mJLJmp8sQp pic.twitter.com/BRIacfCnXQ
— John Ondrasik (@johnondrasik) January 17, 2026
Ed: California voters, you know what to do … before leaving the state entirely. Oh, the stars at night are big and bright …
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