On Police and Emotions

This piece is going to be tangentially about the murder of Renee Nicole Good on January 7, 2026. In case you live on the Galapagos Islands, and haven't heard the story, on that day, Ms. Good was shot three times by an ICE agent named Jonathan Ross. He was walking around her vehicle on an icy/snowy street in a Minneapolis suburb. After he crossed in front of her Honda Pilot SUV, she appologized and he seemed to be offended, switched his smartphone to his left hand and pulled his weapon and summarily shot her three times, killing her.

And if you haven't seen the multitude of copies of videos from different angles including the officially leaked copy of officer Ross' smartphone footage, I salute you. It is disturbing, enraging, and the official response by DHS, ICE, the FBI, and the DOJ has been just blatantly, flat-out wrong and lies.

But that is what we expect out of the administration.

I do not want to litigate that, as a lot of people are covering it exceptionally. No, this morning, walking my dog, I (against all my instincts) listened to this week's "Focus Group" podcast by Sarah Longwell from The Bulwark.[1]

This episode has Bill Kristol as the guest, and one of the first snippets of participant feedback triggered me this morning.[2] The group were Biden to Trump swing voters, and this lady went on about how stressful it is to be a police officer, and that when people are disrespectful of them, that their emotions can sometimes get carried away.

I literally had to stop for a moment or two on that one.

Emotional?

I should set the table a bit. I am one of those armed liberals. I have a safe full of long arms and pistols. I have shot a lot at various points in my life. To me, it is like golf, it is me and the weapon versus the target, and it can be very relaxing.

But I didn't just start here. I got safety training when I was a wee lad, probably at age 6. I went through hunter safety training in my tween years, and at times spent a lot of time at the firing range. I have taking training ans self defense courses (all I would have needed to get a CCW permit, although I never took that step, as I never felt it was necessary).

There are some cardinal rules around firearms. Two that stand out are: every firearm is loaded. Even if you just unloaded it. you treat it like it is loaded. And never point it at anything that you aren't willing to shoot. You don't joke around and play with it.

There are a lot of other rules if you are going to carry a sidearm and use it in self defense, but what is ingrained into you is that by having it, even in your safe, you have to acknowledge that you might one day need to use it for its intended purpose. To kill something or someone.

And that is a very serious responsibility. Legally, financially, and potentially penally. Thus, you are instructed to be extremely rational about the possibility. Emotions are never justification for the use of firearms.

And emotions are normal, but you should never let your emotions take over. You need to be rational with that tool of death in your hand(s).

So, when I hear people excuse the ICE agent because Renee's wife was being mouthy, and that got him into an emotional state, I get really pissed.

Training

While it is true that not only have the standards for hiring ICE agents been loosened to make quotas, but that the training has been reduced from about 5 months worth of classroom and practical training (that is still too short in my mind) to 47 days[3], in this case, that wasn't an issue.

Jonathan Ross is a 10 year veteran of the service, and he also is an instructor in firearms for the agency.

That means, this fucker has had a lot of training, knows the rules, and knows that he shouldn't let someone saying things like "Maybe you should go get some lunch big boy.." shouldn't get to him.

Not only that, but this car was stopped (yes, it was partially obstructing the road, but other vehicles had just driven around) in the roadway, and the driver, Ms. Good, was waving them around, when he decided to get out and to start recording video.

And what does he do? He walks in front of the car. Look, I know a few police officers from my time living in Tucson, and the instructor I took firearms training with was a retired officer, and that was one thing they told us was to not put yourself in harm's way. Ross disobeyed this rule.

Oh, and the whole "people need to treat the police with respect" really need to get a grip. You can say anything to a police officer, call them a baby, call them Baby Huey, call them pigs, cowards, fuckers, c-words, whatever. That has been adjudicated, and in precedent after precedent, the Supreme Court has ruled that it is A-OK to call cops the worst words you can think of.

If as an officer of the law you can't take that sort of verbal abuse, you are in the wrong fucking job.

The Aftermath

The official story from the agency and the administration was that she had run him over, and that was why he "bravely" opened fire.

Funny thing is, on his smartphone video after he dumped 3 rounds into her, he called her a (and I quote): "Fucking Bitch" before calmly walking down to where the SUV crashed into a parked car, and then he and his cadre hop into the idling truck they drove up in, and drive away.

Not one shred of remorse, or concern that he had killed a fellow human being.

That is what I can't forgive (ok, there's a lot that I can't forgive) that he gets to go home, he will be protected by the agency, the administration, the DoJ.

This fucker (and from what we are seeing with all the abusive video clips) should not be in any LEO role, should not carry a firearm.

There's a meme going around about ICE hiring people who are too lazy to join the military, and too stupid to join the police. That sounds about right, and it is distressing.

Anyhow, this is where we are, and it is going to get worse.

Watch a mix of ICE Icecapades:

1 - Against my instincts because they have sound clips from voters, and while I would like to think they pick the worst fucking people to talk to, alas, they just get representative samples of people, and man, are they just dumb fuckers.

2 - Here's the full episode:

3 - It is 47 days because Trump is the 47th president. You can't make this shit up. THe Onion must be on life support at this time.