Blaming Good

Silly me. For my first blog post of 2026, I planned on lightening things up and writing about “Dry January,” where you abstain from drinking alcohol for the entire month to reset holiday habits and emerge feeling like a new person. Tanned, rested and ready to start the new year on a healthier note. Forget that idea. I blew it on Day 1 by having drinks with neighbors — for five hours. I could say I sipped on a double shot of Basil Hayden (neat, of course) for the duration, but I’d be fibbing. Nearly made it through the first weekend of the new year, though, but I blew it last Sunday at a Friendsgiving dinner at Ike’s, my favorite Middle Eastern restaurant. Who can pass up a nice savignon blanc with fresh hommus and tabouli appetizers? Not me. Honestly, I had pledged to stick with Dry January for the remaining month, even though we head south soon, leading us into the tropical temptation of consuming pretty umbrella drinks and too much queso. Surprisingly, I abstained through the fifth anniversary of January 6, 2021, the deadly attack by rioters on our Capitol that now appears as shameful revisionist history on a White House website. Apparently, a plaque honoring law enforcement personnel who defended the Capitol will be displayed inside the building. So there’s that.

Then, January 7, 2026, happened. I’m a mess, and I am sure there’s not enough Basil Hayden Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey to drown my sorrows.

Of course, I’m speaking of last Wednesday’s cold-blooded murder of 37-year-old U.S. citizen Renee Nicole Good by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, America’s secret police.

Literally, Good versus evil this time. To hell with Minnesota nice in the Land of 10,000 Lakes.

Under just about any other circumstances, a photo of a middle-aged white woman sitting on a snow-covered sidewalk with her black dog would make my heart melt and bring to mind thoughts of how much our beloved fur baby Madison enjoyed being outdoors in winter securing her property.

But not this time. The blurry snapshot of Rebecca Good crying and blaming herself for her wife’s death made me sick to my stomach.

Rebecca is sitting on the ground with her dog on a Minneapolis residential street where, minutes before, her wife, Renee, was murdered by a masked ICE officer who claimed he felt threatened. The unarmed couple was driving home. But these days, when a paramilitary force occupies America’s neighborhoods, getting home safely isn’t always guaranteed.

Renee Good had just dropped off her 6-year-old son at an elementary school in the new city they called home. Now, he’s an orphan. Her second husband who was the 6-year-old’s father died in 2023.

Renee Good had two other children, ages 15 and 12, from her first marriage. Their father, her ex-husband, described the mother of his children as no activist, and he never knew her to participate in a protest of any kind.

A recording released Friday by Alpha News appears to show the moments immediately before the shooting from the perspective of the masked ICE officer who fatally shot her.

In the video, Renee Good can be heard speaking to an ICE officer through the open driver’s side window, saying, “That’s fine, dude, I’m not mad at you,” as a masked ICE officer circles her vehicle like a hungry shark while filming with a cell phone camera in his hand.

Another masked ICE officer grabs the door handle and yells at her to “get out of the fucking car.”

ICE officer Jonathan Ross is the masked man who killed Renee Good in cold blood at point-blank range on a residential street. He’s standing in front of her, and she talks to him in a calm voice. At one point, she even smiles at Ross as her dog stares out the side window.

“That’s fine, dude. I’m not mad at you.”

Were those the last words spoken by this 37-year-old white mother of three?

Then, the man filming lowers his phone and at point-blank range, fires three shots at her. Renee Good’s maroon Honda Pilot covered with National Park stickers on the rear window advances forward and crashes into a parked car.

Then, we hear a man say this: “Fucking bitch.”

Were those the last words Renee Good heard before she died? A final insult by her murderer?

I pray not.

I have watched that cell phone video over and over again. And I have so many questions.

There really is no humanity left, is there? Cruelty is the point.

“That’s fine, dude. I’m not mad at you.”

Do those sound like the words of a “domestic terrorist,” as she was immediately labeled by authorities? And then later smeared on far-right social media as a “radical lesbian leftist”?

Do domestic terrorists bring their pets with them? Or have their son’s stuffed animals overflowing from the glove compartment?

No. Full stop.

What’s worse is authorities are lying about it. All of it.

Welcome to 2026 and the gaslighting of Americans. Don’t believe what you see and hear. Believe what we tell you.

Imagine if there was no video of this horrific tragedy?

One more horrifying fact from that day: No one on the scene tried to administer CPR or help save Renee Good. No one. A doctor tried to intervene but was told to wait for EMTs to arrive.

She was likely already dead by the time EMTs dragged her limp body to the ambulance that could not get to her because ICE vehicles had still blocked the street.

Her widow, Rebecca Good, later said in a statement, “We had whistles. They had guns.”

It could have been any of us. Any one of our activist friends who continually stand up for their rights and those of others. For the good of the nation we hold dear.

They’re out there. Marching peacefully. Always peacefully.

Not looking for trouble, but making “good trouble,” as the late civil rights leader and Georgia congressman John Lewis said.

I honestly don’t know where we go from here.

Instead of wallowing, let’s revisit some not-so-distant history. In a low moment, Winston Churchill said this to the Nazis on July 14, 1941: “You do your worst and we will do our best.”

Here’s to Renee Good and being better about doing our best against the worst.

(YouTube video: From American singer-songwriter Jesse Welles, here’s a link to his latest song, “Good vs. ICE.”)