Welcome to the RedState Weekly Briefing, your go-to source for the week’s most engaging stories. If you’ve fallen behind on the whirlwind events of January, we’re here to catch you up. So, settle in with your favorite beverage and enjoy this modern twist on a weekend edition from your cherished online publication.

#1 – Anti-ICE Signal Chats: Walz Administration Implicated, Foreign Funding Revealed — by Jennifer Van Laar

#2 – Anti-ICE Crew Thinks They Have ICE Cornered in CA Restaurant, Then an Epic Fail Ensues — by Nick Arama

#3 – Has Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney Made the Dissolution of Canada a Done Deal? — by streiff

Organization

Current polling indicates that at least 29 percent of Albertans and 31 percent of Quebecois support the idea of independence from Canada. This sentiment is based on the current status quo, which includes a highly favorable trade agreement with the U.S. If this trade deal were to disappear, but independence provided a pathway to similar benefits, it’s likely that both provinces might choose to exit Canada.

While the fracturing of Canada presents certain risks, they seem less severe compared to maintaining a close relationship with China. An independent Alberta and Quebec, potentially followed by other provinces, could align with the U.S. similarly to Puerto Rico or Guam. This affiliation would allow them to enjoy political, economic, and defense advantages without introducing millions of quasi-communists into the U.S. political landscape.

Turns out, of course, the men weren’t ICE agents. Fox 11 identified them as TSA workers; other local news clarified that, specifically, they were federal air marshals.

But this kind of harassment just isn’t right, either for ICE agents or anyone else. This isn’t “resisting” anything except reality. If you took away the leftist “it’s ICE” excuse, who would really argue that it’s all just cool if you follow people, blow whistles in their ears, scream curse words at them? They think they can do this because of their political opinion. It’s bizarrely delusional.

#3 – Has Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney Made the Dissolution of Canada a Done Deal? — by streiff

Right now, polling shows that independence from Canada receives at least 29 percent of Albertans’ and 31 percent of Quebecois’ support. This, however, is based on the status quo, which includes a highly advantageous trade arrangement for Canada with the U.S. If that trade deal goes away, but remains possible through independence, then I think it is safe to say that both provinces could vote to head for the exits. 

A broken and atomized Canada has its risks, but they are lower than those of a Canada with a close relationship to China. An independent Alberta and Quebec—and if that happens, a lot of other provinces will be close behind—could become territories in the mode of Puerto Rico and Guam, where they gain the political, economic, and defense benefits of affiliation with the U.S. but don’t bring millions of quasi-communists into our political system. 

The irony here is just too rich and luxurious to ignore. Carney’s push to become the darling of the Never-Trump international community could end up being the final straw that leads to the inevitable breakup of Canada.

#4 – Boss Mode: Trump Delivers Priceless Response to Tim Walz on His ‘Fort Sumter’ Comments — by Nick Arama

“Wow. Does he know what Fort Sumter was?” Trump asked. “Or do you think somebody wrote it out for him?” He went on to say that he was elected on law and order, and that was what all of this was about. 

That’s a hilarious takedown of Walz. But it’s true, Walz is not very bright. 

Does Tim know what happened in that scenario? Maybe that’s not what he wants to be implying or inciting. Yet he’s already shown he wants to keep ratcheting up the temperature when he makes Civil War references.

Tim knows he’s in big trouble, between the massive fraud and the chaos he’s helped to incite with the anti-ICE people. If he or they go full Civil War, it would not end well for them. They’re already treading all over the insurrection line at this point; he shouldn’t want to be trying to confirm that.

#5 – California’s Oil Refining System Has Collapsed, and One Region Is Ground Zero — by Steve Williams

Competent leadership starts with an honest accounting of refining capacity and geographic concentration. It treats energy reliability, affordability, environmental protection, and national security as linked responsibilities.

Right now, California does none of this.

Residents of AD-66 live with the infrastructure. They bear the environmental risk. They absorb the economic consequences. And they are told disruption is the price of progress, even as the state fails to manage that disruption responsibly.

They did not ask to become ground zero for California’s energy contradictions. But they have. The refining reckoning has arrived. California can continue mistaking aspiration for execution, or it can start governing like a state that understands how systems work.

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