The Topic Cafe

01/10/2026

To: News 4 WIVB Buffalo

Subject: We need to turn the heat down on the people who are being given unlawful orders.

Who are these ICE Agents answering to? Who is in charge of them? Under Secretary Kristi Noem’s leadership at the Department of Homeland Security, Acting ICE Director Todd Lyons currently oversees the agency’s operations. He is currently directing what he has termed the "largest immigration operation ever," involving the deployment of 2,000 federal agents to the Minneapolis area alone.

Why are they targeting US CITIZENS AND INDIGENOUS PEOPLE? Recent reports indicate that Renee Nicole Good, a 37-year-old mother and U.S. citizen, was fatally shot in her car by an ICE officer in Minneapolis on January 7, 2026. Furthermore, concerns have been raised by advocacy groups that ICE agents are racially profiling and detaining Native Americans, mistaking them for immigrants from Central and South America.

Who is responsible for these deaths? While the DHS Office of Inspector General and the Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties are technically responsible for oversight, 2025 was officially ICE's deadliest year in two decades, with 32 people dying in custody. Oversight concerns have escalated following a rapid "hiring blitz" that added roughly 12,000 officers to the agency in less than a year, leading to questions on Capitol Hill about whether training standards were lowered to meet these aggressive recruitment targets.

We need these questions answered first before any more innocent civilians get killed. This is America, not some third world country that the Trump Administration keeps saying that tinpot dictators are running.

Jonathan Ross, who shot and killed Renee Good on Wednesday, was seriously injured last summer when he was dragged by the vehicle of a fleeing suspect whom he shot with a stun gun.

01/10/2026

PROPAGANDA PEDDLER OF THE DAY

Carmen Akers — Grief Scavenger and Moral Coward

Carmen Akers seems to assume three things about the people reading her posts:

1. They won't fact-check: She assumes her audience is too angry or too busy to look up the victim’s name or the actual video of the event.
2. They value "Strength" over "Truth": She assumes that by acting "tough" and using aggressive labels, she will be seen as an authority figure.
3. They are motivated by fear: Her posts lean heavily into "stranger danger" and "criminal alien" tropes, assuming her audience is primarily driven by fear of the unknown.
The Impact of This Behavior
When someone uses a public tragedy to "use and abuse" people for social or political capital, it creates a "post-truth" environment where:
• Healing is impossible for the family (the Goods).
• Justice is delayed because the public narrative becomes so cluttered with lies that the actual legal facts get buried.
• Community polarization increases, which is exactly what Mayor Frey and Governor Walz warned against when they called this type of rhetoric "propaganda."

Carmen, you are the definition of a social parasite. You circle tragedies like this not to seek truth, but to scavenge for clout by dehumanizing a dead U.S. citizen and her grieving family. Calling people 'useful idiots' is a transparent projection; you are so desperate for a sense of power that you’ll swallow any lie and parrot any script as long as it lets you feel superior for five minutes. You don’t support law and order—you support the cowardly abuse of narrative to justify the indefensible. You aren't a leader; you're just a bully who uses people’s pain as a stepping stone for your own ego.

01/08/2026

Yesterday, The Buffalo Sabres posted their new Pride Jerseys and immediately fans started calling them out for embracing inclusion of their LGBTQ fans. Others called them out for not having their Pride Jerseys looking good enough or cool enough, perhaps they think the colors make the Sabres logo “look too gay”, or they were posting on social media preening for their buddies about how “not gay” they are.

Looking at the logo, in the words of Tim Curry, as Doctor Frankenfurter, I decided “we could do a little bit better than that”.

Here’s a version of the Sabres logo for the Pride Jerseys that I think is far more befitting of a sport where men and women race around on ice with blades strapped to their feet and chase after a little black dot with sticks while trying to keep their blood and teeth in their mouths.

If anyone still thinks the logo is “too gay”, then stay at home and watch Heated Rivalry instead of attending Pride Night at Key Bank Center.

01/02/2026

Buffalo Sabres
Sabres fans are eager for a playoff run this year!
Stay focused and driven, Lindy! ⚔️ 🦬

01/01/2026

The US DEPT OF LABOR POSTED THIS PICTURE and the comment section is full of people dog whistling racist statements.

We've reached a point where we can't even look at a painting of a family celebrating New Year's without searching for reasons to hate them. We assume the worst about their hearts because of the color of their skin—the very definition of what we claim to be fighting. If our 'progress' requires us to dehumanize a moment of joy because it doesn't meet a modern demographic quota, we aren't building bridges; we're just painting the walls a different color.

• Stereotyping: Assuming that a group of white people at a party is "racist" or "exclusionary" simply because they are together is a stereotype that lacks empathy.
• Cultural Segregation: By insisting that every historical image must be a perfect "census" of diversity, people actually reinforce segregation. They refuse to allow a specific moment of a specific family to just be, insisting instead that it must represent a "system".

What are your thoughts? Comment below. ⬇️

12/31/2025

The Cost of the Bridge: Beyond the "Mad Bugger’s Wall"

We live in a world that is obsessed with "winning" the argument and protecting the "definition." We’ve become so loyal to our sociological silos and academic theories that we’ve forgotten how to look at a human being and simply say, "I see your pain, and it matters."

I’ve lived my life at the intersections. I was an adoptee navigating a world where I didn't always "fit." I was raised in the Black church. My family and my heart are a mosaic of Black, Hispanic, Asian, and Indigenous lives. I have seen the beauty of these cultures, but I have also felt the physical weight of racial violence and the scars of being targeted for my skin color.

The Compassion Gap
Lately, I’ve noticed a dangerous trend: The "Gatekeeping" of Suffering. When I share my lived experience—of being physically attacked or told I don't belong on this land—I am met with lectures on "systemic hierarchies." I am told that my pain isn't "racism" because of a historical chart.
This is what I call hitting a "Mad Bugger’s Wall." It is the point where ideology becomes more important than empathy. When we tell a victim that their experience "doesn't count" because it doesn't fit a specific academic framework, we aren't dismantling systems—we are just dehumanizing people.

The Consequences of "Winning"
People are hurting others unintentionally because they’ve replaced their conscience with a script. They don't consider the damage they are doing until it’s too late.

• Compassion Fatigue: Those of us trying to build bridges are exhausted. It is draining to have your humanity treated like a logic puzzle.
• The Ultimate Loss: When we prioritize the "right" word over the "right" treatment of a neighbor, we all lose. As I’ve felt lately: Either we find the sanity to lead with empathy, or we keep beating our heads against the wall until we're gone.

Either way, if empathy dies, Death wins.

Let’s stop arguing about the dictionary and start looking at the person. If your "fact" requires you to ignore someone’s scars, it isn't a truth worth holding onto.

12/27/2025

Machines, Mentors, and the Weight of Individual Responsibility

I spent 1994–2010 in the trenches of the automotive world—years of R-134a, $300 Ford Escorts, and the grind of night school. It was an era of "Organic Engineering" where you learned that machines, like the people who build them, are rarely perfect.
Looking back, I’ve realized a hard truth: Every creator is fallible.
Whether it’s the engineer behind a legendary engine that had a fatal flaw, or the cultural icons we grew up with who turned out to be deeply broken humans—the history of the "messenger" is often messy. But as a mechanic, you learn to separate the "part" from the "person."
We live in an age of $100,000 "debt traps" and digital systems that hide their flaws behind code. But the old-school way—the "Go-Kart" way—was about Individual Responsibility. * You didn't blame the manufacturer when the head gasket blew; you pulled the head and fixed it.
• You didn't wait for a "software update" to fix your life; you put in the time at the library and the shop to build a better future.
The "Frankenstein" spirit of a Rat Rod is about taking what is useful from the past, leaving the trash behind, and taking ownership of the result. We need to stop looking for perfect heroes and start focusing on Handworked Ingenuity. I’ll stick with a small truck for the road, or an old Jeep for the soul. I’ll take "Organic" over "Digital" every time, because when you understand the machine, you’re the one in control—not the person who built it.

12/11/2025

His feed is a jukebox of hollow notes—clowns, noise, and silence where truth should sing.

12/05/2025

I recieved a message from a friend today who is droppng his latest album, The Ridiculous Christmas EP.

Devo Spice for the Holidays in his most epic rap.

https://thefump.com/music/song/santaome

Recently I asked people for another batch of ridiculous ideas for Christmas songs. I got over 70 suggestions and rather than just choose one I decided to do multiple songs and release an EP. The Ridiculous Christmas EP is now available featuring this and three additional tracks. This song was sugges...

12/05/2025

“Measure twice, cut once.”

12/05/2025

To those who disagree with Mark Poloncarz, unlike President Trump, he’s not calling you “stupid”, he’s proving it.

Poloncarz’s statement is a civic shield against the weaponization of exclusion. It affirms that Somali refugees are not just welcome — they are essential. In the war over affordability and dignity, this message stands as a reminder: economic survival and cultural belonging are inseparable. To attack one is to fracture both.

🔗 How Poloncarz’s Message Relates to Affordability and Inequality

• Affordability is about inclusion.
When leaders dismiss affordability, they dismiss the lived reality of marginalized communities — including immigrants, refugees, and working-class families. Poloncarz’s message affirms the opposite: that Somali refugees belong, that their contributions matter, and that exclusionary rhetoric is unacceptable.
• Trump’s rhetoric undermines both dignity and economic truth.
By attacking Somali immigrants and using slurs, Trump not only dehumanizes individuals — he erases their economic role. Somali communities contribute labor, culture, and resilience. To ignore affordability is to ignore how these communities survive and enrich the economy.
• Historical echoes of exclusion.
Poloncarz invokes past waves of anti-immigrant sentiment — against Polish, Irish, and Italian Americans — to show that economic and cultural exclusion are cyclical. These groups were once scapegoated, denied affordability, and pushed to the margins. Today’s Somali community faces the same pressures.

12/05/2025

Affordability is the battlefield of history. When nations forget it, they fall. The Soviet Union collapsed because wages and prices lost all meaning — citizens could not afford the goods they needed to survive. America nearly broke in the Great Depression when affordability vanished, and only bold intervention restored the link between income and survival.

We stand in that crucible again. This recession is not just numbers on a chart — it is an economic war over whether ordinary people can afford housing, healthcare, and dignity. Price ceilings and wage floors are not abstractions; they are shields forged to protect citizens from markets that would otherwise devour them.

Affordability is the missing link in the chain of logic, the sword that cuts through exploitation. To dismiss it is to dismiss reality itself. Measure for measure, we must demand policies that restore affordability — or risk repeating the failures of history.

⚖️ Affordability: The Hinge of Civilization

• Supply and Demand are the levers.
One produces, the other consumes. But without affordability, the fulcrum breaks — and the system collapses.
• Cost vs. Profit is the tension.
Producers seek profit, consumers face cost. Affordability is the mediator that keeps the balance from tipping into exploitation or scarcity.
• Capitalism vs. Socialism is the ideological seesaw.
Capitalism prioritizes profit and market freedom; socialism prioritizes access and shared utility. Affordability is the flip side — the shared concern that both sides of the economic system must address or risk collapse.
• Socioeconomic Inequality is the root system.
When affordability fails, inequality grows. The wealthy access high-utility goods; the poor are priced out. The hinge rusts, the levers seize, and the system fractures.

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Affordability is not a footnote — it is the hinge upon which the entire economic edifice swings. Without it, supply and demand become disconnected, profit devours cost, and ideology becomes irrelevant in the face of human suffering.