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Posted on 01/28/2026 2:55:04 AM PST by TheDon
Transcription
People keep saying the same two things about the Pretti shooting here in Minneapolis. They say, you have the right to observe and film. They say, you have the right to carry a gun if you have a permit.
Now, of course, both of those statements are true, but both of them are completely misleading when ripped out of context. Because what both of those statements do is substitute slogans for circumstances. And circumstances are everything.
Let's start with the gun. Yes, in Minnesota, if you have a permit, you can carry a firearm. That's absolutely true.
But every concealed carry instructor in this state will tell you the same thing. The moment you choose to carry a firearm, your responsibility goes up, not down. You don't become more entitled to engage in confrontation.
You actually become more obligated to avoid it. Here in Minnesota, we have what's called a duty to retreat, which means if a judge later decides after the fact that you could have reasonably avoided a conflict, even if you felt threatened at the time, you could still go to prison for using your firearm. That's not theory.
That's the real law here in this state. And anyone who teaches carry knows it. So the idea that a carry permit somehow entitles someone to walk into an active area of federal law enforcement, get into a physical confrontation with armed agents, and then claim, well, I had the right to be there.
That's not how any of this works at all. If anything, being armed creates an elevated duty to stay away from such volatile situations. Because now, by doing that, you're introducing lethal force into the environment, you're increasing the perceived threat to officers, and you're dramatically narrowing their reaction window.
That's not politics. That's physics. Now let's talk about the filming aspect.
Yes, of course, you have a First Amendment right to record police. That's true. But that right has limits.
Even professional journalists can't just walk into an operational zone and demand whatever angle they want. They're required to follow lawful orders. They're required to not interfere with the operation.
They're required to respect safety perimeters. Because filming and documenting does not override lawful operational control. You don't get to insert yourself into the middle of an arrest and say, I'm the press.
I'm a citizen journalist. I'm observing. Because that's not observation, that's interference.
And here's the problem with how this is being discussed right now in the public. People are using abstract rights language to excuse concrete behavior. They're saying things like, well, he had the right to carry.
He had the right to film. Without asking, were his actions those of someone trying to avoid conflict? Or were his actions those of someone inserting himself into conflict? And those are very different things. Carrying a gun does not give you license to approach law enforcement and interfere with their duties.
Filming does not give you license to defy lawful orders. And neither of those activities creates immunity from the consequences when things predictably escalate. And this is where context matters.
Was this a peaceful sidewalk interaction? Or was this the middle of an enforcement operation? And the answer is obvious. Was this passive observation from a distance? Or physical proximity and confrontation? Was Pretty retreating or advancing? Those questions shape the case, not your slogans. And here's what bothers me about the way this is being framed.
It trains people to think that their rights are shields from consequences instead of responsibilities. It tells them, well, just invoke the magic words, gun rights, press rights, protest rights, and reality will bend around you. But it doesn't.
Reality responds to your behavior. Law evaluates your choices and actions. And officers in the field don't have the luxury of freeze frame hindsight.
What they see is distance, movement, compliance, resistance, threat posture. And you have 100% control over all of those factors. You choose whether to approach.
You choose whether to comply. You choose whether to resist. And you choose the posture and temperament with which you engage.
All of which is relevant to whether you are exercising your rights lawfully or committing multiple state and federal crimes. Now, none of this means that we definitively know whether the shooting was justified. The most up-to-date analysis at the time of this recording suggests a great deal of confusion during the struggle, potential accidental discharge, and decisions made in the moment under disorienting circumstances.
Investigators will determine all of that. What we do know is that the standard for deploying lethal force is not correctly believing that you're under imminent threat, but reasonably believing that you are. So even if this turns out to be a mistake to one degree or another, it likely won't turn out to be a crime committed by the officers involved.
And that's because that's the way it should be. Because these officers and officers must make split-second decisions in chaotic circumstances which are created by the subjects they interact with. Their decision to fire never would have been made if Preddy had maintained appropriate distance, not charged forward, complied with lawful orders, stopped resisting, and not maintained a threatening posture.
He made those choices, which led to the officers making theirs. So the conversation becomes dishonest if it only asks, did Preddy have the right to do X? Instead of asking, did Preddy act in a way that someone with those rights is expected to act under the law? Because rights without responsibility aren't liberty. They're license for chaos.
And when chaos meets armed law enforcement, people are likely to die. If you want to carry, you must avoid confrontation. If you want to film, you must avoid interference with lawful operations.
If you want to protest, you must avoid impediment. Those aren't my political opinions. Those are the laws of our land.
And pretending otherwise doesn't honor Preddy. It endangers the next guy who thinks that some slogan will protect him from the predictable consequences of his actions. The tragedy here isn't just what happened.
It's how people in influence are talking about it and what the public is inferring from those misguided and inaccurate comments. The public is being taught by far too many, you're entitled to walk into danger. No, you're obligated to stay out of it.
And until we start talking about that part, we're not talking about what actually matters.
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Loved his point that carrying obligates you to avoid confrontation, not to foment it. Nurse Pretti decided to insert himself into a confrontational situation. He chose......poorly.
Just like everything else in their performance driven, self identifying, participation trophy, follower seeking, narcissistic life. It is all a phony illusion of their warped view of the good life.
My advice, spend a little time on your knees thanking God for your life. It may rewire your outlook.
Walter nails it!
The same liberals who say that Pretti had every right to be there with a firearm, are the same ones who hate firearms and want to get rid of the 2nd Amendment.....talk about hypocrisy.
Those people are not protesting, what they are doing is called rioting.
Remember friends, “A firearm is only dangerous when the wrong nut is connected to the trigger” L.Star
That’s basically what I learned in concealed weapons class. Get the hell out of Dodge and call the cops. Stand your ground only when cornered and there’s no other choice.
The only clear rule is the Castle Doctrine where one is not required to retreat.
Excellent analysis. Rational and logical. I forwarded to several people I know who need to see this.
Excellent analysis.
Even deep purple Michigan trashed their “duty to retreat” laws about 20 years ago. I see Minnesota is still doing things the lefty way.
CC
5,000 ways to spell priddi...
Yet, a great article.
Saw a meme on ICE that said How do you think ICE is doing?
Under the heading it said: Pretti Good with a picture of Nurse Pretti and Renee Good 🤣🤣
It's obtuse on the part of the Communists (and us BTW) to pretend otherwise.
Ok, then, if one were to establish that fact AND conspiracy, then this guy's death is murder, and THEY ARE GUILTY of it.
He's a martyr to the Communist cause, which perhaps he set out to be.
“The same liberals who say that Pretti had every right to be there with a firearm, are the same ones who hate firearms and want to get rid of the 2nd Amendment.....talk about hypocrisy.”
Reminds me of when anti-gun Leftist journalist Carl Rowan confronted a bunch of kids with his gun at his home swimming pool. After that happened there was a cartoon that came out with a bunch of NRA dudes carrying Mr. Rowan above them, as in Mr. Rowan being their hero - with Mr. Rowan saying “I said, put me down!!!”.
I think this situation falls under the situation I used to tell my kids
I called it the “you can be right, and be dead”
Example pedestrians have the right of way on a crosswalk, but if a bus is barreling down you should give the bus the right of way.
If you have a left turn arrow but see that a car coming at you is not stopping, you should stop and let the car pass.
My understanding of the situation is that he had a gun, the gun was removed. Shortly thereafter after “gun, gun, gun” had been declared the gun was accidentally discharged by the officer who removed it.
LE reacted to the discharge in the confusion of the situation by shooting the individual thinking he was still a threat with a gun.
If this is the case then the shooting was not justified, but it wasn’t murder or an execution it was an accident.
The individual chose to bring a gun to this situation, regardless of why or if he had the right, that choice resulted in this escalation.
Without the gun in the equation, I have no doubt he would still be alive.
He was right, dead right.
He was carrying illegally, You have to have an ID on you to carry
someone finally gets it 100% correct
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