NPR looks like National Propaganda Radio as it pumps out nasty articles against immigration enforcement in Minneapolis. Their war on everything Trump continues. On Saturday, the NPR home page sported this smeary article by NPR desk intern Ava Berger:
A red hat, inspired by a symbol of resistance to Nazi occupation, gains traction in Minnesota
Berger began this "happy news" story:
The weekly gatherings of knitters at Needle & Skein, a yarn store in Minneapolis, are typically filled with giggles and storytelling. But, earlier this month, a heaviness hung in the air.
"It was just collective exhaustion," said Paul Neary, a shop employee. "Minnesotans — we're not going to say the big thing, but we often know what the big thing is just by looking at each other."
The "big thing" being the presence of the ICE villains. Berger touts how this is compassionate charity work:
"What's been happening in Minneapolis has been so egregious and awful and so destructive to our community," shop owner Gilah Mashaal said of federal agents' use of aggressive tactics. It was obvious to her and Neary how the shop would protest.
They pulled out their knitting needles and got to work.
Neary created the pattern that has now become the well-known "Melt the ICE" hat, a red beanie-shaped cap topped with a braided tassel.
Since making the pattern available for $5, the shop has raised nearly $400,000, Mashaal said Friday. So far, she said, they have donated a total of $250,000 to two local nonprofits focused on housing support for immigrants in the community — STEP (St. Louis Park Emergency Program) and the Immigrant Rapid Response Fund.
The red hat has become a movement in the crafting community, popping up on social media and reaching other countries.
Mashaal and her daughter have received messages from people around the world, from Israel to South Africa to Norway, expressing their support for the movement, Mashaal said.
Berger may have just lifted this from the socialist British newspaper The Guardian. They included an image of "F--K ICE" in needlepoint. Their headline was:
‘Rage knitting’ against the machine: the hobbyists putting anti-ICE messages into crafts.
Then NPR had to underline their nasty historical analogy:
As a history buff, Neary chose the pattern based on a Norwegian hat used to protest the Nazi occupation of Norway in the 1940s. The hats were called "nisselue," which roughly translates to Santa hat.
"I brought this hat back for a reason," Neary said. To him, they symbolize resistance as they did in the 1940s.
….Peter Fritzsche, a history professor at the University of Illinois, said the Nazis were operating on "obviously a very, very different scale," but with ICE's presence in Minnesota, people can still feel "occupied."
This is NPR, so obviously there is no one quoted as pushing back on this smear, like ICE agents of friends and relatives of ICE agents. Instead, NPR underlines the injustice that conservatives and Trump voters have had to pay taxes for decades of subsidized smears.
