Random News: April 20, 2023

DISCLAIMER: Zak's Random News is very random and doesn't cover many things, and not everything may be accurate, because I'm just some guy. Go find a real news source.

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Good morning. It’s April 20, 2023, and it’s a Thursday for some reason. Here’s some stuff just for you…

• It’s 4/20, the international day of acknowledging that a lot of people like weed.
• I used to smoke weed. I still do, but I used to too.
• What is the origin of “420” as a stoner term? It’s really nothing spectacular. 
• In the early ‘70s, a group of friends at San Rafael High School in Marin County, CA, would meet each afternoon at 4:20pm to smoke the herbal essence. That term, possibly spread by traveling Deadheads from the area, went around the country. I was certainly aware of “420” while in high school in the ‘80s.
• I knew this intuitively at that age, because it’s obviously the right time to get high. You got off school about three, you ate some food, took care of whatever, and then could meet back up with your friends to spark a doobie. Light a spliff. Hit a bong. Pass a pipe. But your parents wouldn’t be home for a good while, so you wouldn’t be all blazed when they did.
• So “420” being a literal thing makes sense. It speaks for itself. Res ipsa loquitur.
• Over the past decade, 21 US states (plus D.C. and Guam) have made recreational use of cannabis fully legal. 
• Those states and territories are — in order of when they went legal — Colorado, Washington, Alaska, Oregon, Washington, D.C., California, Maine, Massachusetts, Nevada, Michigan, Vermont, Guam, Illinois, Arizona, Montana, New Jersey, New York, Virginia, New Mexico, Connecticut, Rhode Island, and the two most recent states to end marijuana prohibition, Maryland and Missouri.
• I can choose between many various strains at a weed store, or even have weed delivered as I would a meal via DoorDash.
• Now the funny thing. Despite all that, is marijuana legal at the federal level?
• Nope! Marijuana is classified at the federal level as a Schedule I drug under the Controlled Substances Act, the same as heroin and LSD. Cultivating, distributing and possessing marijuana violates federal drug laws.
• We live in a weird country. 
• Let’s do some news…
• The Supreme Court is leaving women’s access to mifepristone, the most common method of abortion in the United States, untouched until at least Friday.
• So I guess we’ll see soon enough whether America will become an outright forced-birth nation, thanks to the conservative court and the Republicans who put them there.
• Florida is sinking deeper and deeper into its Christofascist hell. A state board approved an expansion of Ron DeSantis’s “Don’t Say Gay” law yesterday, and the House passed bills on gender-transition treatments, bathroom use and keeping children out of drag shows.
• Florida has now completely banned classroom instruction about sexual orientation and gender identity in all grades. I feel a lot of pity for those kids.
• Elon Musk’s SpaceX had a large failure a few minutes ago when its Starship, the world’s largest rocket in history, exploded four minutes after launch.
• "Starship just experienced what we call a rapid, unscheduled disassembly.”
• Space travel is hard.
• You know what else is hard, apparently? Being a gun owner and not being a horrible piece of shit.
• On Tuesday, a North Carolina man shot a 6-year-old girl, her parents and an additional neighbor after a basketball rolled into his yard.
• 24-year-old Robert Louis Singletary seriously injured one adult male and one juvenile female and that a separate female was grazed by a bullet while a second adult male was shot.
• The victims were transported to a local area hospital for treatment. They are expected to survive.
• But yeah, keep up the “more guns = safer life” narrative.
• Let’s see how the rest of the planet is doing…
• Ongoing fighting in Sudan's capital is now severely affecting food supplies, as well as disrupting access to water and electricity. Khartoum residents fear food shortages amid fighting.
• Ugh.
• In other world news, a crowd stampeded at an event during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan in Yemen’s capital late yesterday, killing at least 78 people and injuring at least 73 others.
• Those people had gathered to receive about $10 each from a charity funded by local businessmen.
• Sigh.
• Let’s go back to the USA. How about Florida at 4:45am this morning?
• That’s when the state’s Emergency Alert Alarm mistakenly blared on people’s phones. 
• “FLSERT wants to apologize for the early morning text. Each month, we test emergency alerts on a variety of platforms. This alert was supposed to be on TV, and not disturb anyone already sleeping.”
• Slow clap.
• And now, The Weather: “Window” by Spill Tab
• At least two people have been killed after a tornado and strong storms swept across Oklahoma last night. The extreme weather included hail the size of ping-pong balls and winds up to 70 miles per hour.
• Good luck, Oklahomans.
• I have some other news about the Elongated Muskrat.
• Twitter has officially removed what they call “legacy verified checkmarks”. Instead of the verification badge on Twitter meaning that the amount is he’d by a public figure or entity, now it just means that. the amount has pain the company to sign up for their “Twitter Blue” option.
• So, keep in mind that you now have no way of telling who is a true account on that platform versus an impersonator who paid to deceive you.
• Here’s some schadenfreude for you.
• My Pillow CEO Mike Lindell has been ordered to shell out $5 million to an expert who debunked his data related to the 2020 election.
• The election conspiracist vowed to award the multimillion-dollar sum to any cyber security expert who could disprove his data. An arbitration panel awarded Robert Zeidman, who has decades in software development experience, a $5 million payout on Wednesday after he sued Lindell over the sum.
• Ha ha!
• For the first time in almost all of our lives, China is about to fall into second place in world population.
• India will surpass China by the middle of this year, projected at 1.4286 billion compared to China’s 1.4257 billion.
• The USA thankfully remains a distant third in world population with 336.412 million.
• From the Sports Desk… the NBA playoffs are cruising along in the first round. Some current standings: Bucks/Heat tied 1-1; Celtics lead Hawks 2-0; 76ers lead Nets 2-0; Knicks/Cavs tied 1-1; Nuggets lead T’wolves 2-0; Lakers/Grizzlies tied 1-1; Kings lead Dubs 2-0; and Clippers/Suns tied 1-1.
• Today in history… Oliver Cromwell dissolves England's Rump Parliament (1653). Freedom of religion is granted to the Jews of New Amsterdam, now known as New York City (1657). George Washington arrives at Grays Ferry, PA while en route to Manhattan for his inauguration (1789). U.S. Congress passes an act creating the Wisconsin Territory (1836). Louis Pasteur and Claude Bernard complete the experiment disproving the theory of spontaneous generation (1862). William McKinley signs a joint resolution to Congress for declaration of war against Spain, beginning the Spanish–American War (1898). Manfred von Richthofen, a.k.a. The Red Baron, shoots down his 79th and 80th victims, his final victories before his death the following day (1918). On his 56th birthday Adolf Hitler makes his last trip from his bunker to the surface to award Iron Crosses to boy soldiers of the Hitler Youth (1945). Failure of the Bay of Pigs Invasion of US-backed Cuban exiles against Cuba (1961). Apollo 16 lunar module, commanded by John Young and piloted by Charles Duke, lands on the moon (1972). Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold kill 13 people and injure 24 others before committing suicide at Columbine High School in Columbine, CO (1999). Danica Patrick wins the Indy Japan 300 becoming the first female driver in history to win an Indy car race (2008). The Deepwater Horizon drilling rig explodes in the Gulf of Mexico, killing eleven workers and beginning an oil spill that would last six months (2010). Derek Chauvin is found guilty of all charges in the murder of George Floyd by the Fourth Judicial District Court of Minnesota (2021).
• April 20 is the birthday of physician/psychologist Philippe Pinel (1745), composer Georg Michael Telemann (1748), sculptor Daniel Chester French (1850), fashion designer Paul Poiret (1879), politician and genocidal maniac Adolf Hitler (1889), painter Joan Miró (1893), vibraphone player Lionel Hampton (1908), SCOTUS justice John Paul Stevens (1920), drummer Tito Puente (1923), actor George Takei (1937), actor Ryan O’Neal (1941), actress Jessica Lange (1949), singer-songwriter Luther Vandross (1951), MLB player/manager Don Mattingly (1961), actor Andy Serkis (1964), drummer Mike Portnoy (1967), actress Carmen Electra (1972), and NFL player Luke Kuechly (1991).

I really need a weekend. The post-trade show week is always a grind. I actually thought it was Friday when my alarm went off and was bitterly disappointed to find out otherwise. Enjoy your day.