Random News: April 21, 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 21, 2023, and if you can believe it, it’s a Friday once again! I’m a guy who really needs an actual weekend, so let’s see what’s happening while I slog through the final day of a hell week…

• Tonight is the self-imposed deadline for the Supreme Court to decide whether women’s access to a widely used abortion pill will stay unchanged or be restricted.
• Mifepristone is used in the most common abortion method in the United States. It has repeatedly been found to be safe and effective, and has been used by more than 5 million women in the U.S. since the FDA approved it in 2000.
• The chances of bad effects from mifepristone is five times less than that of viagra. If it gets banned under these circumstances, many other commonly-used drugs will need to go as well.
• Lawmakers in Washington state have passed a bill that would ban assault weapons in the state.
• The bill, which was given final approval by the House on Wednesday after passing the Senate earlier this month, places a ban on at least 60 types of assault weapons and would go into effect immediately with the signature of Washington Gov. Jay Inslee.
• The legislation does not affect the weapons that are owned by people in the state or those who inherit them. Even with the exceptions, it would be one of the most comprehensive statewide bans on assault weapons in the country.
• I hope it holds up in court and that more states follow suit. There have been 165 mass shootings in the first 110 days of 2023.
• Speaking of guns and assholes…
• Nathan Pelham, 40, of Greenville, TX, is charged in connection with the failed coup attempt on Jan. 6, 2021. So he next did something you’d expect of a person of his ilk: he shot at law enforcement ahead of his first court appearance, and now has been hit with additional federal firearm charges.
• Way to MAGA, Nathan.
• Moving on…
• If you’re mad at House Republicans for passing H.R. 734 (118) — the measure that restricts transgender students from playing on women’s sports teams — you should be. But don’t be concerned.
• Yes, the bill does bar transgender women from playing on teams consistent with their gender identity and yes, it amends Title IX, the federal education law that bars sex-based discrimination, to define sex as based solely on a person’s reproductive biology and genetics at birth.
• But it also has no chance of passing the Senate, and even if it did, Biden already pre-vetoed it. No worries.
• Like many things in the current environment, there will be many of these for-show-only bills that get through the House and then disappear.
• In other news…
• Florida’s Gov. Ron DeSantis signed a bill yesterday that will no longer require juries agree unanimously to recommend death sentences.
• To be clear, that means four people on a jury in Florida can vote against a death sentence and the accused would be put to death anyway.
• Ever hear of a death row inmate later exonerated by DNA or other new evidence? It happens a lot. Will Florida be killing innocent people? How much worse can that state get?
• “Florida already has the highest number of death row exonerations in the country. With this bill and others, Florida is rapidly widening the net of who will be sent to death row with absolutely no consideration for the flaws that will inevitably lead to the harm of more innocent people.” - Tiffani Lennon, Florida ACLU executive director
• Yup.
• Down in Texas, public schools will have to prominently display the Ten Commandments in every classroom starting next school year under a bill the Texas Senate approved yesterday.
• I’d sue the fuck out of that state if my child was in school there. Taxpayer money being used to buy religious texts and Christian signage? Fuck all the way off.
• High school and college students across the state of Florida plan to walk out of school on Friday to protest Governor DeSantis and Florida’s “authoritarian takeover of its public education system.”
• Good.
• Clarence Thomas can’t just skip away from his ethics violations with a “whoops, my bad,” it would seem.
• Senate Judiciary Committee Chair Dick Durbin is inviting Chief Justice John Roberts to testify before Congress next month in order to improve public faith in the high court.
• Someone needs to clarify what’s acceptable regarding these undisclosed real estate transactions and expense-paid luxury trips taken by Justice Thomas.
• Looks like Joe Biden is going to announce his reelection campaign next week with a video that premiers on Tuesday.
• That’s the four-year anniversary of Biden’s 2020 campaign launch. Alrighty then.
• In world news, Russia accidentally bombed itself.
• Russia’s military acknowledged that a bomb accidentally dropped by one of its warplanes caused a powerful blast in Belgorod, a city of 340,000 located about 25 miles east of the Russia-Ukraine border.
• It left a 60-foot-wide crater in the middle of a tree-lined avenue flanked by apartment blocks, damaged several cars, and threw one vehicle onto a store roof. Two people were injured.
• The Orange Man, who’s gone relatively quiet lately beyond his ridiculous NFT drops, has another appointment in New York City next week. And he has no excuse not to show up.
• Trump attorney Joe Tacopina had asked a federal judge on Wednesday to inform the jury that if Trump didn't appear for the trial for defaming and battering writer E. Jean Carroll in lower Manhattan, it would be to avoid the "logistical and financial burdens upon New York City, its residents, and court itself."
• But Judge Lewis Kaplan, who is presiding over Carroll's lawsuit against Trump, said yesterday that the decision whether to attend the trial or testify is Trump's alone, and that Trump has had "ample time" to make the necessary arrangements. No mention of that bullshit is allowed.
• "Moreover, the Court notes from Mr. Trump's campaign web site and media reports that he announced earlier this week that he will speak at a campaign event in New Hampshire on April 27, 2023, the third day of the scheduled trial in this case. If the Secret Service can protect him at that event, certainly the Secret Service, the Marshals Service, and the City of New York can see to his security in this very secure federal courthouse.”
• Hahahahahahahahahaha! Get fucked, loser.
• Note that Trump is under no legal obligation to be present or to testify at a civil trial. This is all silly theatre.
• One of the McCurtain County, Oklahoma Commissioners who were caught on tape talking about hit men for journalists and hanging Black people has resigned.
• “I know. Take them down to Mud Creek and hang them up with a damn rope. But you can’t do that anymore. They got more rights than we got.” - McCurtain County Commissioner Mark Jennings, in reference to Black people
• Jennings stepped down, but no word yet on McCurtain County Sheriff Kevin Clardy, sheriff's investigator Alicia Manning, and Jail Administrator Larry Hendrix. All were asked to resign by Gov. Kevin Stitt.
• Over in Tennessee, a bipartisan ethics committee yesterday found that Republican Rep. Scotty Campbell officially violated the chamber’s sexual harassment policy. He resigned shortly thereafter.
• Campbell made headlines for condemning three of his fellow state lawmakers for breaking decorum while protesting for gun control laws.
• Campbell, 39, made inappropriately crude and suggestive comments to a 19-year-old intern who lived nearby him. He “made comments about how he was in his apartment imagining that we were performing sexual acts on one another and how it drove him crazy knowing that was happening so close to him.”
• Ladies and gentlemen, your GOP! (slow clap)
• And now, The Weather: “The Garden” by Unknown Mortal Orchestra
• Involuntary manslaughter charges against Alec Baldwin in the 2021 shooting death of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins on the set of the film "Rust" have been dropped. 
• It would have set a terrible precedent if actors were responsible for the myriad dangers that can happen on a film set.
• I’m sure that as a producer of the film, though, he will be very liable in the resulting civil suit.
• Have you used Facebook at any point from May 24, 2007, to Dec. 22, 2022? If so, you may be owed some sweet-ass cash!
• It’s part of a $725 million settlement, reached in December, in a lawsuit that alleged the social media company shared users’ data without their consent. Hahahaha, really? I had no idea, said no one ever.
• Anyway, if you want to apply for the class-action claim, hit me up and I’ll send you a link.
• From the Sports Desk… it’s official; the Oakland A’s are moving to Vegas. The MLB team has been situated in the East Bay since 1968.
• But as of yesterday, the Athletics have signed a binding agreement to purchase land near the Las Vegas Strip, where they intend to construct a major league ballpark. The agreement is for a 49-acre site owned by Red Rock Resorts, and the plan includes a $1.5 billion, 35,000-seat stadium with a partially retractable roof. Other developments, including restaurants and an amphitheater, are being discussed.
• You kinda knew this was going to happen. Las Vegas has been one of the fastest growing populaces in the USA over the past 20+ years, and they already have an NFL team (the Raiders) and an NHL team (the Golden Knights). And they have lots and lots of money, which Oakland does not.
• Poor Oakland. Even their NBA team, the Golden State Warriors, moved back across the bay to SF in 2019.
• Speaking of the Dubs, they won their playoff game last night and trail the Kings 2-1. The Suns are beating the Clippers 2-1. Philadelphia is up 3-0 over Brooklyn. 

• Today in history… the traditional mythological date of Romulus founding Rome (753 BC). Henry VIII ascends the throne of England on the death of his father, Henry VII (1509). The city of Rattanakosin, now known internationally as Bangkok, is founded on the eastern bank of the Chao Phraya River by King Buddha Yodfa Chulaloke (1782). John Adams is sworn in as 1st US Vice President — nine days before George Washington (1789). Republic of Texas forces under Sam Houston defeat troops under Mexican General Antonio López de Santa Anna (1836). Brasília, Brazil's capital, is officially inaugurated (1960). The Seattle World's Fair opens, the first World's Fair in the United States since World War II (1962). A Transit-5bn satellite fails to reach orbit after launch; as it re-enters the atmosphere, 2.1 pounds of radioactive plutonium in its power source is widely dispersed (1964). Astronauts John Young and Charles Duke fly Apollo 16's Apollo Lunar Module to the Moon's surface, the fifth NASA Apollo Program crewed lunar landing (1972). Annie opens on Broadway (1977). In Beijing, around 100,000 students gather in Tiananmen Square to commemorate Chinese reform leader Hu Yaobang (1989). The city of Flint, Michigan switches its water source to the Flint River, beginning the ongoing Flint water crisis (2014). 
• April 21 is the birthday of painter Ludovico Carracci (1555), novelist Charlotte Brontë (1816), environmentalist John Muir (1838), economist/sociologist Max Weber (1864), actor Anthony Quinn (1915), UK queen Elizabeth II (1926), actress/comedian Elaine May (1932), actor Charles Grodin (1935), singer-songwriter Iggy Pop (1947), actress/singer Patti LuPone (1949), actor Tony Danza (1951), actress Andie MacDowell (1958), singer-songwriter Robert Smith (1959), actor James McAvoy (1979), NFL player/announcer Tony Romo (1980), and MLB player Joc Pederson (1992).

Well, that was a lot of news. I can’t wait to have sushi today for lunch. I missed it last week due to being in Anaheim. Don’t have sushi in Anaheim. Enjoy your day.