Random News: May 5, 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 May 5, 2023, and if you can believe it, it’s a Friday once again! What follows are various things I’ve seen or thought that pertain to the present moment for the most part…

• Happy Cinco de Mayo, the most sacred and important of all of Mexico’s holidays.
• Eso no es cierto en absoluto. El Cinco de Mayo conmemora el aniversario de la victoria de México sobre el Segundo Imperio Francés en la Batalla de Puebla en 1862. No es el Día de la Independencia de México. Se hizo popular fuera de California a partir de la década de 1980 debido a las campañas publicitarias de las empresas de cerveza, vino y tequila.
• So anyway, happy Cinco de Mayo to all.
• Regardless of its misunderstood meaning and mostly American observance, I’m always cool with celebrating the people and culture of our friends south of the border.
• Growing up here in Southern California, I’ve been fortunate to be surrounded by various aspects of Mexican influence and have many, many friends of Mexican descent. I’m better off for it.
• And now, the news…
• Enrique Tarrio, the one-time president of the far-right Proud Boys group, and three of his henchmen were convicted of numerous felonies yesterday including seditious conspiracy for their roles in the Jan. 6, 2021 failed coup attempt.
• Tarrio, along with Ethan Nordean, Zachary Rehl, and Joseph Biggs were found guilty of conspiring to prevent the peaceful transfer of power from Donald Trump to Joe Biden and using force and prior planning to hinder the 2020 presidential election certification.
• A fifth defendant, Dominic Pezzola, was found not guilty of seditious conspiracy. Unlike the other defendants in this trial, Pezzola is not alleged to have a leadership position in the organization and was inactive in Proud Boys group chats.
• All five defendants were found guilty of other charges related to January 6, including obstruction of an official proceeding; conspiracy to prevent an officer from discharging any duties; obstruction of law enforcement during civil disorder; and destruction of government property and aiding and abetting.
• They all face at least one charge that carries a 20-year maximum prison sentence. A sentencing date has not yet been scheduled, but judge Timothy Kelly said it is likely to happen in late July.
• What is especially significant about the conviction of Tarrio is that he was not in Washington, D.C. on January 6. According to the indictment, he helped to create a command structure within the Proud Boys in the lead up to January 6.
• That means that other people who facilitated the failed coup attempt but were not personally amidst the insurrectionists could still face similar charges.
• Who might that be? All of them. Just all of them.
• Moving on…
• Yesterday, North Carolina’s Republican-controlled state Senate passed legislation that would ban most abortions after 12 weeks.
• Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper has vowed to veto the bill, but the GOP supermajority in the legislature can override him. The measure passed both chambers on party-line votes less than 48 hours after being introduced. The state House had advanced the bill on Wednesday after it was introduced Tuesday night.
• North Carolina had previously been a haven for women seeking abortion care as Southern states tightened restrictions after the Supreme Court took away the Roe v Wade rights for women to have bodily autonomy last June.
• In March, the NC state legislature also overrode the governor’s veto on a bill that now makes it legal to purchase a gun without a permit in the state.
• Sad. I have plenty of friends in that lovely state.
• Man, stories from the South aren’t making me happy today.
• Yesterday morning, a 26-year-old gunman in a small south Georgia town killed two relatives, a fast food employee and then himself. The man shot his 50-year-old mother and 74-year-old grandmother before going to a local McDonald's halfway across town and killing a female assistant manager in Moultrie, GA.
• Sigh.
• Might as well get Florida out of the way.
• A batch of bills are heading for GOP Gov. Ron DeSantis’s signature to become law in that state. They will each alter the lives of transgender people in Florida – including their access to health care and everyday amenities.
• The first bill prohibits transgender children from receiving gender-affirming treatments. A court  in Florida can intervene to remove a child from their home if they receive any gender-affirming treatments or procedures.
• Another bill restricts teachers, faculty and students from using the pronouns of their choice in public schools. That bill declares that it must be the policy of all schools that “a person’s sex is an immutable biological trait” and “it is false” to use a pronoun other than the sex on a person’s birth certificate.
• The third bill prohibits transgender people from using a bathroom or changing room that matches their gender identity.
• So, again, my deep condolences to any sane people stuck in these miserable, evil, backwards places.
• Let’s move on.
• President Biden and Vice President Harris met with the CEOs of Google, Microsoft, Anthropic and OpenAI to have a chat about potential new AI regulations and legislation.
• Harris said that she and Biden are committed to “doing our part” to ensure people safely benefit from AI. She also warned that companies have a “ethical, moral and legal responsibility” to guarantee their products are safe and secure.
• Hahahahahahahahaha. Yes, because corporate America has also gone the route that is ethical, moral, and legally responsible. Jesus.
• Biden told the executives that his visit showed how the administration views AI as “really, really important.”
• That’s nice, Joe. Thanks for that.
• AI is super high on my personal list of real things that are way likely to kill us all. Not in some stupid Terminator-inspired fantasy way, but in ways that are much more insidious and horrifying. If it’s not contained and controlled and locked down now, we’re fucked.
• Just saying.
• And now, The Weather: “Scaredy’s World” by Lomelda
• We had two very small (EF0) tornados hit the Los Angeles area yesterday, and these weren’t very far from here at all, in the Carson/Campton area. Weird.
• No one hurt, some minor damage to structures and cars.
• Let’s spin the wheel and give some news about one of the many, many criminal and civil cases being faced by the former president. 
• Ah, here we go.
• Things haven’t gone well in his criminal hush money case. His lawyers are now seeking to move his criminal case from New York state court to federal court, they said yesterday.
• They argue the ex-president can’t be tried in state court because the alleged conduct occurred while he was in office.
• Hahahahahahahaha! God, what a loser.
• Just FYI: such requests are almost never, ever granted in criminal cases, although Orange Julius’s request is unprecedented because he’s the first former president ever charged with a crime.
• Moving on…
• Some kinda good news: COVID deaths dropped in 2022. It was only the fourth-leading cause of death last year in the USA, having killed about 245,000 people in 2022, as opposed to the third-leading cause in the two years prior.
• Unintentional injuries moved back to the third leading cause of death, as drug overdoses reached record levels. Heart disease and cancer remained the top two leading causes of death, and rates for both increased in 2022.
• Sigh. Try not to die. Thank you.
• From the Sports Desk… as expected, after shockingly losing game 1 at home, the Golden State Warriors came back and crushed the Los Angeles Lakers 127-100 in game 2 of the Western Conference semifinals in the NBA playoffs last night. Klay Thompson catching fire with eight 3-pointers sort of helped.
• Game 3 of that series is in LA on Saturday night.
• Other NBA standings: Heat/Knicks tied 1-1, 76ers/Celtics tied 1-1, Nuggets lead Suns 2-0.
• In the NHL playoff semifinals, the Florida Panthers are up 2-0 over the Toronto Maple Leafs, the Carolina Hurricanes lead the New Jersey Devils 1-0, the Seattle Kraken and Dallas Stars are tied 1-1, and the Las Vegas Golden Knights lead the Edmonton Oilers 1-0.
• Today in history… Kublai Khan becomes ruler of the Mongol Empire (1260). On his second voyage to the New World, Christopher Columbus sights Jamaica, landing at Discovery Bay and declares Jamaica the property of the Spanish crown (1494). Mary Kies becomes the first woman awarded a U.S. patent, for a technique of weaving straw with silk and thread (1809). Emperor Napoleon dies in exile on the island of Saint Helena in the South Atlantic Ocean (1821). The first edition of The Manchester Guardian, now The Guardian, is published (1821). Troops led by Ignacio Zaragoza halt a French invasion in the Battle of Puebla in Mexico (1862). Workers marching for the eight-hour day in Milwaukee, WI were shot at by Wisconsin National Guardsmen in what became known as the Bay View Massacre (1886). The Music Hall in New York City — later known as Carnegie Hall — has its grand opening and first public performance, with Tchaikovsky as the guest conductor (1891). Cy Young of the Boston Americans throws the first perfect game in the modern era of baseball (1904). Authorities arrest Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti for alleged robbery and murder (1920). A Fu-Go balloon bomb launched by the Japanese Army during WWII kills six people near Bly, OR (1945). The General Treaty, by which France, Britain and the United States recognize the sovereignty of West Germany, comes into effect (1955). Alan Shepard becomes the first American to travel into outer space, on a sub-orbital flight via Project Mercury (1961). Secretariat wins the 1973 Kentucky Derby in 1:59-2⁄5, an as-yet unbeaten record (1973). Start of Congressional televised hearings in the United States of America with the Iran-Contra affair (1987).
• May 5 is the birthday of philosopher Søren Kierkegaard (1813), philosopher/sociologist Karl Marx (1818), hatter John Batterson Stetson (1830), geneticist Helen Redfield (1900), actor Tyrone Power (1914), musician/composer Delia Derbyshire (1937), actor Lance Henriksen (1940), singer-songwriter Tammy Wynette (1942), actor Michael Palin (1943), actor John Rhys-Davies (1944), journalist Kurt Loder (1945), drummer Bill Ward (1948), singer-songwriter/guitarist Jon Butcher (1955), singer-songwriter Ian McCulloch (1959), philanthropist/model Vanessa Bryant (1982), actor Henry Cavill (1983), and singer-songwriter Adele (1988).

I have no special plans for the day despite it being a Friday and Cinco de Mayo. Just work and normal things, and my every-Friday sushi lunch delights. Enjoy your day.