Random News: July 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 July 5, 2023, and it’s a Wednesday. I am hoping that you and your friends and neighbors still have all your fingers this morning. Statistically unlike, but let’s do some news regardless…

• Yesterday, a judge prohibited several federal agencies and officials of the Biden administration from working with social media companies about “protected speech”.
• This is bizarre. U.S. District Judge Terry Doughty of Louisiana granted the injunction in response to a 2022 lawsuit brought by attorneys general in Louisiana and Missouri.
• Their lawsuit alleged that the federal government overstepped in its efforts to convince social media companies to address postings that could result in vaccine hesitancy during the COVID-19 pandemic or affect elections.
• \What a fucking load of shit. The people behind this suit include the leaders of far-right groups. It’s like they’re sad everyone didn’t die in the pandemic and now need some way to vent their anger.
• Moving on…
• The creatures who live in the ocean seem angry at us. In addition to the spate of recent orca attacks on boats, there were multiple shark attacks off the shores of Long Island, NY over the past few days,
• Drones spotted some 50 sand sharks that morning near a popular beach park. When the beach reopened, swimmers were advised to stay close to shore.
• Personal note: I got bit by a sand shark once. I still have a little scar on my right hand 40 years later. Guess what? That was my fault. I was in its home, and I stepped on it and then it nipped me and swum off.
• Did it seem warm yesterday to you? Per scientists, it may have been the hottest day on Earth in around 125,000 years. We know it was the hottest day on Earth since at least 1979.
• Why? It’s a dangerous combination of climate change causing global temperatures to soar, the return of the El Niño pattern, and the start of summer in the northern hemisphere.
• Sigh.
• Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Russian forces have placed devices resembling explosives on the roofs of nuclear reactors at the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant.
• "We have information from our intelligence that the Russian military has placed objects similar to explosives on the roof of several power units," Zelenskyy said.
• That’s not good.
• And now, The Weather: “Don't Stop (Keep on Keepin on)” by Lemonade Baby
• From the Sports Desk… today at Wimbledon, I hope that Jordan Thompson of Australia beats Novak Djokovic of Novaccineistan. That won’t happen, but I can always hope.
• Today in history… John Guy sets sail from Bristol with 39 other colonists for Newfoundland (1610). Isaac Newton publishes Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica (1687). Frederick Douglass delivers his "What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July?" speech in Rochester, NY (1852). The United States Secret Service begins operation (1865). The police open fire on striking longshoremen in San Francisco (1934). Spam, the luncheon meat, is introduced into the market by the Hormel Foods Corporation (1937). Micheline Bernardini models the first modern bikini at a swimming pool in Paris (1946). National Health Service Acts create the national public health system in the United Kingdom (1948). The BBC broadcasts its first daily television news bulletin (1954). Elvis Presley records his first single, "That's All Right", at Sun Records in Memphis, TN (1954). The Twenty-sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution, lowering the voting age from 21 to 18 years, is formally certified by President Richard Nixon (1971). Arthur Ashe becomes the first black man to win the Wimbledon singles title (1975). Swedish tennis player Björn Borg wins his fifth Wimbledon final and becomes the first male tennis player to win the championships five times in a row (1980). Jeff Bezos founds Amazon (1994). The Juno space probe arrives at Jupiter and begins a 20-month survey of the planet (2016). 
• July 5 is the birthday of doge of Venice Carlo Contarini (1580), Connecticut colony founder Thomas Hooker (1586), admiral David Farragut (1801), businessman P. T. Barnum (1810), novelist/poet Jean Cocteau (1889), chemist John Howard Northrop (1891), politician Henry Cabot Lodge Jr. (1902), actress Katherine Helmond (1929), singer-songwriter/guitarist Robbie Robertson (1943), singer-songwriter Huey Lewis (1950), cartoonist Bill Watterson (1958), singer-songwriter Marc Cohn (1959), actress Edie Falco (1963), rapper RZA (1969), and soccer player Megan Rapinoe (1985).

It’s back-to-work Wednesday, so I’m going to see what I’m supposed to be doing today and then kinda half-assed do it. I had a terrific live show yesterday in Second Life, and I’ll find some time to write about that as well. Enjoy your day.