Random News: August 27, 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 August 27, 2023, and it’s a Sunday. I’m up and about, enjoying my coffee, and it’s time to see what’s going on in the world…

• I usually don’t open with this… it’s too depressing. But Sunday is Gunday here at Zak’s Random News, and this one is a doozy. Americans really got their Second Amendment on this weekend, and the ammosexuals are loving all the death and destruction… it’s their favorite thing.
• Four dead including the shooter at a Dollar General in Jacksonville. A teenager killed and four others injured at a high school football game in Choctaw, OK. One dead, six injured in Louisville. At least seven wounded in a shooting at a parade in Boston. One dead, one injured in Philadelphia. Four dead in Joppatowne, MD. Five injured in an apartment complex in Pasadena, CA. Five shot in Orem, UT. Two wounded at the White Sox game in Chicago. A woman critically injured in a shooting in Tallahassee, FL. A woman killed in Papillion, NE. A road rage shooting in Denver. A 14-year-old shot in Rochester. A woman shot a man to break up a fight in a sports bar in San Antonio. A South Carolina student shot and killed for mistakenly entering the wrong home on a street where he lived.
• And, like I often mention, those are just the ones I noticed in a quick scroll through the news. There are always more.
• Let’s back up a sec. The shooting in Jacksonville was particularly purposeful and heinous. It was a racially motivated attack. The shooter, a white man in his 20s, shot and killed himself after the attack. He’d left behind three manifestos outlining his disgusting ideology of hate and his motive in the attack.
• It seems like he’s actually wanted to target Edward Waters University, a historically Black school. He was turned away from its campus after refusing to identify himself. This piece of shit wore both a tactical vest and mask during the attack. He was armed with an AR-15 rifle and a Glock handgun. He’d painted swastikas on the rifle.
• There have been at least 470 mass shootings in the United States so far in 2023; it’s only the 239th day of the year. A mass shooting is defined by four or more people being injured and/or killed by gunfire, not including the shooter. We are likely on track for a record number of shootings in 2023, with one of the causes being the purposeful loosening of sensible gun laws in states like Florida.
• I’ll remind you that guns are the #1 killer of children in the USA… above car accidents, above cancer, above any other cause of death. When you vote for candidates who are against sensible gun control measures, you are complicit in the deaths of those children, and they might end up being your own kids, grandkids, neighbors, nieces and nephews.
• Moving on…
• And now, The Weather: “Skin” by Best Frenz
• A state of emergency has been issued in 33 counties along Florida's Gulf Coast in preparation for Tropical Storm Idalia. Stay safe, friends.
• Some sort-of good news: 100 of the remaining 388 people on the missing list form the Maui wildfires have reported themselves safe. That still leaves nearly 300 more people missing. Hoping the best.
• From the Sports Desk… congratulations to the local boys from El Segundo, CA, a city just a few miles up the road from me here in Redondo Beach. They clinched a spot in the Little League World Series championship game yesterday with a 6-1 win over the team from Needville, TX.
• The LLWS consists of two brackets; an international bracket and a United States bracket. El Segundo will face a team from Willemstad, Curaçao. That final game is happening right now.
• Also from the Sports Desk, American Chase Ealey successfully defended her women's shot put crown at the World Athletics Championships yesterday, winning her second successive gold medal. Ealey won with a 20.43 meter throw, while Canada's Sarah Mitton took the silver with 20.08.
• And in final sports news, again from the World Athletics Championships in Budapest, both the American men’s and women’s teams got gold in the 4x100 relay. Both teams were anchored by the respective fastest man and woman on the planet: Noah Lyles for the guys, and Sha’Carri Richardson for the ladies. Well done!
• Today in history… the Visigoths stop sacking Rome after three days (410). George Washington gets his ass kicked by British forces under William Howe at the Battle of Long Island in what is now Brooklyn, NY (1776). Napoleon defeats a bigger army of Austrians, Russians, and Prussians at the Battle of Dresden (1813). Cruse oil is discovered in Titusville, PA, leading to the world's first commercially successful oil well (1859). Krakatoa is almost completely destroyed in four explosions during a volcanic eruption (1883). The UK and Zanzibar fight the world’s shortest war, from 9:02am to 9:40am (1896). In the Battle of Ambos Nogales, the US takes on Mexico in the only battle of WWI fought on American soil (1918). The Kellogg–Briand Pact outlawing war is signed by fifteen nations… lol (1928). First flight of the Heinkel He 178, the world's first jet aircraft (1939). The first edition of the Guinness Book of Records is published (1955). An attempted coup d'état fails in the African nation of Chad (1971). Mars makes its closest approach to Earth in nearly 60,000 years (2003).
• August 27 is the birthday of shōgun Ashikaga Yoshikazu (1407), philosopher Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770), vice president Hannibal Hamlin (1809), vice president Charles G. Dawes (1865), serial killer Ed Gein (1906), president Lyndon B. Johnson (1908), actress Martha Raye (1916), MLB player Pee Wee Butts (1919), computer scientist Kristen Nygaard (1926), writer Ira Levin (1929), pianist/composer Alice Coltrane (1937), guitarist/composer Sonny Sharrock (1940), keyboardist/songwriter Daryl “Captain” Dragon (1942), actress Tuesday Weld (1943), actress Barbara Bach (1947), actor Paul Reubens (1952), guitarist/composer Alex Lifeson (1953), fashion designed Tom Ford (1961), NHL player Adam Oates (1962), dog trainer Cesar Millan (1969), actor Aaron Paul (1979), and NFL player Darren McFadden (1987).

Time to shower and dress and do various things. Enjoy your day.