Random News: August 28, 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 28, 2023, and it’s a Monday. I’m sure things have happened, and the more you know, the better decisions you can make and the better your life goes. Let’s do it.

• Let’s start with some important shit… the double threat of Tropical Storm Idalia and Hurricane Franklin. Florida, you folks are experienced with this shit. Do what you have to do to be prepared and survive.
• Moving on.
• Donald John Trump will be arraigned in the Georgia election subversion case at 9.30AM on Wednesday September 6. His 18 co-defendants will be arraigned that same day, each in 15 minute increments. 
• Already this morning, Trump’s lawyers have arrived at federal court in Washington DC for the hearing that will determine when his trial on charges related to trying to overturn the 2020 election and the January 6 insurrection will be held.
• Special counsel Jack Smith’s team has asked that the trial begin in January 2024, while Trump’s attorneys have proposed starting in 2026. Federal judge Tanya Chutkan is presiding over the hearing.
• Meanwhile in Atlanta, Mark Meadows will be in federal court, arguing that his trial on charges of trying to disrupt Joe Biden’s election win in Georgia three years ago should be held there, and not in its current state court venue.
• I’ll let you know how both of those hearings go in tomorrow’s news.
• Moving on.
• 21-year-old Ryan Christopher Palmeter has been identified as the white supremacist gunman who killed three Black people at a Jacksonville Dollar General store Saturday. Investigations show that Palmeter legally purchased the two firearms used in the racially motivated attack.
• Palmeter killed Angela Michelle Carr, 52; Anolt Joseph Laguerre Jr., 19, a Dollar General employee; and Jerrald De’Shaun Gallion, 29, before shooting himself in the head.
• At a vigil for the victims yesterday, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) was loudly booed and hackled. DeSantis, 44, has loosened gun laws in the state and faced criticism from civil rights leaders for targeting what he calls "woke ideology".
• "We must say clearly and forcefully that white supremacy has no place in America.” - President Joe Biden
• Do you know what a drastic difference would happen if gun owners were simply required to carry liability insurance, similar to what all Americans have to do to own and drive a vehicle?
• Moving on…
• You know who we haven’t mentioned much recently? Our US lawmakers. What’s the top thing on their mind right now?
• House Speaker Kevin McCarthy and top Republicans have begun to strategize about how to move forward with an impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden this fall.
• In recent weeks, McCarthy has privately told Republicans he plans to pursue an impeachment inquiry into Biden and hopes to start the process by the end of September.
• These people could be addressing climate change, the economy, the epidemic of gun violence that’s killing our children, securing reproductive rights for women across our country, but… no, that’s what grown up politicians would be doing.
• And now, The Weather: “I Forget” by Jaakko Eino Kalevi
• We’re expecting a bit of a heat wave in many areas of Southern California for the next couple of days… not here at my beloved beach, but most other places will be toasty.
• Also in local (for me) news: I was chilling here in the afternoon yesterday when I heard helicopters and sirens and all kinds of batshit craziness disturbing my peaceful Sunday.
• Turns out the hubbub was about a large disturbance at the Del Amo Fashion Center in Torrance. Video showed hundreds of teens and young adults running around the mall, with multiple fights occurring in groups as they moved around.
• It took several hours for officers from multiple agencies including Torrance PD but also LAPD, LA County Sheriffs, and others to disperse the crowds, as the city issued warnings asking the public to steer clear of the mall. They say there may have been as many as 1,000 juveniles at the mall.
• Witnesses said that some of the fights seemed to have started around the AMC movie theater. Sunday was National Cinema Day and theaters around the country were offering $4 ticket specials.
• Let’s move on.
• Age discrimination may be banned in the workplace but the employers of the US president — the people of the country — aren’t shy about their bias. A recent poll says that 77% of Americans feel Biden is too old to be effective for four more years. Not only do 89% of Republicans say that, so do 69% of Democrats. That view is held across age groups, not just by young people, though older Democrats specifically are more supportive of his 2024 bid.
• Let’s keep in mind, Biden and Trump are just three years apart in age. They would have been in high school at the same time.
• I’ll gladly vote for Biden in 2024, knowing he’s also surrounded by a fantastic team in every position. But my personal preference would also be to have some new blood at the helm. The 2028 election is going to show a whole lot of that.
• Fuck all this news.
• Let’s do some charts. This time, we’re looking at Billboard’s Modern Rock songs from this date in August 1994. I was done with college and was already fully working at the same basic job I do now, 29 years later. I’m a lot better at it now than I was then, and I worry less about what other people think of me, which is a bonus of being old.
• 1. Basket Case (Green Day). 2. Vasoline (Stone Temple Pilots). 3. Einstein On The Beach (Counting Crows). 4. Am I Wrong (Love Spit Love). 5. Come Out And Play (Offspring). 6. All I Wanna Do (Sheryl Crow). 7. Prayer For The Dying (Seal). 8. Undone - The Sweater Song (Weezer). 9. Sometimes Always (The Jesus And Mary Chain). 10. Headache (Frank Black). 11. Far Behind (Candlebox). 12. Black Hole Sun (Soundgarden). 13. Fall Down (Toad The Wet Sprocket). 14. Shrine (The Dambuilders). 15. Fade Into You (Mazzy Star). 16. Stay (I Missed You) (Lisa Loeb & Nine Stories). 17. Saints (The Breeders). 18. Labour of Love (Frente!). 19. Girls & Boys (Blur). 20. You Let Your Heart Go Too Fast (Spin Doctors).
• From the Sports Desk… amazing work by the El Segundo, CA Little League team. They won the Little League World Series championship yesterday over international champs Curaçao by a score of 6-5.
• Watch this space and mark my words… that kid Louis Lappe will 100% be a major league baseball player some seven years from now. I’ll be quoting myself in 2030 or so.
• I played Little League. I was a second baseman because I was small, but I was… slow, and didn’t bat very well.
• Today in history… Fatimah, daughter of the Islamic prophet Muhammad, dies (632). Pedro Menéndez de Avilés founds the oldest continuously European-occupied city in the continental United States near St. Augustine, Florida (1565). William Herschel discovers Saturn’s moon Enceladus (1789). The US takes possession of then-unoccupied Midway Atoll (1867). Caleb Bradham's beverage "Brad's Drink" gets a better brand name, being changed to “Pepsi-Cola" (1898). Italy declares war on Germany in WWI (1914). Toyota Motors becomes an independent company spun off from Toyota Industries (1937). Black teenager Emmett Till is brutally murdered in Mississippi, kicking off the civil rights movement (1955). Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. gives his ‘I Have a Dream’ speech (1963). Cops and protestors clash at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago (1968). 
• August 28 is the birthday of writer Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749), physician George Whipple (1878), conductor Karl Böhm (1894), writer/illustrator Jack Kirby (1917), actor Donald O’Connor (1925), actress Roxie Roker (1929), MLB player/manager Lou Piniella (1943), drummer Danny Seraphine (1948), MLB player Ron Guidry (1950), actor Luis Guzmán (1956), actor Daniel Stern (1957), singer-songwriter Shania Twain (1965), actor Billy Boyd (1968), actor/singer-songwriter Jack Black (1969), actor Jason Priestly (1969), NHL player Pierre Turgeon (1969), singer LeAnn Rimes (1982), and singer-songwriter Florence Welch (1986).

I suppose I’ll wrap it up there. We’ll know a lot more after the results of this morning’s various hearings in various courtrooms that are trying various crimes of that Orange Fool, and I’ll tell you about those tomorrow. Enjoy your day.