Random News: October 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 October 21, 2023, and it’s a Saturday. I’m in a blue bathrobe and I would like to tell you things.

• Yesterday was a dizzying whirlwind of crazy good news, much of it happening nearly simultaneously, so let me break it down for you in chronological order if I can.
• When we left off yesterday morning, it was 7:58am PT and I was heading downstairs to work out as I do each weekday at that exact time. The third vote to try and elect Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) as Speaker of the House was just starting.
• I admit, I sort of hurried through my yoga, strength training, and cardio so I could get my ass back upstairs and see how the vote was going. When I did, they were only halfway through the alphabetical list of Reps and Jordan had already lost far more than the requisite Republican votes it would have taken to give him the role (which in this razor-thin R-led House is four).
• I cackled as the vote continued. Jordan had lost 20 Republican votes on the first ballot Tuesday, lost 22 on the second vote Wednesday, and at one point it looked like he’d given up. Nevertheless, they held a third ballot yesterday morning… and Jordan lost 25 Republicans. The number kept getting worse for him.
• The final tally… out of 429 Reps voting, Democrat Hakeem Jeffries (R-NY) got 210 votes, Jim Jordan got just 194 votes, and 25 others voted for a range of other names, spit between Scalise (8), McHenry (6), Zeldin (4), McCarthy (2), Donalds (2), Emmer (1), Garcia (1), Westerman (1), and two Reps who just didn’t bother voting at all.
• Fun Fact: Jim Jordan's vote total yesterday is the lowest percentage of votes ever received by a speaker nominee from the majority party since 1859… right before the Civil War.
• Hmm.
• Okay, so while I was still bubbling with schadenfreude about Jordan’s defeat, another news story broke. It was about El Dumpo lawyer Kenneth Chesebro, who had been a co-defendant of Dumpy in the Fulton County, GA election interference RICO trial.
• Chesebro had stated to the media earlier that very morning that there would be no plea deal and he would march in and prove his innocence on the first day of his trial.
• Except that’s not what happened. An hour later, Chesebro pleaded guilty in exchange for a greatly reduced sentence.
• If you need a refresher, Chesebro is the guy who helped orchestrate Dumpster’s 2020 fake electors plot. This is a massive blow to Don the Con. 
• As part of his plea deal, Chesebro admitted that he conspired to put forward fake GOP electors in Georgia with Trump and former Trump lawyers Rudy Giuliani and John Eastman. Giuliani and Eastman have both pleaded not guilty in the Georgia case, and now face the prospect of Chesebro taking the witness stand against them.
• And this came one day after former Trump campaign lawyer Sidney “The Kraken” Powell also pleaded guilty and agreed to cooperate with prosecutors.
• In exchange for his testimony against Trump, Chesebro got five years of probation, paid $5,000 in restitution, must write an apology letter to the citizens of Georgia, and, of course, testify truthfully at future court proceedings.
• Having these two flip puts Trump into a grave legal threat. Chesebro directly implicated Trump in a criminal conspiracy, and his plea establishes for the first time that the fake electors plot was illegal.
• Chesebro has now admitted that the entire purpose of the fake electors conspiracy was to “disrupt and delay the joint session of Congress on January 6, 2021,” which is a key element of the federal charges Trump is facing.
• Holy shit.
• So by this point yesterday, it was still only 9:30am, and I had a meeting to attend and work to do. By the time I wrapped that up, the House Republicans had finished their own meeting.
• To figure out what their next steps were, they held a secret ballot, behind closed doors, seeing who would still support Jordan in a fourth vote… and Jordan lost 112-86. To be clear, he needs 217 votes, and could barely get half that amount within his own party.
• Immediately after, Jordan withdrew his name from consideration. Now the Republicans were back to square one. Kevin McCarthy hadn’t been conservative enough for eight members of the furthest right wing of the House who took him out; the election-denying, ineffective Jordan couldn’t get the support among the somewhat sane members of his party.
• What’s important to understand is that Jordan’s loss is a big rebuke of Trump and the MAGA movement that’s threatened the country for far too long. Jordan was their hand-picked guy who would use all the dirty tricks to try and prevent Trump from facing the repercussions of his illegal actions.
• Now? Not.
• As soon as Jordan was officially kicked out of the running, a number of other Republicans threw their hats in the ring. Those include House Majority Whip Tom Emmer (R-MN), Rep. Kevin Hern (R-OK), House Republican Conference Vice Chairman Mike Johnson (R-LA), Rep. Jodey Arrington (R-TX), Rep. Byron Donalds (R-FL), Rep. Jack Bergman (R-MI), Rep. Austin Scott (R-GA), Rep. Pete Sessions (R-TX), and Rep. Dan Meuser (R-PA).
• It’s not clear that any of these people can be elected by the current chaos-driven House.
• We’ve had no Speaker, the person second in line to the President, for 18 days. The House Republicans couldn’t handle any more of this, and split for the weekend.
• Okay, so all that had happened well before lunchtime out here in the West. But there was still another event that occurred before I could take my first bite of an amberjack roll at Ichiriki, and that was El Dumpo barely managing to keep himself out of actual jail.
• Don the Con was fined $5,000 by a New York judge yesterday for violating a gag order not to speak about any members of the court staff – and was warned twice about possible imprisonment.
• Back on October 3, Judge Arthur Engoron issued a partial gag order on all parties not to speak about any members of the court staff after Dump Ass made a post attacking Engoron’s clerk. The post claimed she was a “girlfriend” to Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer.
• The post was removed from Truth Social right after the gag order was issued, but it was not erased from Trump’s campaign website.
• Dumpy’s team claimed it was an innocent, inadvertent mistake.
• Engoron was pretty clear. “Make no mistake: future violations, whether intentional or unintentional, will subject the violator to far more severe sanctions, which may include, but are not limited to, steeper finanicial penalties, holding Donald Trump in contempt of court, and possibly imprisoning him.”
• Delicious. And before you start saying, “It’s only $5,000, that’s nothing!”, keep in mind that this is normal in courts, and that the judge is serious when he says that another infraction will result in more serious penalties.
• Let’s move over to some world news.
• About 100,000 people joined a pro-Palestinian demonstration in central London today. Protests have erupted globally this week, particularly around the Arab world, with thousands of demonstrators taking the streets in Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Iraq, Yemen and the West Bank to protest Israel’s actions in its war on Hamas.
• Also today, the Rafah crossing briefly opened to allow the first convoy of aid trucks to enter the besieged Gaza Strip from Egypt. Rights groups welcomed the short reopening, but stressed that more aid is desperately needed in the Palestinian enclave, where conditions continue to deteriorate.
• As I’ve said many times before, you can be supportive of Israel’s right to defend itself against horrific terrorist attacks, and be sympathetic toward the plight of the Palestine people who have nothing to do with Hamas or other terrorist group.
• The problem is, we’re existed so long in a polarized world that people now think you have to choose a side and blindly follow them at all costs.
• And you should note that while the US is an ally of Israel and are supporting them against terrorist actions with both diplomatic and military action, we are also lending humanitarian aid to the people of Palestine.
• There’s no clear cut good guy or bad guy in this situation. Except the terrorists, who are always bad.
• Moving on.
• Yesterday, the Supreme Court sided with the Biden administration and agreed to decide a dispute about whether officials in the White House and federal agencies violated the First Amendment when they leaned on social media companies to suppress content about the election and COVID-19.
• The Supreme Court's move allows the Biden administration to continue to interact with social media platforms such as Facebook and X to request that they remove disinformation.
• Good news for now, but trust me, there will be more to come on that matter. Three members of the court's conservative wing − Alito, Thomas and Gorsuch, unsurprisingly − said they would have sided with the states and social media users who filed the lawsuit.
• The court is expected to decide the case by the end of this term, which runs through June.
• In more SCOTUS news, yesterday the Supreme Court kept a Missouri law on hold that bars police from enforcing federal gun laws, rejecting an emergency appeal from the state. The law would impose a fine of $50,000 on an officer who knowingly enforces federal gun laws that don’t match up with state restrictions.
• Missouri had wanted the law to be in effect while the court fight plays out. Justice Clarence Thomas was the only member of the court to side with Missouri, because of course he was.
• Fuck off, Missouri. You don’t get to have your own laws that are conflicting with the rest of the country.
• And now, The Weather: “Drawbridge” by Helena Deland
• Let’s do a chart. It’s October 1977. I’m eight years old. Things seem pretty good, but that’s because I’m eight and don’t know about anything beyond my tiny worldview. I will say, the music itself holds up.
• 1. Rumours (Fleetwood Mac). 2. Simple Dreams (Linda Ronstadt). 3. Aja (Steely Dan). 4. Foreigner (Foreigner). 5. Love You Live (The Rolling Stones). 6. Anytime...anywhere (Rita Coolidge). 7. Shaun Cassidy (Shaun Cassidy). 8. Chicago XI (Chicago). 9. I Robot (The Alan Parsons Project). 10. Livin' On The Fault Line (The Doobie Brothers). 11. Moody Blue (Elvis Presley). 12. Foghat Live (Foghat). 13. Barry White Sings For Someone You Love (Barry White). 14. Rose Royce II/In Full Bloom (Rose Royce). 15. Star Wars (Soundtrack). 16. Too Hot To Handle (Heatwave). 17. Star Wars & Other Galactic Funk (Meco). 18. Elvis In Concert (Elvis Presley). 19. I Remember Yesterday (Donna Summer). 20. Commodores (Commodores)
• From the Sports Desk… things have been crazy in MLB playoffs. In the ALCS, the Houston Astros had been down 2-0 and then won three straight. They now lead 3-2 and one more win over the Texas Rangers will put them into the World Series. Game 6 is tomorrow.
• Similarly in the NLCS, the Phillies were up two-zip over the D-Backs, but now Arizona has clawed back with two straight wins, leaving that series knotted up at 2-2. Game 5 is today.
• Over in the NFL, here’s who’s leading each conference here at week 7.
• AFC: Chiefs (5-1), Dolphins (5-1), Jaguars (5-2), Ravens (4-2), Bills (4-2).
• NFC: 49ers (5-1), Eagles (5-1), Lions (5-1), Cowboys (4-2), Buccaneers (3-2).
• Today in history… Ferdinand Magellan discovers a strait now known as the Strait of Magellan (1520). In Boston Harbor, the 44-gun United States Navy frigate USS Constitution is launched (1797). The Medicine Lodge Treaty is signed by southern Great Plains Indian leaders (1867). Thomas Edison applies for a patent for his design for an incandescent light bulb (1879). President Warren G. Harding delivers the first speech by a sitting U.S. president against lynching in the Deep South (1921). The first edition of the Ernest Hemingway novel For Whom the Bell Tolls is published (1940). The city of Aachen falls to American forces after three weeks of fighting, the first German city to fall to the Allies in WWII (1944). In New York City, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum opens to the public (1959). The meter is defined as the distance light travels in a vacuum in 1/299,792,458 of a second (1983). Images of the dwarf planet Eris are taken and subsequently used in documenting its discovery (2005). A shooting occurs on the set of the film Rust, in which actor Alec Baldwin discharged a prop weapon which had been loaded, killing the director of photography, Halyna Hutchins, and injuring director Joel Souza (2021).
• October 21 is the birthday of poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772), chemist/dynamite inventor Alfred Nobel (1833), music producer Owen Bradley (1915), trumpeter/composer Dizzy Gillespie (1917), MLB player/manager Whitey Ford (1928), author Ursula K. Le Guin (1929), keyboardist/producer Manfred Mann (1940), guitarist/songwriter Steve Cropper (1941), singer-songwriter/guitarist Elvin Bishop (1942), judge Judy Sheindlin (1942), singer-songwriter Lux Interior (1946), astronaut Ronald McNair (1950), singer-songwriter/keyboardist Brent Mydland (1952), guitarist/songwriter Charlotte Caffey (1953), actress Carrie Fisher (1956), singer-songwriter/guitarist Steve Lukather (1957), singer-songwriter/bass player Nick Oliveri (1971), ummm… Kim Kardashian (1980), MLB player Zack Greinke (1983), NBA player Ricky Rubio (1990), and rapper/singer/songwriter Doja Cat (1995).

Alrighty. I have a lot of shit going on. Work shit, health shit, family shit, life shit. Most of us do. One thing I’ve learned is to appreciate any moment of peace when things are running relatively smoothly. You know if won’t last, but you need to enjoy the rare moments when things are going okay. Enjoy your day.