Random News: February 4, 2024

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 February 4, 2024, and it’s a Sunday. We are supposed to get “life threatening” storms and flooding today in the Los Angeles area; I think for most folks, it’s just going to be a rainy day. While we await the deluge and I lounge about in my bathrobe and drink coffee, let’s do some news.

• As we mentioned yesterday, South Carolina held its Democratic presidential primaries yesterday.
• It took all of five minutes after the polls closed to see that President Joe Biden was the overwhelming winner. When the votes were tallied, Biden won a whopping 96.2% of the vote, followed by weirdo Marianne Williamson with 2.1% and Rep. Dean Phillips (D-MN) with 1.7%.
• I had to laugh that Williamson, with her 2,726 votes in SC, beat Phillips with his 2,239 votes. Biden, just to note, received 126,321.
• There is zero doubt… Joe Biden is our candidate for 2024, and we will support him with everything we’ve got.
• Yesterday was supposed to be the culmination of the "Take Our Border Back" convoy that set off from Virginia earlier this week for Eagle Pass, TX, on a mission from God to fight hoards of illegal immigrants whom, they were told, were rampaging over our southern border with Mexico.
• The convoy split to hold three rallies on Saturday, one near Eagle Pass and others in Yuma, AZ and San Ysidro, CA. 
• One of the convoy members, a woman named Misty, made it to a location near Shelby Park, and was surprised by what she saw. "It's not what I expected. But then again, I don't know what I expected. I can tell you it's not as bad as what I thought. So that's kind of eye-opening in itself, too."
• There is no invasion, folks. There are just people trying to create better lives for themselves and their families, very much like the immigrants who came to America from places like Italy and Ireland in the 19th and 20th centuries.
• Reminder: in January, the Supreme Court ruled that federal agents could resume cutting razor wire that Texas installed along the border with Mexico, including in Shelby Park. The razor wire was among a series of aggressive measures, including a floating barrier installed in the Rio Grande near Eagle Pass, that anti-American Governor Greg Abbott has taken at the border in a bid to curb illegal crossings.
• In somewhat related news, a South Dakota tribe has banned Republican Gov. Kristi Noem from the Pine Ridge Reservation after she spoke this week about wanting to send razor wire and security personnel to Texas. Noem also said cartels are infiltrating the state’s reservations.
• “Due to the safety of the Oyate, effective immediately, you are hereby Banished from the homelands of the Oglala Sioux Tribe!”, said their Tribe President in a statement.
• I like that. She should be banned in as many places as possible, if you ask me.
• Moving on.
• It’s Sunday Gunday at Zak’s Random News, where we do a quick scroll through just some of the shootings in the USA over the past two days.
• Two dead, four injured in a shooting in Denver, CO. Two dead in separate shootings in the Southwest Philly and the Frankford neighborhoods of Philadelphia, PA. One dead and two more injured after a shooting in a home in Minneapolis, MN. One dead and two wounded after a shooting at a baby shower in the Fairywood neighborhood of Pittsburgh, PA. One dead and two injured after a shooting in Fort Wayne, IN. One dead, one injured in a targeted drive-by shooting in southwest Houston, TX. One shot dead in a drive-by on the north side of Indianapolis, IN. One shot dead in a parking lot of a Chick-fil-A in Rochester, NY. One shot dead in the Beaumont-Wilshire neighborhood of Portland. OR. One shot dead at his own bakery in Lawrenceville, GA. One shot dead in Ocala, FL. One shot dead in Denton, TX. One shot dead in Beaumont, TX. One shot dead in Bessemer, AL. One shot dead in Anderson, SC. One shot dead on I-95 in Foxboro, MA. Four shot, including two teenagers in Kankakee, IL. Three shot in Davidson County, NC. A 22-year-old shot and in critical condition in a McDonald’s parking lot in Talladega, FL. A woman shot and in critical condition in the Little Village neighborhood of Chicago, IL. One shot and in critical condition after an armed robbery at a gas station in Phoenix, AZ. One shot and in critical condition in Lexington, KY. One shot and in critical condition in Milwaukee, WI. One shot and in critical condition in east Charlotte, NC. One shot in a drive-by in Moore, SC. One shot on I-76 in Philadelphia, PA. One shot in Wake County, NC.
• So, a relatively light weekend of gun violence. Side note: I don’t include law enforcement shootings or suicides or even accidental shootings on this list, or else you’d never be able to scroll to the bottom each week.
• Vote for candidates who support common sense gun regulation. Thank you.
• Let’s move on.
• Wisconsin Democrats are inching closer to overturning Republican-drawn legislative maps that the GOP has used over the past 13 years to grow their majorities and advance their agenda.
• Fuck yeah. Go Wisconsin. You can do this.
• Republicans drew the lines in 2011 and Democratic court challenges have since failed to overturn them, until now. Republican maps adopted in 2022 by the conservative-controlled Wisconsin Supreme Court used the 2011 map as a template and kept largely the same lines in place.
• But their state Supreme Court has now ruled out two plans submitted by Republican lawmakers and a conservative law firm. The Court’s consultants described the Republican plans as "partisan gerrymanders.”
• Ha. Take that, assholes.
• Moving back to the world of the geniuses who are running for the top office in the land…
• On Wednesday, GOP candidate Nikki Haley had said in response to a question about Texans suggesting the state could leave the union, “If Texas decides they want to do that, they can do that. If that whole state says we don’t want to be part of America anymore, I mean, that’s their decision to make.”
• She clarified that remark this morning when asked if states can conceded from the Union.
• “According to the Constitution, they can’t,” she replied.
• Make up your mind, Nikki.
• And now, The Weather: “Old Friends” by J Mascis
• As I mentioned up top, evacuation orders and warnings are in effect for portions of Southern California as we brace for a winter storm that's expected to bring heavy rain and widespread flooding.
• I’m fine and will remain so. The topography of my specific neighborhood in a hilly part of Redondo Beach means that we’re rarely the point where excess water flows or accumulates.
• Got a chart for you. It’s February 1981. I am in seventh grade. I am playing guitar a lot. John Lennon had been murdered in December, the same night as my first public Zak Claxton-type performance, singing and playing guitar at a recital. Songs off his just-released album ‘Double Fantasy’ are all over the charts.
• 1. Celebration (Kool & The Gang). 2. The Tide Is High (Blondie). 3. I Love A Rainy Night (Eddie Rabbitt). 4. 9 To 5 (Dolly Parton). 5. Passion (Rod Stewart). 6. (Just Like) Starting Over (John Lennon). 7. Every Woman In The World (Air Supply). 8. Woman (John Lennon). 9. It's My Turn (Diana Ross). 10. Giving It Up For Your Love (Delbert McClinton). 11. Hey Nineteen (Steely Dan). 12. Same Old Lang Syne (Dan Fogelberg). 13. Keep On Loving You (REO Speedwagon). 14. Miss Sun (Boz Scaggs). 15. Love On The Rocks (Neil Diamond). 16. The Winner Takes It All (ABBA) 17. The Best Of Times (Styx). 18. I Ain't Gonna Stand For It (Stevie Wonder). 19. Together (Tierra). 20. Crying (Don McLean).
• From the Sports Desk… I know this isn’t really sports, but l am still giggling daily about how much Taylor Swift scares the crap out of conservative American men.
• One guy, a major pro-Trump broadcast personality, posted "The NFL is totally RIGGED for the Kansas City Chiefs, Taylor Swift, Mr. Pfizer (Travis Kelce). All to spread DEMOCRAT PROPAGANDA. Calling it now: KC wins, goes to Super Bowl, Swift comes out at the halftime show and 'endorses' Joe Biden with Kelce at midfield. It's all been an op since day one."
• HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA. Jesus.
• Today in history… The coronation of Zhao Kuangyin as Emperor Taizu of Song, initiating the Song dynasty period of China that would last more than three centuries (960). George Washington is unanimously elected as the first President of the United States by the U.S. Electoral College (1789). John Marshall is sworn in as Chief Justice of the United States (1801). The Ohio Legislature authorizes the construction of the Ohio and Erie Canal and the Miami and Erie Canal (1825). Adolf Hitler appoints himself as head of the Armed Forces High Command (1938). The United Service Organization (USO) is created to entertain American troops (1941). The Yalta Conference between the "Big Three" (Churchill, Roosevelt, and Stalin) opens at the Livadia Palace in the Crimea (1945). Lunar Orbiter 3 lifts off from Cape Canaveral's Launch Complex 13 on its mission to identify possible landing sites for the Surveyor and Apollo spacecraft (1967). A coup d'état is led by Hugo Chávez against Venezuelan President Carlos Andrés Pérez (1992). Unarmed West African immigrant Amadou Diallo is shot 41 times by four plainclothes New York City police officers on an unrelated stake-out, inflaming race relations in the city (1999). Facebook, a mainstream online social networking site, is founded by Mark Zuckerberg and Eduardo Saverin (2004). 
• February 4 is the birthday of composer Johann Ludwig Bach (1677), labor organizer Bill Haywood (1869), pilot/isolationist Charles Lindbergh (1902), astronomer Clyde Tombaugh (1906), civil rights activist Rosa Parks (1913), actor Conrad Bain (1923), film director George A. Romero (1940), computer scientist Ken Thompson (1943), politician Dan Quayle (1947), singer-songwriter Alice Cooper (1948), new Zealand prime minister Jenny Shipley (1952), NFL player Lawrence Taylor (1959), playwright Jonathan Larson (1960), attorney/lobbyist Hunter Biden (1970), boxer Oscar De La Hoya (1973), singer-songwriter Natalie Imbruglia (1975), and singer-songwriter Gavin DeGraw (1977).

Time for me to do things other than this. Enjoy your day.