Random News: May 30, 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.

---

Good morning. It’s May 30, 2024, and it’s a Thursday for some reason. I had one of those days yesterday where I found myself still responding to work emails after 9pm, which shouldn’t be how we lead our lives and yet here we are. Hopefully things are slightly more chill today. Let’s do some news.

• The jury in the Donnie Dump criminal hush money trial did not reach a verdict in their first day of deliberation yesterday.
• It would have been weird (and possibly problematic) if they had.
• One thing you may not be considering as you ponder how long it will take: there are 34 separate felony charges.
• Example: Count 1 says, “The defendant, in the County of New York and elsewhere, on or about February 14, 2017, with intent to defraud and intent to commit another crime and aid and conceal the commission thereof, made and caused a false entry in the business records of an enterprise, to wit, an invoice from Michael Cohen dated February 14, 2017, marked as a record of the Donald J. Trump Revocable Trust, and kept and maintained by the Trump Organization.”
• And Count 2 says, “The defendant, in the County of New York and elsewhere, on or about February 14, 2017, with intent to defraud and intent to commit another crime and aid and conceal the commission thereof, made and caused a false entry in the business records of an enterprise, to wit, an entry in the Detail General Ledger for the Donald J. Trump Revocable Trust, bearing voucher number 842457, and kept and maintained by the Trump Organization.”
• You can’t just make a sweeping judgement that applies to all of them. You have to consider each one individually and come to a verdict on each discrete count.
• If they’d come back five minutes later (or maybe even five hours later) with a guilty or innocent verdict, it would have been immediately brought into question whether or not they actually considered the details in each of the 34 counts.
• So their deliberations are continuing today. Something I posted yesterday on Threads is probably applicable as a reminder here as well.
• Even if they convict his sorry ass on all 34 felony counts (and they should and I hope they do), it's still very unlikely he'd ever see the inside of a jail cell.
• But not because he’s Donald Trump or any other entitled prick. For a person with no criminal history, even being guilty of multiple Class E felonies likely means a sentence of probation, not jail time.
• And as I say here over and over again, the courts will never save you from this piece of shit; you will save yourself with your vote in November.
• Jury deliberations are continuing this morning. The most recent update is that the jury had Judge Merchan re-read parts of his instructions to them a few minutes ago.
• Moving on.
• As if Nikki Haley couldn’t be any more disappointing, she managed to step up her position on the Asshole List by writing “Finish them” on an artillery shell in Israel this week.
• I assume she’s referring to the compete annihilation of the Palestinian people, something that most Republicans seem to fully support.
• Danny Danon, Israel’s former ambassador to the United Nations and a member of the Israeli Parliament, shared a photo on social media on Tuesday showing Haley signing the shell.
• This was on a visit that came just days after Israel drew international condemnation for a strike that killed dozens of Gazan civilians in a camp for displaced Palestinians.
• Nikki Haley is a disgusting scummy human being.
• While we’re covering the humanitarian disaster in Gaza…
• The U.S. military-built pier that was intended to delivery at least some relief to the region  was broken apart by strong winds and heavy seas just over a week after it became operational.
• It’s safe to say it hasn’t lived up to its initial billing or its $320 million price tag.
• However, they’re not giving up. The steel causeway connected to the beach in Gaza and the floating pier are being repaired and reassembled at a port in southern Israel, then will be reinstalled and working again next week.
• Even when the pier is in place, the Israeli offensive in Rafah has made it nearly impossible to get aid into the region by land routes.
• Sigh.
• And in more related news, yesterday Brazil withdrew its ambassador to Israel with tensions between the two countries over the war in Gaza. Israel continues to make itself more and more isolated in the world.
• Moving on.
• Samuel Alito is rejecting calls to step aside from Supreme Court cases involving El Dumpo and his brigade of January 6 insurrectionists, saying his wife hoisted the two controversial flags that flew above their homes.
• In letters to members of Congress, Alito said his wife, Martha-Ann, was responsible for flying both an upside-down flag over their home in 2021 and an “Appeal to Heaven” flag at their New Jersey beach house last year. Both flags were like those carried by the piece of shit MAGA assholes who violently stormed the Capitol in January 2021 while echoing Trump’s false claims of election fraud.
• Alito says, “I am confident that a reasonable person who is not motivated by political or ideological considerations or a desire to affect the outcome of Supreme Court cases would conclude that the events ... do not meet the applicable standard for recusal. I am therefore required to reject your request.”
• Supreme Court justices decide for themselves whether to sit out a case. The only potential consequence for refusing to step aside is impeachment by the House of Representatives and removal from office by the Senate. That has never happened in American history.
• So, that’s it, then, I guess.
• Let’s do some good news before I throw up.
• Federal investigators took down one of the world's largest malicious botnets, one that helped generate tens of thousands of fraudulent transactions that cost victims billions — including many related to COVID relief funding.
• Fuck those bots.
• They also arrested the botnet's administrator, YunHe Wang, a Chinese national. He's been accused of orchestrating an international plot to deploy malware and surreptitiously sell access to the infected computers' IP addresses.
• Wang is charged with leading an operation — known as the 911 S5 Botnet —  that deployed 19 million compromised IP addresses in over 190 countries, using them as for carrying out crimes such as bomb threats, financial fraud, identity theft, child exploitation, initial access brokering, and many other computer crimes.
• That rat fucker already purchased $30 million in property in the U.S., St. Kitts and Nevis, China, Singapore, Thailand, and the United Arab Emirates, and paid over $4 million for luxury items including a BMW, Rolls Royce and several watches. 
• And now, The Weather: “Somber The Drums” by DIIV
• Hurricane season officially starts this coming Saturday, June 1. It might be a good weekend for you Easter Coasters, Floridians, and Gulf Coast people to put together some kind of plan in case you suddenly find yourself in 150mph winds.
• Just a thought. Do what you want.
• From the sort-of Sports Desk… yesterday, prosecutors dropped criminal charges against Scottie Scheffler, less than two weeks after the world's top golfer was arrested outside the PGA Championship in Louisville, KY.
• He’d been charged with second-degree assault of a police officer, third-degree criminal mischief, reckless driving and disregarding signals from officers directing traffic when he was arrested outside Louisville's Valhalla Golf Club, which was hosting the tournament.
• Jefferson County Attorney Mike O'Connell said his office couldn't move forward with the charges based on the evidence in the case.
• Not that it matters, but I agree. Everything I saw looked like complete overreactive bullshit by the cops involved.
• In actual Sports Desk news, tonight is Game 5 in the Western Conference Finals between the Dallas Mavericks and Minnesota Timberwolves. Dallas leads the series 3-1 and can punch a ticket to the finals with a win.
• In the NHL’s Stanley Cup playoffs, the New York Rangers and Florida Panthers are locked up 2-2 in the East, while the Dallas Stars and Edmonton Oilers are also tied at 2-2. Exciting times for hockey fans!
• Today in history… Beginning of the Peasants' Revolt in England (1381). In Rouen, France, the 19-year-old Joan of Arc is burned at the stake by an English-dominated tribunal (1431). Johann Sebastian Bach assumed the office of Thomaskantor in Leipzig, presenting his first new cantata, ‘Die Elenden sollen essen, BWV 75’ (1723). The Kansas–Nebraska Act becomes law establishing the U.S. territories of Kansas and Nebraska (1854). Decoration Day — the predecessor of the modern "Memorial Day” — is observed in the United States for the first time (1868). At the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, the first Indianapolis 500 ends with Ray Harroun in his Marmon Wasp becoming the first winner of the 500-mile auto race (1911). The Lincoln Memorial is dedicated in Washington, D.C. (1922). Chicago police shoot and kill ten labor demonstrators (1937). Mariner 9 is launched to map 70% of the surface, and to study temporal changes in the atmosphere and surface, of Mars (1971). Spain joins NATO (1982). Nigeria passes a law banning same-sex marriage (2013).
• May 30 is the birthday of mathematician Grace Andrews (1869), film director Howard Hawks (1896), actor Stepin Fetchit (1902), voice actor Mel Blanc (1908), clarinetist/bandleader Benny Goodman (1909), NFL player Gale Sayers (1943), actor Colm Meany (1953), drummer Topper Headon (1955), actor Ted McGinley (1958), singer-songwriter Wynona Judd (1964), songwriter/guitarist Tom Morello (1964), singer-songwriter Stephen Malkmus (1966), singer-songwriter Idina Menzel (1971), MLB player Manny Ramirez (1972), and singer CeeLo Green (1975).

I’m going to be glad when this Dump verdict is in. These past couple of mornings, I’ve had to rush through these news tidbits in the event that the jury came back with a verdict, thereby rendering everything I wrote to be moot. But as I said earlier (and many times before): guilty or innocent, there’s nothing you can do personally to save the world from this fucking fascist asshole than to vote and to encourage every single person in your life to also vote. That’s what matters. Enjoy your day.