Random News: July 7, 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 July 7, 2024, and it’s a Sunday. There’s a certain degree of humidity going on here at the beach that precluded me from lounging about in my robe as I tend to do on weekends, so I’m having my coffee and writing to you having already put on some shorts and a  t-shirt. Feels very formal for a weekend report.

• While we’re wrapping up this long weekend and I have the time to go a little deeper into the important news of the day, I’d promised that we would take a look into what might happen should Joe Biden choose to not be the Democratic nominee for President.
• I’ll preface this highly hypothetical conversation by saying that I do not believe any of the following things will happen.
• I think Joe Biden is and will remain the candidate. And I think he’ll win.
• But as I told you before, I completely understand your feelings about making contingency plans. The question, “But what if…?” is a very normal part of healthy human behavior.
• You don’t want to be unprepared should things change. That’s normal and fine. I get it, I promise.
• So, if the person to go up against Lord Dumpypants isn’t Joe Biden, then who would it be?
• About a dozen names have been tossed around. I’m well aware of all of them and their track records. Many of them probably would make for a good — if not exceptional — President of the USA.
• But I genuinely see only three names that really make sense for now, should it come to that.
• And the one in first place by a mile is Vice President Kamala Harris.
• This is super obvious to me, and I assume you as well. Many would say she’s the only choice to replace Biden, if it came down to that.
• She’s already part of the Biden admin and already the on the ticket. She’s 59 years old, removing the concerns about electing an elderly person in the role. She has a national profile and name recognition that no other contender would have time to build before November.
• She would also be the USA’s first female President… something that’s extremely long overdue in this nation.
• Harris is highly experienced and qualified for the gig. Born in Oakland, CA, she served as a district attorney for San Francisco, the attorney general for the state of California, and the US Senator for California before accepting Joe Biden’s offer to become Vice President in 2020.
• She has been a consistently high fundraiser for Biden and the Democratic party. She’s also been great at engaging with voters of color, younger voters, and women — especially on issues of reproductive rights, a focal point for the Biden campaign since the Supreme Court’s Dobbs ruling in 2022 that overturned Roe v. Wade.
• To me, she’s the only logical and fully viable choice… and she would beat Dump.
• The second possibility, much further down the list, is the current California governor Gavin Newsom.
• He was a two-term mayor of San Francisco before being elected as lieutenant governor of our state in 2011 and serving two terms, and then being elected governor in 2018 and reelected in 2022.
• Newsom, 56, is known for his progressive policies, including prisoner rehabilitation and new legal strategies to promote gun control.
• Even further down the list is Michigan governor Gretchen Whitmer.
• Born and raised in Michigan, Whitmer, 52, worked her way up through Michigan state politics, serving as a member of the state House and state Senate before being elected governor in 2018 and being reelected in 2022.
• She was a co-chair of the Biden campaign in 2020, and continues her role as vice-chair of the Democratic National Committee. Whitmer has championed gun safety legislation, electric car manufacturing, and abortion rights.
• So let me be clear on something important: all three of these folks are 100% behind Joe Biden. All of them in recent days have voiced their complete support for Biden to remain the candidate.
• But I would also say that any of the three — particularly VP Harris — would be great choices as President, and I would support any of them should they choose to run for that office now or in the future.
• Are there others? Of course. But beyond those three, I don’t think any of them have a possibility of winning right now. 
• Those include Maryland governor Wes Moore, transportation secretary Pete Buttigieg, Illinois governor J.B. Pritzker, and several others.
• But I’ll wrap this up by reiterating that Joe is our guy until Joe says it’s time to ride off into the sunset… or in Joe’s case, drive his Vette into the sunset.
• Let’s move on.
• The fallout from this week’s Supreme Court’s decision to turn the office of President into that of King continued yesterday when U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon granted Dumpy’s request for further briefing on the issue of presidential immunity in the Mar-a-Lago classified documents case and delayed certain deadlines.
• In the order, Cannon afforded special counsel Jack Smith the right, but not the obligation, to file a submission on the use of classified information at trial. At the same time, she paused two upcoming deadlines for Dump and his co-defendants.
• Smith’s brief is now due on July 18, and a reply from Trump’s team is due on July 21. There is no trial date in sight in the classified documents case. Dump has pleaded not guilty to all charges.
• He’s counting on being elected, and then dismissing all charges against himself. But it’s more likely that he won’t need to, since the SCOTUS said in essence that he can’t be accused of, or be accountable for crimes no matter what he does.
• A man above the law. Is that what we want in America? We went 248 years without it ever even being considered much less enacted, and now here we are.
• It has happened in other countries, though. In Germany, the Enabling Act of 1933 gave the German Chancellor the power to make and enforce laws without the involvement of the other areas of government, allowing the Chancellor to completely bypass the system of checks and balances.
• It immediately transformed Hitler's government into a legal dictatorship and laid the groundwork for his totalitarian regime.
• And it’s the exact playbook being used by Dump, his minions, and the delusional MAGA populace.
• Moving on.
• Today is Sunday Gunday, where I take a quick scroll through just some of the incidents of gun violence in the USA from the past couple of days. A somber reminder: guns are the number one cause of death for children in the USA.
• Four dead, three wounded in a mass shooting at a 21st birthday party in Florence, KY. Two dead, 19 wounded in a mass shooting on the east side of Detroit, MI. One teenager dead, two injured in a shooting at a park in Aurora, CO. A teenager shot and killed in the Mattapan neighborhood of Boston, MA. One shot dead in St. Stephen, SC. One shot dead in Goodyear, AZ. One shot dead in Orlando, FL. One shot dead at a nightclub in Bradenton, FL. One shot and in critical condition in a road rage incident in Taneytown, MD. One shot dead in Fort Lauderdale, FL. Four people, including a 4-year-old, wounded in a shooting in Akron, OH. Two adults and a child shot at a state park in Steuben County, IN. Three shot at a Waffle House in Florence, SC. Two shot, including one child, in Orlando, FL. Two children shot in a McDonalds in The Bronx, NY. One shot and in critical condition in a road rage incident in Laurel County, KY. One shot and in critical condition at a party in an Airbnb an Indianapolis, IN. One shot at a Cold Stone Creamery in the Navy Yard district of Washington, D.C.
• There’s a lot more but I can’t do this all day.
• Oh, and just for special mention, 16 dead and 88 shot in a multitude of different gun violence incidents across the greater Chicago, IL area over the holiday weekend.
• Those include three mass shootings, one in which two women and an 8-year-old boy were killed and two young boys were left in critical condition after multiple shooters opened fire into a Greater Grand Crossing neighborhood home on the South Side.
• There have been more than 277 mass shootings to occur in the United States in 2024. There have only been 189 days in the year thus far.
• Let’s move on.
• In international news, we are semi-anxiously awaiting section returns in France, which will likely be available in a few hours.
• As we’ve discussed here previously, France is holding a snap election which may lead to France’s first far-right government since the World War II Nazi occupation.
• Turnout is very high for the second round of the elections happening right this moment. At 59.71%, it’s on track to be the highest turnout in France in four decades, since 1981.
• Following up on that important world news after we get the final returns.
• Back in the USA, I am super happy and encouraged to see the huge proliferation of information about the horrific Project 2025 that’s happened in the past few days.
• I see people talking about it who I normally never see being public with “political” news and opinions.
• Having been aware of it for months, it was disconcerting that the information on Project 2025 seemed to be pushed to underground discussions.
• Suddenly, it seems that a wide swath of the public is aware of it and having intelligent discussions about how it would impact their lives, and that of their friends and families, should Dumples the Clown be elected this fall.
• And now, The Weather: “Little Things” by Still Woozy
• From the Sports Desk… the ten worst (at the moment) teams in MLB.
• Nationals (42-27). Tigers (41-48). Cubs (41-49). Blue Jays (40-49). Angels (37-51). Athletics (34-57). Rockies (32-57). Marlins (31-59). And the current worst baseball team of all… White Sox (26-65).
• Maybe they’ll turn it around. You never know.
• Today in history… A retrial verdict acquits Joan of Arc of heresy 25 years after her execution (1456). Jacques Cartier makes his first contact with aboriginal peoples in what is now Canada (1534). As a result of the XYZ Affair, the US Congress rescinds the Treaty of Alliance with France sparking the “Quasi-War" (1798). In New York City, four nights of rioting against abolitionists began (1834). US troops occupy Monterey and Yerba Buena, thus beginning the US conquest of California (1846). The United States begins its first military draft; exemptions cost $300 (1863). Four conspirators in the assassination of Abraham Lincoln are hanged (1865). US President William McKinley signs the Newlands Resolution annexing Hawaii as a territory of the United States (1898). The United States, UK, Japan, and Russia sign the North Pacific Fur Seal Convention of 1911 banning open-water seal hunting, the first international treaty to address wildlife preservation issues (1911). Sliced bread is sold for the first time by the Chillicothe Baking Company of Chillicothe, MO (1928). Industrialist Henry J. Kaiser begins construction of Boulder Dam, now known as Hoover Dam (1930). Howard Hughes nearly dies when his XF-11 reconnaissance aircraft prototype crashes in a Beverly Hills neighborhood (1946). US President Dwight D. Eisenhower signs the Alaska Statehood Act into law (1958). Institution of sharia law in Iran (1980). Boris Becker becomes the youngest male player ever to win Wimbledon at age 17 (1985). The New York Court of Appeals rules that women have the same right as men to go topless in public (1992). Boris Johnson announces his resignation as leader of the Conservative Party following days of pressure from the Members of Parliament during the July 2022 United Kingdom government crisis (2022).
• July 7 is the birthday of weaver/merchant Joseph Marie Jacquard (1752), composer Gustav Mahler (1860), film director George Cukor (1899), MLB player Satchel Paige (1906), singer/guitarist Mary Ford (1924), trumpet player/bandleader Doc Severinsen (1927), keyboardist/composer Joe Zawinul (1932), singer-songwriter/drummer Ringo Starr (1940), actress Shelly Duvall (1949), NBA player Ralph Sampson (1960), singer-songwriter Vonda Shepard (1963), comedian Jim Gaffigan (1966), NHL player Joe Sakic (1969), figure skater Michelle Kwan (1980), and guitarist Synyster Gates (1981).

I’m going to go do various things — some fun, some necessary. Enjoy your day.