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 December 5, 2024, and it’s a Thursday for some reason. This time of year is stressful for many people, but for me, it’s a double-whammy of being my busiest time of year at work. So, curating this news each day in the quiet of the very early morning is often the most peaceful part of my day.
- Let’s see what’s happening.
- France’s far-right and left-wing lawmakers joined together yesterday in a historic no-confidence vote prompted by budget disputes that forces Prime Minister Michel Barnier and his Cabinet members to resign, a first since 1962.
- The National Assembly approved the motion by 331 votes. A minimum of 288 were needed.
- President Emmanuel Macron insisted he will serve the rest of his term until 2027. However, he will need to appoint a new prime minister for the second time after July’s legislative elections led to a deeply divided parliament.
- Macron will address the French this evening. Barnier is expected to formally resign by then.
- Yikes.
- You know, some of my fellow American friends are under the impression that our challenges are unique… but they’re not.
- If your backup plan is to move to a different country where you assume things are better than here, guess what? That isn’t necessarily the case, which is why I advise each and every one of you to prepare to stay and fight.
- You’re stronger than you realize. All of you.
- Moving on.
- Some good news…
- Lawmakers in Montana crossed party lines this week to reject a measure that would have banned a transgender representative from using the women's bathroom at the state Capitol.
- Several Republicans joined all Democrats in voting against the proposal at a meeting of the Joint House and Senate Rules Committees on Tuesday.
- The proposed rule would have designated two bathrooms — located between the House and Senate chambers — as male and female and required legislators to use the one that aligned with their sex chromosomes at birth.
- Montana’s measure was made to target Rep. Zooey Zephyr, a transgender Democratic lawmaker who was reelected in November, from using the women’s bathroom outside Montana’s House and Senate chambers.
- This is similar to the resolution introduced at the federal level by Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) to ban trans lawmakers and visitors to the U.S. Capitol from using bathrooms associated with their gender identity.
- Mace’s resolution came two weeks after Sarah McBride, a Democrat from Delaware, became the first openly trans person elected to Congress.
- I’m glad Montana made the right decision here.
- Let’s move on.
- The FBI has issued a warning to all Americans sending text messages with iPhone and Android phones… which, I think, is basically all of us.
- An unprecedented cyberattack nicknamed Salt Typhoon by Microsoft has potentially exposed private communications to foreign hackers. China hacked targeted major telecommunication companies such as AT&T, Verizon, and Lumen Technologies to spy on customers.
- Here’s the weird part. Apple iMessages — which appear blue between iPhone users — and Google Messages, sent between Android users, are also fully encrypted using Signal’s protocol.
- But texts sent from an iPhone to an Android and vice versa are not fully encrypted. Messages between different devices are encrypted only with Rich Communications Services (RCS), which in the U.S. are all decrypted by Google.
- The FBI official warned that citizens should be “using a cell phone that automatically receives timely operating system updates, responsibly managed encryption and phishing resistant MFA for email, social media and collaboration tool accounts.”
- Lordy. We’re all fucked.
- Moving on.
- A follow-up from the news that the Supreme Court was taking up a huge case involving transgender rights.
- Yesterday, Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett asked a team of ACLU lawyers advocating for trans rights if trans people had ever really been discriminated against.
- What the fuck?
- Yesterday, the court held oral arguments in United States v. Skrmetti, a landmark case originating from Tennessee that could decide just how far the federal government has to go, if at all, to protect the rights of trans people.
- In 2023, Senate Bill 1 became law in Tennessee, banning hormone therapy and puberty blockers for minors and imposing civil penalties on doctors who don’t fall in line. Skrmetti is challenging S.B. 1, but the conservative justices don’t seem to give a single shit.
- As expected.
- “One question I have is, at least as far as I can think of, we don’t have a history — that I know of — we don’t have a history of de jure discrimination against transgender people,” Coney Barrett said during oral arguments yesterday morning. “Is there a history that I don’t know about where we have de jure discrimination?”
- What the actual fuck?
- Fortunately, U.S. Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar had a good response. “Historical discrimination against transgender people may not have been reflected in the laws. But I think there’s no dispute that there is a broad history here and it hasn’t just been confined to private actors. I think that if you actually looked at the facts there’s a wealth of evidence to suggest that transgender people throughout history have been subjected to violence, discrimination, and maybe lost employment opportunities, housing opportunities.”
- Well said.
- I still don’t have high hopes that this court would rule on the right side of history.
- Coney Barrett, in particular, has a history of judicial hostility toward LGBTQ issues, and trans rights specifically.
- She defended the dissenting justices on the Marriage Equality Act, has argued Title IX rights shouldn’t apply to trans people, and personally believes that marriage should be between a man and a woman.
- In other (shitty) news…
- The incoming Dump administration is preparing a list of countries to which it may deport migrants when their home countries refuse to accept them.
- The countries include but may not be limited to Turks and Caicos, the Bahamas, Panama, and Grenada.
- The plans could mean that thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of migrants would be permanently displaced in countries where they do not know any of the people or the language and have no connection to the culture.
- Dump also wants Mexico to accept non-Mexicans who are deported from the United States. I’m trying to picture someone from Sweden being deported… to Mexico.
- Of course, that’s less likely, since the Dump gestapo will only be focusing on people with brown skin.
- Honestly, this incoming administration is packed full of the worst people you can possibly imagine. No matter how awful you might think they are, they’re definitely worse than that.
- And now, The Weather: “Bodys Chorus” by Skeleten
- From the Sports Desk… the NFL’s Jacksonville Jaguars placed quarterback Trevor Lawrence on injured reserve yesterday, likely ending his season.
- The QB was already dealing with a sprained AC joint in his left (non-throwing) shoulder, and then suffered a concussion in the team's 23-20 loss to the Houston Texans on Sunday. As mentioned yesterday, Texans linebacker Azeez Al-Shaair was suspended three games for hitting Lawrence in the head as he was sliding at the end of a 6-yard scramble.
- I love football, but it’s a brutal sport. I can’t tell you how many people I know that suffered lifelong injuries as a result of something that happened playing football in their teen years.
- Today in history… King Manuel I of Portugal issues a decree ordering the expulsion of Jews from the country (1496). Auctioneer James Christie holds his first sale (1766). At Fort Ticonderoga, Henry Knox begins his historic transport of artillery to Cambridge, MA (1775). Former U.S. President John Quincy Adams takes his seat in the House of Representatives (1831). Jefferson Davis is elected to the U.S. Senate (1847). In a message to the United States Congress, U.S. President James K. Polk confirms that large amounts of gold had been discovered in California (1848). The Football Association bans women's football in England from league grounds, a ban that stays in place for 50 years (1921). The Twenty-first Amendment to the United States Constitution is ratified, repealing the nationwide prohibition of alcohol (1933). Mary McLeod Bethune founds the National Council of Negro Women in New York City (1935). The American Federation of Labor and the Congress of Industrial Organizations merge and form the AFL–CIO (1955). E. D. Nixon and Rosa Parks lead the Montgomery bus boycott (1955). Leonid Kravchuk is elected the first president of Ukraine (1991). The Civil Partnership Act comes into effect in the United Kingdom, and the first civil partnership is registered there (2005).
- December 5 is the birthday of composer Francesco Scarlatti (1666), US president Martin Van Buren (1782), US general George Armstrong Custer (1839), zoologist/ornithologist/entomologist/ethnographer Clinton Hart Merriam (1855), pilot/businessman Clyde Vernon Cessna (1879), film director Fritz Lang (1890), animator/producer Walt Disney (1901), physicist Werner Heisenberg (1901), politician/racist Strom Thurmond (1902), film director Otto Preminger (1905), singer-songwriter/harmonica player Sonny Boy Williamson II (1912), singer-songwriter/pianist Little Richard (1932), writer/journalist Joan Didion (1934), singer-songwriter/guitarist J. J. Cale (1938), singer-songwriter Andy Kim (1946), cosmonaut Jügderdemidiin Gürragchaa (1947), singer-songwriter/guitarist Jim Messina (1947), NFL player Jim Plunkett (1947), singer-songwriter Jack Russell (1960), singer-songwriter/guitarist John Rzeznik (1965), comedian Margaret Cho (1968), actor/race car driver Frankie Muniz (1985), and NFL player LeGarrette Blount (1986).
Time to get my less-fun part of my day rolling. That’s alright. The sooner I start, the sooner it’s done. Enjoy your day.
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