Random News: January 29, 2025

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 January 29, 2025, and it’s a Wednesday. I am still battling the stress of intense work deadlines along with my stupid cold. To say I’m looking forward to the coming weekend is a vast understatement. Meanwhile, important stuff is going on in the world, so let’s not dilly-dally and jump right in.

• One of the key plans of Donnie Dump’s plans for dictatorship is to fling so much shit at you at once, it’s difficult to discern what’s important.
• And the reality is, it’s all important.
• Dump calls it “flooding the zone,” and it’s a purposeful tactic to make you feel defeated and hopeless. But that’s not how we roll here.
• Instead, we try and prioritize our information here at Random News based on the most egregious things the Dump administration does that affects the widest range of people.
• And today, it’s following up on the illegal and massively overreaching freeze on federal funding to state and local governments.
• The worst example of this — at least thus far — was the shutdown of Medicaid funding with no warning.
• The White House confirmed that Medicaid websites are down throughout the country due to Dump's federal aid freeze. 72,058,701 people rely on Medicaid for health insurance.
• As usual, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said it well…
• ”Trump is holding all the nation's hospitals and vital services hostage to seize power from Congress and hand it over to billionaires. We must state the truth: This is a constitutional crisis. It's a massive, illegal power grab that the House and Senate have a sworn duty to stop!"
• Dickface Dump’s administration announced the pause in federal grants, loans, and other financial assistance as they embarked on a sweeping review of spending — a measure aimed at “ending ‘wokeness’ and the weaponization of government,” according to a memo from Matthew Vaeth, acting director of the Office of Management and Budget.
• So millions of Americans suffer and die — including those who voted for Dump — because the GOP can’t handle the idea that some people are gay. Got it.
• The funding freeze affects trillions of dollars and causes a massive widespread disruption in health care research, education programs and other initiatives. Grants that have been awarded but not spent are also halted.
• Before we take to the street, at least for now…
• Later in the day, a federal judge temporarily blocked Dump’s freeze on federal grants and loans. As we mentioned, the White House had planned to enforce the freeze today with no forewarning.
• U.S. District Judge Loren L. AliKhan blocked the action minutes before it was set to go into effect. The administrative stay pauses the freeze until Monday.
• Dump administration officials claim that programs that provide direct assistance to Americans would not be affected, such as Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, student loans and food stamps. But the lack of clarity around other programs is causing chaos.
• And I don’t believe them.
• I think your (or your parents’) Social Security and Medicaid are imminently to be ripped out from them.
• We promised you this would happen. You voted for Dump anyway… or you stayed home and didn’t vote at all. I’m not sure which group I respect the least.
• If there’s anything good coming out of this shit, for the first time in the nine days Dump was taken office, the Resistance is showing signs of life.
• Senate Democrats moved with rare dexterity to block a GOP-led bill in one of the few places where they have real leverage, and blanketed social media with panicked reports from their constituents.
• House Democrats called an emergency meeting for today to plot a "comprehensive three-pronged counteroffensive" — targeting appropriations, litigation, and communications.
• Nonprofits — later joined by Democrat-led states — stormed the federal court system with lawsuits, which is what led to the judge temporarily halting the funding freeze yesterday evening.
• We’re going to fight and we’re going to keep fighting until we win. End of story.
• Let’s move on for now.
• As of yesterday, the total number of U.S. active duty troops at the border is now about 1,600. It includes about 500 Marines, with the remainder being Army soldiers.
• Did you plan to have your peaceful life upended by seeing armed U.S. active duty military troops in your neighborhood when you voted for Dumpy (or didn’t vote)?
• Now you have that.
• Moving on.
• Yesterday, the White House announced details of a “deferred resignation” offer it made to federal employees that allows them to resign with pay through September 30.
• The offer affects the majority of the 2.3 million workers employed by the government, and was made in an email blast yesterday afternoon.
• It’s not clear what happens if the employees don’t accept the forced retirement offer.
• Sen. Tim Kaine (D-VA) sees the big picture here. He argued that Dump’s offer to federal employees overstepped his authority.
• He said on the Senate floor, “The President has no authority to make that offer. There’s no budget line item to pay people who are not showing up for work. If you accept that offer and resign, he’ll stiff you.”
• Correct.
• We should cover one more story of Dump’s pure cruelty, and this is one that affects a number of my friends on a very direct basis.
• Yesterday, Dump signed an executive order that seeks to end gender-affirming medical treatments for children and teenagers under the age of 19.
• Dump’s obsession with transgender people has been a major focus of his presidency this far. That’s his big thing, as opposed to all the ways he could actually help hard-working American families.
• On Monday, Dump signed an executive order to ban transgender troops from serving openly in the military. On his first day in office last week, Dump signed an order recognizing two sexes, male and female, and taking aim at what the order described as gender ideology extremism.
• So this is the top priority of the USA, I guess.
• Yesterday’s order says the federal government will not "fund, sponsor, promote, assist, or support" gender-affirming care for children. The medical care includes the use of puberty blockers, hormones and surgeries.
• LGBTQ advocacy and civil rights groups strongly condemned this latest action, saying it targets and discriminates against some of the most vulnerable in the U.S.: trans youth.
• But as I’ve said many times about MAGA: the cruelty is the point.
• Let’s move on.
• Greenland does not want to be part of the USA. Shocking, I know.
• A large majority of residents of the country are against Dump’s wish to acquire the island territory. 85 percent of the Arctic island’s residents do not want to join the U.S. Another 6 percent of respondents said they were in favor of joining while 9 percent were undecided.
• Roughly 45 percent of the island’s residents see Trump’s push to take control as a “threat.” 
• They’re right.
• Let’s keep on moving on… with another piece of depressing news.
• Some days, that’s just how it is. I don’t sugarcoat this shit for you.
• Earth is the closest it’s ever been to destruction. The “Doomsday Clock” ticked over to 89 seconds till midnight.
• The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists made the annual announcement — which rates how close humanity is from ending — citing threats that include climate change, proliferation of nuclear weapons, instability in the Middle East, the threat of pandemics, and incorporation of artificial intelligence in military operations.
• The group said it’s concerned about cooperation between countries such as North Korea, Russia, and China in developing nuclear programs. Russia President Vladimir Putin has also talked about using nuclear weapons in his war against Ukraine.
• Starting in 1947, the advocacy group used a clock to symbolize the potential and even likelihood of people doing something to end humanity. After the end of the Cold War, it was as close as 17 minutes to midnight.
• In the past few years, to address rapid global changes, the group has changed from counting down the minutes until midnight to counting down the seconds.
• Is our demise inevitable? No. The group said the clock could be turned back if leaders and nations worked together to address existential risks.
• That’s a big “if.”
• And now, The Weather: “Unbelonging” by Cloakroom
• From the Sports Desk… who the NBA’s individual leaders in this season thus far?
• Points per game… 1. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander (OKC) - 32.1. 2. Giannis Antetokounmpo (MIL) - 31.7. 3. Nikola Jokic (DEN) - 30.0. 4. LaMelo Ball (CHA) - 28.2. 5. Kevin Durant (PHX) - 27.1.
• Assists per game… 1. Trae Young (ATL) - 11.4. 2. Nikola Jokic (DEN) - 10.2. 3. Cade Cunningham (DET) - 9.4. 4. LeBron James (LAL) - 9.0. 5. Tyrese Haliburton (IND) - 8.7.
• Rebounds per game… 1. Domantas Sabonis (SAC) - 14.6. 2. Karl-Anthony Towns (NY) - 13.8. 3. Nikola Jokic (DEN) - 13.1. 4. Ivica Zubac (LAC) - 12.6. 5. Giannis Antetokounmpo (MIL) - 12.2.
• Today in history… "The Raven" is published in The Evening Mirror in New York, the first publication with the name of the author, Edgar Allan Poe (1845). Henry Clay introduces the Compromise of 1850 to the U.S. Congress (1850). Kansas is admitted as the 34th U.S. state (1861). Karl Benz patents the first successful gasoline-driven automobile (1886). Charles Curtis of Kansas becomes the first Native American U.S. Senator (1907). The Bolshevik Red Army, on its way to besiege Kyiv, is met by a small group of military students at the Battle of Kruty (1918). The first inductees into the Baseball Hall of Fame are announced (1936). In his State of the Union address, President George W. Bush describes "regimes that sponsor terror" as an Axis of evil, in which he includes Iraq, Iran and North Korea (2002). The Trump administration establishes the White House Coronavirus Task Force under Secretary of Health and Human Services Alex Azar (2020).
• January 29 is the birthday of scientist/philosopher Emanuel Swedenborg (1688), activist/philosopher Thomas Paine (1737), US president William McKinley (1843), playwright Anton Chekhov (1860), businessman/philanthropist John D. Rockefeller, Jr. (1874), actor W. C. Fields (1880), actor John Forsythe (1918), composer Leslie Bricusse (1931), bass player James Jamerson (1936), actor Tom Selleck (1945), drummer Tommy Ramone (1949), actress/TV host Oprah Winfrey (1954), diver Greg Louganis (1960), actor Nicholas Turturro (1962), NHL player Dominik Hašek (1965), actor Edward Burns (1968), politician Paul Ryan (1970), actress Heather Graham (1970), actress Sara Gilbert (1975), singer Adam Lambert (1982), and MLB player José Abreu (1987).

Time for me to get to work. Enjoy your day.