Random News: March 10, 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 March 10, 2025, and it’s a Monday. Been out of bed for over an hour. Oh look… the sun has decided to start coming up. How nice of it to join me on this day.

• Honestly, the issue I have with the start of Daylight Savings — especially on the first Monday of the time change — isn’t just waking up and feeling like it’s 5am.
• It’s that I sleep like shit the night before, constantly aware that things are somehow different and coming out of my slumber to peek at the clock every couple of hours all night.
• Ugh. Fuck this. DST has me annoyed as usual on this stupid day.
• Let’s see what’s going on.
• Here’s a perspective on why things are going the way they are.
• For decades — long before I was born — conservatives in Congress have talked about the need to cut government deeply, but they have always pulled back from mandating specific reductions, fearful of voter backlash.
• Those people need to get re-elected, and nothing is as immediately unpopular than removing benefits from constituents and making their lives worse.
• But think about where we’re at now.
• Dumpy — who is barred from running again by the Constitution — never needs to face voters again.
• Elon Musk — who’s in charge with slashing all of American citizens’ benefits — is neither an elected official nor will he ever run for office.
• Where does that leave Congress?
• Fucked. They have to get re-elected. That’s why they’re trying to wrest control of the federal budget away from an unelected businessman and a guy who doesn’t give a shit about the people.
• On Wednesday, Republican senators told Musk that he needed to ask Congress to approve specific cuts.
• Right-winger Jessica Reidl of the conservative think tank The Manhattan Institute noted she has advocated for deep cuts for decades, but there’s a reason Congress has balked.
• “If Congress won’t pass certain spending cuts, it’s because the American people don’t want it enough. If I want spending levels to be cut, it’s my job to persuade the people of America to agree with me.”
• But that hasn’t been the process. Voters have not been asked, nor our representatives in the House and Senate who have to stand behind what Dump and Musk/DOGE are doing.
• I’m calling it right now: fall 2026 will be “Revenge of the Pissed-Off People” against anyone who’s supported this screwing of the people — who will really be feeling it by then, with trusted support systems like Medicare and Social Security being slashed, and vital federal services being removed entirely.
• The first chance people have to vote, they’ll want a scapegoat. They can’t do much about President Musk or Li’l Dumpy… but there’s a bunch on congresspeople and senators who will have to answer for their actions.
• Moving on to some shitty news in the Middle East.
• Yesterday, Israel cut off the electricity supply to Gaza, affecting a desalination plant producing drinking water for part of the arid territory.
• Hamas called it part of Israel’s “starvation policy.” Last week, Israel suspended supplies of goods to the territory of more than two million Palestinians, an echo of the siege it imposed in the earliest days of the war.
• The first phase of the ceasefire between Israel and Hamas ended last weekend. Israel wants Hamas to release half of the remaining hostages in return for a promise to negotiate a lasting truce.
• But Hamas instead wants to start negotiations on the ceasefire’s more difficult second phase, which would see the release of remaining hostages from Gaza, the withdrawal of Israeli forces, and a lasting peace.
• As you know, Dumples the Colonizing Clown wants the Palestinian people dead or otherwise gone so he can build resort hotels in Gaza on top of the mass graves of their families.
• In more international news…
• Former central banker Mark Carney will become Canada’s next prime minister after a Liberal Party leadership vote in a landslide. He will soon replace Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. The timing of the transition will be determined by Carney in conjunction with Trudeau.
• Carney won nearly 86% of the more than 151,000 votes cast. The next closest candidate received 11,144 votes.
• What do we know about Carney? A lot.
• He’s 59. He was born in Fort Smith, Northwest Territories, on March 16, 1965, and raised in Edmonton, Alberta.
• He received a bachelor’s degree in economics from Harvard University in 1988, and master’s and doctoral degrees in economics from Oxford University.
• He ran the Bank of Canada from 2008 to 2013 and the Bank of England from 2013 to 2020. After helping Canada manage the worst impacts of the 2008 financial crisis, he was recruited to become the first non-Brit to run the Bank of England since it was founded in 1694.
• He’s also served as the United Nations’ special envoy for climate action and finance. However, he has no experience in politics.
• I wish him luck in his new role.
• And while we’re talking about the world (and its relationship with the USA)…
• Today, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said that Elon and his sidekick Dumpy have finished their purge of programs of the six-decade-old U.S. Agency for International Development, and said he would move the remaining 18% of aid and development programs that survived under the State Department.
• 18%. That’s it.
• A lot of people are about to die, thanks to your vote for Donnie Dump.
• On his first day in office, Dumpy issued an executive order directing a freeze of foreign assistance funding. He stated that foreign assistance was wasteful and advanced a liberal agenda.
• I want to mention, for the record, that the USA has held policies for decades that humanitarian and development aid abroad advanced U.S. national security by stabilizing regions and economies, strengthening alliances, and building goodwill.
• That’s gone now. 5,200 of USAID’s 6,200 programs have been eliminated entirely.
• Moving on.
• Have any of you had parents or other loved ones who’ve gone through the horrors of Alzheimer’s disease? I have.
• But major Alzheimer’s disease research centers across the country face a $65 million funding gap amid a Dump-imposed delay.
• But didn’t the courts rule that a government-wide funding freeze is illegal? Yes, but Dump has managed to delay research funding by canceling scientific meetings and failing to publish forthcoming meetings in the Federal Register, both which are legally required.
• It’s possible that Alzheimer’s could have been eliminated in our lifetimes. But now, funding for research is expected to run out on April 30.
• The degenerative condition affects 6.7 million Americans, with diagnoses expected to double by 2060. Although it most often affects older adults, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) does not consider Alzheimer’s a normal part of aging.
• Assholes. Making America worse, one evil step at a time.
• Let’s move on.
• Yesterday afternoon, a small plane crashed into the parking lot at a retirement community in Lancaster County, PA, injuring the five people aboard and damaging around a dozen vehicles.
• The Federal Aviation Administration said it will investigate the crash, which comes after a devastating midair collision in January and a string of plane crashes across the country.
• In other news…
• U.S. fighter jets were scrambled twice over the weekend to intercept civilian aircraft in the skies over Palm Beach, FL., where Dumpy was relaxing at his Mar-a-Lago golf motel.
• NORAD said the most recent incident occurred yesterday around 1pm Florida time. Military aircraft escorted a civilian plane out of the area after setting off flares to get the pilot’s attention.
• NORAD said its aircraft have responded to more than 20 “tracks of interest” since Dump took office. The agency reported three interceptions just last week.
• Hmm. Interesting.
• Let’s chat about something else.
• Due to the paranoid transphobia being pushed by Dumpy and his weird friends, there have been several instances of people being accused of being trans who… aren’t.
• In Arizona, a cisgender woman was harassed by cops in the women’s restroom of a Tucson Walmart in February.
• Kalaya Morton of Phoenix was in a stall in the store’s women’s restroom when two male sheriff’s deputies entered. Side note: Arizona law does not dictate that people use public restrooms that correspond with the sex they were assigned at birth.
• Morton lifted her shirt to prove to the deputies that she was a woman. But one of the deputies continued to insist she “looked like a man.”
• “The only men in the women’s restroom were the cops,” she said. The Pima County Sheriff’s Department has launched an internal investigation into the incident, and Walmart says they’re cooperating with the investigation
• This isn’t by far the only instance of cisgender people being accused of being trans.
• Last year, a junior varsity girl’s basketball player in Utah was accused of being transgender by another parent, who attempted to have her banned from playing.
• The angry MAGA man confronted the family and the principals of both competing schools, declaring: “I wasn’t born yesterday, I know that’s a boy and you better be able to prove yourself because I am going to the top.”
• The student “was 100 percent eligible to be on the court,” according to a Canyons School District spokesperson, who added that the accuser is not allowed to return to any other games.
• How did this grown man want the minor girl to prove she was born female? By pulling down her underwear on the court? These brainwashed fucking people are completely sick.
• Let’s move on to a bright shining light in the face of all this darkness, in the form of an 83-year-old man who might still save us all.
• Bernie Sanders is not running for president again. But the stooped and silver-haired democratic socialist has emerged as a leader of the resistance to Dump’s second presidency. 
• In tearing into Dump’s seizure of power and warning about the consequences of firing tens of thousands of government workers, Sanders is bucking the wishes of those who want Democrats to focus on the price of eggs or “roll over and play dead.”
• For now, at least, Sanders stands alone as the only elected progressive willing to mount a national campaign to harness the fear and anger of the sprawling anti-Dump movement.
• He drew a crowd of 4,000 in Kenosha, WI, on Friday night. He faced another 2,600 or so the next morning a few hours away in Altoona, WI, a town of less than 10,000 residents. And his crowd of 9,000 in suburban Detroit exceeded his own team’s expectations. By design, each stop was in a swing U.S. House district represented by a Republican.
• The goal of Bernie’s “stop oligarchy tour” is to see if a high-profile Democrat would fill the leadership void. His crowds are large and enthusiastic.
• Yelling to his crowd over the weekend in his familiar way, Sanders said, “What all of this tells me, is not just in Michigan or in Vermont, the people of this country will not allow us to move toward oligarchy. They will not allow Trump to take us into authoritarianism. We’re prepared to fight. And we’re going to win.”
• Fuck yeah, man. Let’s fucking go.
• And now, The Weather: “Blu-ray Land” by Miynt
• From the Sports Desk… um, NBA standings, I guess.
• Eastern Conference: 1. Cavaliers (54-10). 2. Celtics (46-18). 3. Knicks (40-23). 4. Bucks (36-27). 5. Pacers (35-27). 6. Pistons (36-29).
• Western Conference: 1. Thunder (53-11). Lakers (40-22). 3. Nuggets (41-23). 4. Grizzlies (40-24). 5. Rockets (39-25). 6. Warriors (36-28).
• Today in history… After establishing the city of Santo Domingo, Christopher Columbus departs for Spain, leaving his brother in command (1496). Charles I dissolves the Parliament of England, beginning the eleven-year period known as the Personal Rule (1629). An agreement between Nader Shah and Russia is signed near Ganja, Azerbaijan and Russian troops are withdrawn from occupied territories (1735). The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo is ratified by the United States Senate, ending the Mexican–American War (1848). The first successful test of a telephone is made by Alexander Graham Bell (1876). Mahatma Gandhi is arrested in India, tried for sedition, and sentenced to six years in prison (1922). Mildred Gillars, aka "Axis Sally”, is convicted of treason (1949). Fearing an abduction attempt by China, thousands of Tibetans surround the Dalai Lama's palace to prevent his removal (1959). In Memphis, Tennessee, James Earl Ray pleads guilty to assassinating Martin Luther King Jr. (1969). Astronomers discover the rings of Uranus (1977). Silicon Valley Bank collapses due to a run on its deposits, in the second largest bank failure in US history (2023).
• March 10 is the birthday of poet/critic Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel (1772), educator/activist Hallie Quinn Brown (1849), sculptor Anna Hyatt Huntington (1876), businessman Alfred Peet (1920), basketball player Marques Haynes (1926), actor/martial artist Chuck Norris (1940), songwriter/guitarist Tom Scholz (1947), director/screenwriter Paul Haggis (1953), terrorist Osama bin Laden (1957), model/actress Shannon Tweed, (1957), actress Sharon Stone (1958), songwriter/bass player Jeff Ament (1963), music producer Rick Rubin (1963), NFL player Rod Woodson (1965), singer-songwriter Edie Brickell (1966), actor Jon Hamm (1971), singer-songwriter Robin Thicke (1977), gymnast Shannon Miller (1977), singer-songwriter Carrie Underwood (1983), actress Olivia Wilde (1984), actress Ego Nwodim (1988), rapper Bad Bunny (1994), NBA player Zach LaVine (1995), and NFL player Justin Herbert (1998).

Okay. I’m out of time, at least for now. I’m still annoyed at waking up in the dark, though I should get used to that for a number of weeks. Enjoy your day.