Random News: April 12, 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 April 12, 2025, and it’s a Saturday. I’m… not in a bathrobe. In fact, I’m showered and dressed, and getting ready to go somewhere. But I am drinking coffee because coffee is life. Also, these news bullets may be somewhat curtailed due to time limitation.

• I’m heading out to downtown Los Angeles to participate in Bernie Sanders’ “Fighting Oligarchy: Where We Go From Here” event.
• This rally-type day of activism features special guest Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, along with special musical guests Neil Young, Joan Baez, and others.
• We’ve noted a few potential places to park, but it’s still going to be a pain in the ass. But it’s for a worthy cause, so we’ll put up with that inevitable shit.
• The event, smack in the middle of DTLA at Grand Park, is only 20 miles from here, but it can often take an hour or more to get there from our home in the South Bay. Yes, even on a Saturday morning. Lots of people in Los Angeles, you know.
• It actually already starts in less than an hour at 9am PT, but there are only so many hours I can spend standing in a park downtown.
• We’ll get there ASAP, take pics and videos, and tell you about it afterwards.
• Note that the event is also being live-streamed; I’ll throw a link in the comments.
• A couple of news items before I run.
• Yesterday, Immigration Judge Jamee E. Comans determined that Columbia University graduate student Mahmoud Khalil can be kicked out of the U.S. as a national security risk.
• The government’s contention that Khalil’s presence in the U.S. posed “potentially serious foreign policy consequences” was apparently enough to satisfy requirements for his deportation.
• Note that Khalil was in the USA legally, and has not committed nor been accused of any crime.
• He was detained by federal immigration agents March 8 in the lobby of his university-owned apartment, with the only reason given that he’d participated in campus protests against the war in Gaza.
• Protesting is legal in the USA, I should add.
• Within a day, he was flown across the country and taken to an immigration detention center in Louisiana, thousands of miles from his attorneys and wife, a U.S. citizen who is due to give birth soon.
• Obviously, this is a sad day in America. A sad day for freedom and free speech. Lawyers for Khalil said they plan to keep fighting. The judge gave them until April 23 to seek a waiver.
• Moving on.
• Yesterday, the federal judge who ordered the return of mistakenly-deported Maryland father of three Kilmar Abrego Garcia had a question we’re all asking.
• “Where is he and under whose authority?” U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis asked in a Maryland courtroom. “I’m not asking for state secrets. All I know is that he’s not here. The government was prohibited from sending him to El Salvador, and now I’m asking a very simple question: where is he?”
• She was lambasting Drew Ensign, one of Dump’s deputy assistant attorney generals, who struggled to provide any information about the whereabouts of Abrego Garcia, despite Thursday’s ruling from the U.S. Supreme Court that the Dump administration must bring him back.
• The judge repeatedly asked Ensign about what has been done, asking pointedly: “Have they done anything?” — to which Ensign said he didn’t have personal knowledge of what had been done.
• “So that means they’ve done nothing,” Xinis said, adding later: “Despite this court’s clear directive, your clients have done nothing to facilitate the return of Mr. Abrego Garcia.”
• And White House Mouth of Sauron Karoline Leavitt then confirmed this.
• “The Supreme Court made their ruling last night very clear that it’s the administration’s responsibility to facilitate the return, not to effectuate the return,” she said.
• Fuck these lawless pieces of shit. And if Abrego Garcia is dead, there will be absolute hell to pay.
• Moving on.
• Actually… a note.
• The Dump administration has now canceled the visas of at least 529 students, faculty, and researchers across 88 colleges and universities as part of its efforts to carry out mass deportations.
• It should be assumed that most of those people have brown skin.
• Okay, now moving on.
• Consumer sentiment plunged 11% this month to its second-lowest reading on record going back to 1952.
• That’s just fucking great.
• Dumples the Economic Clown’s idiotic and volatile trade war, which threatens higher inflation, has significantly weighed on Americans’ moods these past few months.
• That malaise worsened leading up to Dumpy’s announcement last week of sweeping tariffs, according to a recent survey.
• The estimated cost of Dump’s moronic tariffs for the typical middle-class household is now $3,700 a year, according to The Budget Lab at Yale.
• The lab published updated research to reflect the fact that tariffs on China are even higher than previously realized, now at least 145%.
• The average American will get hit by even higher costs than the middle-income one, with tariffs costing the average household $4,700 per year from higher prices.
• So tighten those belts. We’re looking at ways here at Chez Claxton to start minimizing our unnecessary spending.
• In very related news… someone must have finally informed Dumpy that nearly all of our electronics are made in China.
• A US Customs and Border Protection notice posted late last night says that electronics imported to the United States will be exempt from Dump’s tariffs.
• Smartphones, computer monitors, and various electronic parts are among the exempted products. The exemption applies to products entering the United States or removed from warehouses as early as April 5.
• What should be obvious even to a child: American companies rely on manufacturing and components from Asia. Dump’s minimum tariff rate of 145% on Chinese goods would have a major impact on tech giants like Apple, which make iPhones and other products in China.
• In other news…
• The Social Security Administration announced that it would use Elon Musk’s social platform X to make announcements going forward, instead of traditional press releases or memos typically posted to the agency’s website.
• Yes, I’m serious.
• The shift comes as communications staff at the agency has dwindled due to Musk’s DOGE group firing thousands upon thousands of essential government employees.
• Officials announced that regional SSA offices would no longer have fully staffed public affairs offices as a result.
• And they have no one left to do communications the proper and professional way, so it’s now a social media intern.
• “I know this probably sounds very foreign to you — it did to me as well — and not what we are used to, but we are in different times now,” said Linda Kerr-Davis, SSA Midwest-West regional commissioner.
• Different times indeed.
• Moving on.
• Dumpy got mad at the state of Maine for not kissing his fat ass.
• So he froze Agriculture Department aid to the state that was used by their Department of Education to fund a state nutrition program.
• Yesterday, U.S. District Court Judge John Woodcock issued a temporary restraining order, requiring the Dump administration to unfreeze the aid.
• The court’s order came the same day Maine officials said the state would not comply with Dump’s ban on transgender athletes in high school sports.
• And now, The Weather: “I'm Not Real (feat. PYNKIE)” by TV Girl & George Clanton
• From the Sports Desk… after the first two rounds of The Masters, here’s the leaderboard.
• 1. Justin Rose (-8). 2. Bryson DeChambeau (-7). T3. Rory McIlroy (-6). T3. Corey Conners (-6). T5. Matt McCarty (-5). T5. Shane Lowry (-5). T5. Tyrrell Hatton (-5). T5. Scottie Scheffler (-5). T9. Rasmus Højgaard (-4). T9. Viktor Hovland (-4). T9. Jason Day (-4).
• Round three is underway today.
• Today in history… The Union Flag is adopted as the flag of English and Scottish ships (1606). The Civil War begins with Confederate forces firing on Fort Sumter, in the harbor of Charleston, SC (1861). Confederate forces kill most of the African American soldiers that surrendered at Fort Pillow, TN (1864). President William McKinley signs the Foraker Act into law, giving Puerto Rico limited self-rule (1900). Sir Frank Whittle ground-tests the first jet engine designed to power an aircraft, at Rugby, England (1937). U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt dies in office; Vice President Harry S. Truman becomes President upon Roosevelt's death (1945). The polio vaccine, developed by Dr. Jonas Salk, is declared safe and effective (1955). The first launch of a Space Shuttle takes place (1981). Harold Washington is elected as the first black mayor of Chicago (1983). United States President Bill Clinton is cited for contempt of court for giving "intentionally false statements" in a civil lawsuit (1999). 
• April 12 is the birthday of politician Henry Clay (1777), playwright Alexander Ostrovsky (1823), photographer Imogen Cunningham (1883), actress Dorothy Cumming (1894), singer-songwriter Hound Dog Taylor (1912), singer/ukulele player Tiny Tim (1932), pianist/composer Herbie Hancock (1940), actor Ed O’Neill (1946), author Tom Clancy (1947), comedian/TV host David Letterman (1947), singer-songwriter/actor David Cassidy (1950), singer-songwriter/guitarist Pat Travers (1954), actor Andy Garcia (1956), singer-songwriter/guitarist Vince Gill (1957), singer-songwriter Amy Ray (1965), actress Shannen Doherty (1971), actress Claire Danes (1979), and politician Tulsi Gabbard (1981).

That’ll have to do for now. I’ll let you know how things go at today’s Bernie Sanders event… including whether we make it there or not. Enjoy your day.