Random News: September 24, 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 September 24, 2025, and it’s a Wednesday. I am still refusing to turn on the lights in the morning here, but it’s getting kind of ridiculous being at my desk before 7am while the sun is just peeking over the horizon. I think next week I’ll acquiesce to flipping the switch and being in unnatural brightness. Lots to discuss today, so enough dilly-dallying. Let’s go.

• Last night, Jimmy Kimmel returned to the airwaves — at least in cities where the media wasn’t under the control of Dump via right-wing media conglomerates like Sinclair and Nexstar.
• Which frankly doesn’t matter for shit in the modern world. Jimmy’s monologue was posted to YouTube by his show hours before the actual air time.
• And that monologue couldn’t have been better. In a talk that alternated between funny, defiant, and emotional moments, Kimmel’s main message was that Dump’s threats to silence comedians is “anti-American.”
• He’s right.
• Dumpy himself was apoplectic that ABC, its owner Disney, and a huge portion of the American populace told him to fuck off and resumed airing “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” despite his objections.
• It honestly seemed like the Orange Pricktator was in shock. He wrote, “I can’t believe ABC Fake News gave Jimmy Kimmel his job back. The White House was told by ABC that his Show was cancelled! Something happened between then and now because his audience is GONE, and his ‘talent’ was never there.”
• His audience is gone, huh? As I’m writing this early Wednesday here on the West Coast, the YouTube video of his monologue has nine million views. Millions and millions more watched the show as it aired.
• Kimmel poked fun at Dump’s bashing of his ratings — which are actually great, earning ABC over $54 million last year and capturing 21% of the late night talk show viewership. Jimmy played a clip of Dumpy saying, “He had no ratings.”
• And then responded, “I do tonight.”
• Let’s get back to these huge conservative companies that own far too many of the nation’s TV affiliates, Sinclair and Nexstar. Together, they account for about 70 ABC affiliates. That sounds like far too close to a monopoly for my comfort level.
• Sinclair actually tried to blackmail Kimmel, saying that it would not allow the late-night show to air until Kimmel apologized to Kirk’s family and made a donation to his conservative activist group Turning Point USA.
• Jimmy is doing none of those things.
• Instead, he pointedly went after FCC chairman Brendan Carr. He ridiculed Dumpy.
• But before I move on, what might be an effective way to deal with this corporate control of our media content is actually pretty simple.
• Just find out if your local station is owned by Sinclair or Nexstar. And if so, note every single company that runs ads on those stations. Then boycott every last fucking one of them. Don’t give any brand that advertises on a Sinclair- or Nexstar-owned station a single dollar.
• If they’re going to allow themselves to be controlled by Dumpy, we don’t need to support them with our dollars. It’s not a difficult concept.
• Back to Kimmel for a moment. Kimmel pointedly did not apologize for his previous statements, nor did he have anything to apologize for.
• But he got emotional discussing the suspension. “You understand it was never my intention to make light of the murder of a young man,” he said, referring to Kirk. “I don’t think there’s anything funny about it.”
• He went on to say that whatever happens with his show is not important. “What is important is that we get to live in a country that allows us to have a show like this.”
• And then Kimmel took direct aim at Dump, saying “he did his best to cancel me. Instead, he forced millions of people to watch the show.”
• Enough on that. I’m going to include a link to the monologue in the comments, if you have yet to watch it.
• Moving on.
• Some breaking news form this morning in Dallas, where three detainees were shot at the Immigration and Customs Enforcement field office.
• Multiple victims are dead, per acting ICE Director Todd Lyons, though he may be wrong (ICE often is). Dallas police said one person was killed and two were hurt while people were moved through the facility’s secured passageway.
• The shooter — who appeared to be a sniper from an elevated position firing from a couple hundred yards away — allegedly died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound. Dallas police said it appears the shooter fired from an adjacent building.
• Apparently, only the immigrant detainees were shot and/or killed. Lyons says that all ICE agents and officers at the location are accounted for.
• This story is developing so those are all the details I have.
• Let’s move on for now.
• Dumpy had a bad day yesterday.
• He went to the U.N., got stuck on an escalator that magically turned into stairs, his teleprompter didn’t work, and then he decided to wing it on his speech.
• And then, after embarrassing our entire country by saying things like, “What is the purpose of the United Nations?,” Dump said during a meeting with U.N. Secretary General  António Guterres that the U.S. is "behind the United Nations 100%.”
• Our leader is a demented and inept idiot. I know that’s not news.
• By the way, why did that escalator stop?
• It was stopped by a videographer from the U.S. delegation who ran ahead of Dump and triggered the stop mechanism at the top of the escalator.
• Why didn’t his teleprompter work? Because the White House was operating the teleprompter for the president.
• Let’s move on.
• Yesterday, Dump abruptly cancelled a planned Thursday meeting at the White House with top congressional Democratic leaders, increasing the chances of a government shutdown on October 1.
• Dump whined that the items in the Democrats' alternative funding proposal — like rolling back the Medicaid changes enacted in the Big Bullshit BIll and extending Affordable Care Act tax credits — were nonstarters.
• We’ll see how he feels when he has no money to run his shitty-ass programs in one week.
• Jeffries shot back his own response on social media saying "Trump Always Chickens Out," a reference to the "TACO" slogan that some popularized around Dump's constantly-shifting positions on nearly everything.
• Schumer argued, "Trump and Republicans are holding America hostage. Donald Trump will own the shutdown."
• Moving on.
• Some great news out of Arizona yesterday, where Democrat Adelita Grijalva won the special election in the state’s 7th Congressional District, further narrowing the already razor-thin Republican House majority.
• Grijalva defeated Republican Daniel Butierez by more than 40 points. Once Grijalva is sworn in, Democrats will hold 214 seats in the House to Republicans’ 219. House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) has at times struggled to hold his conference together, facing some rebellion on issues such as the debt ceiling and the release of files from the investigation into sex offender and pedophile Jeffrey Epstein.
• Now, Republicans can lose just two votes from their conference and still pass legislation. Ha ha, suckers.
• Grijalva might be greeted warmly by an unlikely figure: Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY), who, alongside Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA), is collecting signatures for a discharge petition to force a vote on a bill requiring the Justice Department to release all unclassified files related to the investigation into Epstein.
• They now have enough votes.
• Let’s move on.
• Seeing the press conference on Monday where Dumpy and his brain-wormed buddy tried to allege that one of the world’s most common and safe pain relief drugs — Tylenol — causes autism, it brought to mind this little ditty.
• In Galileo's day, Jupiter had four moons. Today it has 95.
• But of course, Jupiter always had 95 moons (or more); we just didn’t have the technology to see the other 91.
• This is about autism.
• See, the White House points out that “In the last 22 years, autism rates among children have increased nearly 400%. It's time to make our children healthy again!”
• But we already know the reason for this. In 2013 the definition of autism was expanded to include Asperger’s, CDD, PDD-NOS, and the Autistic Disorder.
• The numbers went up because the definition changed to include more variants. meanwhile the testing processes and awareness of autism grew as well.
• There is no higher percentage of people with autism. There’s a far higher percentage of people getting accurately diagnosed as such.
• Last point: 90% of people with cancer have eaten a pickle at some point in their lives. Should we ban pickles? Or should we, as sophisticated modern humans, understand that correlation does not equal causation?
• Sorry to use the big-boy words there, but you hopefully get it.
• Moving on.
• Sometimes I realize that an important story passed by while we were all distracted with other important stories. It happens.
• Example: last week, House lawmakers voted to allow 14-year-olds to be tried as adults and to treat young people more harshly in the D.C. justice system — fulfilling a top request from the Dump administration despite universal opposition among top D.C. elected officials.
• It’s more than ironic they they want to send 14-year-olds to adult prisons, but won’t send adults to prison for fucking 14-year-olds.
• Release the Epstein files.
• That bill has not passed the Senate, where the filibuster requires 60 votes to advance. Hopefully it won’t.
• Moving on.
• Yesterday, a Florida jury found Ryan Routh guilty of an assassination attempt in 2024 against then-presidential candidate Donnie Dump.
• Routh was the weirdo who was arrested in September 2024 at Dump's stupid golf course. A Secret Service agent spotted Routh before Dump came into view. Routh allegedly aimed his rifle at the agent, who opened fire, causing Routh to drop his weapon and flee without firing a shot.
• Compiling a bad decision on top of another, Routh represented himself in the trial. What’s the old saying? He who represents himself in court has a fool for a client? Something like that?
• Routh was found guilty of all five charges, which included attempted assassination of a major presidential candidate and assaulting a federal officer.
• And after the guilty verdict was read, this stable genius tried to stab himself in the neck with a pen. Authorities stopped him from doing so.
• Shrug.
• Moving on.
• The nation’s 250th birthday celebration will go on without the help of a White House-appointed director who was removed from planning efforts after allegedly making unapproved posts and financial decisions.
• Ariel Abergel — a 25-year-old who previously worked as a Fox News producer — was fired from the bipartisan Semiquincentennial Commission after being appointed to the role by Dumpy himself.
• Abergel was terminated “after he initiated a security breach of a commission social-media account, attempted to procure the resignations of multiple commissioners by misrepresenting himself as acting on behalf of Congressional leadership, and engaged in multiple other serious and repeated breaches of authority and trust,” said the America250 foundation spokesperson.
• But I thought Dumpy only hired the best people?
• And now, The Weather: “hookie” by Adult Male Blondes
• Let’s do a chart.
• It’s late September 1991. I’m in college, getting my bachelor’s in music at Cal State Dominguez Hills.
• I’m also working as a telemarketer. It is perhaps the shittiest job I ever had, and I got out of there as quickly as possible.
• This was the top of the Billboard 200 albums chart at the time.
• 1. Metallica (Metallica). 2. Unforgettable: With Love (Natalie Cole). 3. Roll The Bones (Rush). 4. Luck Of The Draw (Bonnie Raitt). 5. C.M.B. (Color Me Badd). 6. Cooleyhighharmony (Boyz II Men). 7. The Fire Inside (Bob Seger & The Silver Bullet Band). 8. For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge (Van Halen). 9. Time, Love And Tenderness (Michael Bolton). 10. Gonna Make You Sweat (C+C Music Factory). 11. Out Of Time (R.E.M.). 12. Spellbound (Paula Abdul). 13. No Fences (Garth Brooks). 14. Extreme II Pornograffitti (Extreme). 15. Heart In Motion (Amy Grant). 16. Robin Hood: Prince Of Thieves (Soundtrack). 17. Naughty By Nature (Naughty by Nature). 18. WBBD - Bootcity! The Remix Album (Bell Biv DeVoe). 19. Shake Your Money Maker (The Black Crowes). 20. Homebase (D.J. Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince).
• From the Sports Desk… I’m sure you know the saying, “Be careful what you ask for, or you might get it."
• Well congrats, baseball fans: in the 2026 season, you get robot umpires. Happy now?
• Major League Baseball will implement a challenge system for balls and strikes in the 2026 season after the league's competition committee voted yesterday to usher in the era of robot umpiring.
• Hitters, pitchers, and catchers will be the only ones allowed to trigger the system by tapping their head, and if a challenge is successful — the pitch will be shown on in-stadium videoboards — teams will retain it.
• Not every player was into it, but the MLB owners were. They unanimously voted it in. The ABS system uses similar technology to the line-calling system in tennis, with 12 cameras in each ballpark tracking the ball with a margin of error around one-sixth of an inch.
• Back in the present, the MLB season — with its lowly human umps — is winding down and there’s been some exciting stuff happening in the standings.
• If the playoffs started today…
• American League: Blue Jays (90-67), Yankees (89-68), Mariners (88-69), Red Sox (86-71), Guardians (85-72), Tigers (85-72), Astros (84-73). Toronto, New York, and Seattle have now locked in their playoff spots.
• National League: Brewers (95-63), Phillies (92-65), Dodgers (88-69), Cubs (88-69), Padres (87-71), Mets (81-67), Reds (80-77), Diamondbacks (80-77). Milwaukee, Philly, LA, Chicago, and SD are locked in for the playoffs, with Cincy and NY fighting out the last spot (and Arizona still in the running).
• Good times. Only about five games remaining in the regular season.
• Today in history… The Battle of Rowton Heath in England is a Parliamentarian victory over a Royalist army commanded in person by King Charles (1645). The United States Congress passes the Judiciary Act, creating the office of the Attorney General and federal judiciary system and ordering the composition of the Supreme Court (1789). General (and future President) Zachary Taylor captures Monterrey in the Mexican-American War (1846). Gold prices plummet after President Grant orders the Treasury to sell large quantities of gold after Jay Gould and James Fisk plot to control the market (1869). Teddy Roosevelt proclaims Devils Tower in Wyoming as the nation's first National Monument (1906). Jimmy Doolittle performs the first flight without a window, proving that full instrument flying from take off to landing is possible (1929). Cathay Pacific Airways is founded in Hong Kong (1946). The Honda Motor Company is founded (1948). President Eisenhower sends the 101st Airborne Division to Little Rock, Arkansas, to enforce desegregation (1957). USS Enterprise, the world's first nuclear-powered aircraft carrier, is launched (1960). Representatives of 71 nations sign the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty at the United Nations (1996). 
• September 24 is the birthday of Roman emperor Vitellius (15), Guru Ram Das (1534), historian/politician Horace Walpole (1717), SCOTUS Chief Justice John Marshall (1755), athlete Lottie Dodd (1871), third oldest person ever Sarah Knauss (1880), singer-songwriter/guitarist Blind Lemon Jefferson (1893), novelist F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896), soldier/pilot Dick Bong (1920), sportscaster Jim McKay (1921), puppeteer/director/producer Jim Henson (1936), singer/activist Linda McCartney (1941), guitarist Jerry Donahue (1946), actor Phil Hartman (1948), MLB player Rafael Palmiero (1964), and drummer Janet Weiss (1965).

As I’ve been saying a lot lately, there’s no way I can cover all the important shit that happens around the world every day. I cherry-pick the things that seem to matter the most to me… your mileage may vary. Regardless, you’re hopefully more informed than you were before you started scrolling through this shit. Enjoy your day.