Random News: July 13, 2022

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 July 13, 2022, and it’s a Wednesday. A variety of various varied thoughts heading your way like a choo-choo train through a tunnel…

• Yesterday was the seventh hearing of the January 6 Select Committee.
• The focus was on extremist groups who followed the former president’s instructions to attack the USA in a violent coup.
• The committee showed direct evidence of how and when Trump and his allies interacted with these violent far right extremists.
• It was sad to hear some of them, with the too-late realization they’d been lied to and made fools of. One guy, Stephen Ayres, lost his job and his house as a result of his criminal actions on January 6. He said, "I felt like I had horse blinders on. Take the blinders off, and make sure you step back and see what's going on, before it's too late."
• He also warned there were still millions of people who still believe the Big Lie and should be thought of as a threat to future elections.
• Looking down your list of friends and family, I’m willing to bet that you personally know some of these people who remain a threat to America. They tell you who they are; don’t be surprised when they get even more radicalized and take action.
• While the session was wrapping up, Liz Cheney dropped a huge bombshell.
• “After our last hearing, President Trump tried to call a witness in our investigation, a witness you have not yet seen in these hearings. That person declined to answer or respond to President Trump's call, and instead alerted their lawyer to the call. Their lawyer alerted us. And this committee has supplied that information to the Department of Justice.”
• Witness tampering is a massive crime that always carries a huge penalty. Even the implied threat of retaliation, much less violence enacted or explicitly stated against a witness, carries a multiple year jail sentence.
• This call did not come from one of Trump’s minions. It came from Trump himself, directly. And it’s already been referred for criminal investigation to the DOJ.
• Another quotable moment from Ms. Cheney: “President Trump is a 76 year old man, he is not an impressionable child. Just like everyone else in our country, he is responsible for his own actions and his own choices.”
• Ba-bam!
• Twitter has sued Elon Musk. Musk’s choices are to a) pay them the $44 billion he promised for the acquisition of Twitter, b) pay them $1 billion as an agreed-upon cancelation fee for not buying Twitter, or c) find a legal reason why he doesn’t have to honor the commitment.
• This case is going to go on for months and months, so don’t expect any quick resolution.
• Meanwhile, combining these two topics, there’s been a simmering war going on between Trump and Musk. A few days ago, Musk said on Twitter, “I don’t hate the man, but it’s time for Trump to hang up his hat & sail into the sunset,” after earlier voicing support for Republican Ron DeSantis for president.
• Trump, as he is prone to do, came unglued. He wrote, “When Elon Musk came to the White House asking me for help on all of his many subsidized projects, whether it’s electric cars that don’t drive long enough, driverless cars that crash, or rocketships to nowhere, without which subsidies he’d be worthless, and telling me how he was a big Trump fan and Republican, I could have said, ‘drop to your knees and beg,’ and he would have done it.”
• Musk’s response to this on Tuesday evening: “Lmaooo.”
• That’s gonna keep going. I love when pieces of shit fight each other, because either way, we all win.
• QotD: “Justice is what love looks like in public, just like tenderness is what love feels like in private.” - Dr. Cornel West
• Today in history… Babylon’s siege of Jerusalem ends after the destruction of Solomon’s Temple (587 BC). The Continental Congress enacts the Northwest Ordinance (1787). The New York City Draft Riots, some of the worst civil unrest in US history, begin (1863). The Dartmouth workshop is the first conference on artificial intelligence (1956). A secret Oval Office taping system is revealed to Watergate investigators (1973). Electrical blackout with widespread fires and looting grips NYC (1977). Live Aid benefit concerts in London and Philadelphia (1985). UK Prime Minister David Cameron resigns and is replaced by Theresa May (2016).
• July 13 is the birthday of Pope Clement X (1590), football player/politician Jack Kemp (1935), chef Paul Prudhomme (1940), the great and mighty actor Sir Patrick Stewart (1940), actor Harrison Ford (1942), musician Roger McGuinn (1942), comedian Cheech Marin (1946), director Cameron Crowe (1957), voice actor Tom Kenny (1962), comedian/physician Ken Jeong (1969), and baseball player Cody Bellinger (1995).

Well, that’s all for now. I’m going to do what I do today, and so should you. One idea that’s helped me over the course of my life: you don’t have to do everything. Try doing one thing, and see what you can do after that. Enjoy your day.

Random News: July 12, 2022

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 July 12, 2022, and it’s a Tuesday. General observances of things…

• Yesterday, we got our first look at an image from the James Webb Space Telescope.
• The area of the sky pictured is so tiny, it would take up the size of a grain of sand held at arm’s length from here on Earth. And yet, it’s showing us details of thousands of galaxies, including some formed in the early stages of the universe.
• The main galaxy cluster being viewed is from 4.6 billion years ago… slightly older than the Earth has existed.
• However, you’re also seeing warped images of other, much more distant galaxies from over 13 billion light years away, due to the gravitational lensing effect. That light reaching us is three times older than our sun and solar system.
• It’s mind-blowing. It’s fucking amazing.
• That image is being called Webb’s First Deep Field; NASA has more to show us today and of course there will be many, many more over our lifetimes.
• Here is some good news that is bound to also create immediate confusion and controversy. HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra issued info yesterday to clarify that federal law preempts state abortion bans when emergency care is needed. The federal government can penalize institutions or providers that fail to provide abortions as needed to treat medical emergencies.
• We’ll see how that plays out in forced-birth states. What will inevitably happen is that a state will refuse, a woman will die, and there will be a federal lawsuit, and yet another Supreme Court decision.
• But the federal law — which has been in place since 1986 — states that if a hospital or doctor refuses to provide abortion for medical emergencies like ectopic pregnancy or complication from miscarriage, they could lose Medicare and Medicaid provider agreements and could face civil penalties, along with federal fines of $119,942 per violation.
• That’s pretty good news. It really is.
• Abortion is health care.
• Today’s January 6 hearing starts at 1PM EDT. The focus will be on the rise of radical extremism, with a lineup of witnesses that includes people involved in the coup and members of groups like Oath Keepers.
• It’s likely we’ll hear testimony from people who were fooled into believing the false narrative of election fraud that came directly from the former President, and whose illegal actions during the coup attempt can be traced directly to Trump as well.
• POP QUIZ: A guy tried to flee deputies on a riding lawnmower until he was tased, and was found to have a gun, a handcuff key, and a well-used meth pipe on him. In what state did this happen?
• Back in space, the full supermoon tomorrow night will be the visually biggest and brightest moon of 2022. Yes, it’s the second of two consecutive supermoons. I don’t know how this shit works.
• This one is called the Buck Moon. Doesn’t cost a buck to see it (ha ha, dad joke for the win); just walk outside and hope it isn’t cloudy.
• Fox News complained over the weekend that gas prices were falling too fast and that mom-and-pop gas stations would be hurt be the decrease. Folks, please wake up and see how you’re being manipulated here. Please.
• QotD: “A lie can travel half way around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes.” - Mark Twain
• Today in history… ‘Nuremberg Chronicle’, one of the best-documented early printed books, is published (1493). The Mughal Empire annexes Bengal (1576). The American Army briefly occupies a Canadian settlement at Windsor, Ontario (1812). The Rolling Stones perform for the first time at the Marquee Club (1962). Riots begin in Newark, NJ (1967). Space Shuttle Atlantis carries a new airlock to the ISS (2001). 
• July 12 is the birthday of Roman politician/general Julius Caesar (100BC), poet Henry David Thoreau (1817), film producer Louis B. Mayer (1884), architect Buckminster Fuller (1895), stage director/lyricist Oscar Hammerstein II (1895), comedian Milton Berle (1908), artist Andrew Wyeth (1917), pianist Van Cliburn (1934), comedian/rapist Bill Cosby (1937), actress Cheryl Ladd (1951), figure skater Kristi Yamaguchi (1971), and actor Topher Grace (1978).

What’s up with me today? I have a couple of meetings and a bunch of deadlines, and it’s my grocery shopping day so there’s that. And… I don’t know, man. I just live life and do things, and try not to be a dick. I’m not always successful but I do try. Enjoy your Tuesday.

Random News: July 11, 2022

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 July 11, 2022, and it’s a Monday. Here’s something, perhaps…

• Here’s a funny for you. You know how Steve Bannon said he was now able to testify in the January 6 hearings due to Trump releasing him from “executive privilege”?
• Nope.
• The DOJ says that Trump "never invoked executive privilege over any particular information or materials; that the former president’s counsel never asked or was asked to attend the defendant’s deposition before the select committee; that the defendant’s attorney misrepresented to the committee what the former president’s counsel had told the defendant’s attorney; and that the former president’s counsel made clear to the defendant’s attorney that the letter provided no basis for total noncompliance."
• Let me translate for you. That means that regardless of Bannon’s newfound willingness to testify, he’s still going to be tried for contempt. His lawyers were due in court for pretrial arguments this morning at… uh, right now (10am EDT).
• Also, just to drive home the silliness of his excuse, Bannon only worked at the White House for seven months back in 2017, three years before the failed January 6 coup attempt.
• Ugly shit in China: banks in the Henan province have frozen the assets of hundreds of thousands of people, and there were demonstrations for people demanding their life savings back, only to be violently crushed by Chinese authorities.
• Ugly shit in the USA: the red states, who already have the absolute worst rankings in terms of infant and maternal deaths and childhood poverty, are about to get much worse with the end of safe and legal abortion. They’re looking at hundreds of thousands of new births each year concentrated among lower-income families.
• “It is as if somebody came down with a magic marker and circled the states least equipped to deal with an abortion ban and with the largest percentage of their population falling into the most elevated risk categories,” says Sara Rosenbaum, a professor of health law and policy at George Washington University.
• Sigh.
• Vote please.
• Back to the Jan 6 Select Committee hearings: the next public event is tomorrow (Tue Jul 12), starting at 1PM EDT. This session is going to probe the direct connection between the Trump administration and far-right militia groups such as the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys.
• They’re doing the bull run in Pamplona, Spain. I always root for the bulls. Three people got gored today. Let’s go bulls!
• How about not put animals in highly stressful situations for your amusements, you fucking pieces of shit? I hope the bulls take out a bunch more people before it’s done. I really do.
• In the “watch evil people destroy each other” file… "You know, he said the other day, Oh, I've never voted for a Republican. I said, I didn't know that, he told me he voted for me. So he's another bullshit artist.” - Donald Trump on Elon Musk, July 9, 2022
• QotD: “Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent.” - Isaac Asimov
• The Sports Desk is on vacation since there are no sports worth talking about. oh wait; they left this note: “The LA Dodgers have won seven straight and are 9-1 in the last 10 games. Could be making a run at the Yankees for the best record in the league soon. Don’t forget sunblock.”
• Today in history… Zheng He sets sail to explore the world (1405). Pluto moved inside the orbit of Neptune for the last since until 1979 (1735). The United States Marine Corp is reestablished after having been disbanded since the Revolutionary War (1798). Aaron Burr shoots Alexander Hamilton (1804). Waterloo Railway Station opens in London (1848). Tijuana, Mexico is founded (1889). Car manufacturer Fiat is founded (1899). Babe Ruth makes his MLB debut (1914). The Hollywood Bowl opens (1922). ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’ is published (1960). Martin Luther King Jr. is posthumously given the Presidential Medal of Freedom (1977). 
• July 11 is the birthday of Scottish king Robert the Bruce (1274), US President John Quincy Adams (1767), writer E. B. White (1899), actor Yul Brynner (1920), actor Tab Hunter (1931), boxer Leon Spinks (1953), musician Peter Murphy (1957), musician Suzanne Vega (1959), one of the best singers of all time Chris Cornell (1964), rapper Lil’ Kim (1975), and NFL player Joey Bosa (1995).

Well, it’s Monday. You can’t expect a lot from a Monday. Just do what you do. Try and enjoy it.

Random News: July 10, 2022

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 July 10, 2022, and it’s a Sunday. No idea what’s coming next, so let’s see what my fingers type…

• Went to Lobsterfest last night, guests of my mom and her husband at their yacht club.
• That sounded pretty bougie, and I suppose it is, but it’s the Cabrillo Beach Yacht Club in San Pedro, CA. Pedro is a pretty working-class town, with the major industry there being the Port of Los Angeles.
• As a result, many of my Pedro friends and their family members have been longshoremen, crane operators and the like.


• That being said, it’s still a yacht club, and I always get a bit of the Caddyshack clubhouse vibe when we go for this event. At age 53, I’m probably in the youngest 10% of people there. These are old people. With yachts. You get the idea.


• It had been an annual tradition for many years before the pandemic hit. Last time we went was 2019. I always do enjoy myself, digging into some clam chowder followed by Maine lobster, corn on the cob, fries, and a little ice cream dessert.
• So that was nice, having a little time with family and such. I always advise all of you to appreciate good times, so I try and take my own advice occasionally.
• Steve Bannon, who to me always resembles the absolute personification of evil in lumpy human form, has allegedly agreed to testify to the January 6 House Select Committee. He originally defied the subpoena and is set to go on trial for criminal contempt charges as a result.
• I don’t trust this shit one bit. Trump made a very public display yesterday of waiving the executive privilege that Bannon was using to avoid giving testimony.
• Trump’s letter to Bannon, provided to media outlets, included the following… 
• "When you first received the Subpoena to testify and provide documents, I invoked Executive Privilege. However, I watched how unfairly you and others have been treated, having to spend vast amounts of money on legal fees, and all of the trauma you must be going through for the love of your Country, and out of respect for the Office of the President. Therefore, if you reach an agreement on a time and place for your testimony, I will waive Executive Privilege for you, which allows you to go in and testify truthfully and fairly.”
• What a load of crap.
• In other Jan 6 news, committee member Adam Kinziger said Pat Cipollone’s testimony on Friday did not contradict the testimony given by other witnesses like Cassidy Hutchinson.
• So much for the “she lied!” defense.
• Keep your eye on this thing with Trump having ordered the IRS to audit Comey and McCabe. If proven true, it’s going to be another huge legal strike against the former President. This is the kind if stuff that forces criminal charges. Guess we’ll see.
• The situation in Sri Lanka is crazy. I was looking at the thousands and thousands of people storming the presidential palace, and I couldn’t help but think that this is what the yokels on January 6 thought it was going to be like.

• If we don’t prosecute them to the fullest extent and safeguard it from happening again, it could be that way next time. It didn’t end on that day.
• Can you believe it’s only been six days since Robert Crimo shot up the Highland Park parade? See how easily you get numb to mass shootings?
• From the sports desk… Novak Djokovic beat Nick Kyrgios 4-6, 6-3, 6-4, 7-6 (3) for his fourth consecutive Wimbledon championship and seventh overall. Can I just say that tennis is super weird in that the same one person can dominate an entire sport for like a decade at a time? Other sports “dynasties” typically get 2-3 year runs of greatness.
• QotD: “Wealth consists not in having great possessions, but in having few wants.” - Epictetus
• Epictetus was a Greek stoic philosopher, in case you were wondering.
• I can be pretty stoic and logic-driven, but I’m not all that virtuous and I like to chill and laugh and have a good ass time. Not sure what that makes me philosophy-wise.
• Today in history… Soga no Iruka is assassinated in a coup d’état in the Japanese imperial palace (645). King Canute IV of Denmark is killed by peasant rebels (1086). Lady Jane Grey, a teenage girl, takes the throne of England for nine days (1553). Louis XVI declares war on Great Britain to aid the American Revolution (1778). Wyoming is admitted as the 44th state (1890). Bloody Sunday in Belfast, Northern Ireland (1921). The start of the Scopes trial against the teaching of evolution (1925). Telstar, the first communications satellite, is launched (1962). Boris Yeltsin becomes the first elected president of Russia (1991). The final Volkswagen Beetle rolls off the assembly line (2019).
• July 10 is the birthday of theologian John Calvin (1509), vice-president George Dallas (1792), brewer Adolphus Busch (1839), physicist Nikola Tesla (1956), novelist Marcel Proust (1871), blues musician Blind Boy Fuller (1907), journalist David Brinkley (1920), activist Eunice Kennedy Shriver (1921), boxer Jake LaMotta (1922), actor Fred Gwynne (1926), singer Mavis Staples (1939), metal god Ronnie James Dio (1942), tennis player Arthur Ashe (1943), musician Greg Kihn (1949), musician Béla Fleck (1958), actress Sophia Vergara (1972), singer Jessica Simpson (1980), and NFL player/head case Antonio Brown (1988).

Welp, I guess that’s all for now. I’m going to do Sunday things.

Random News: July 9, 2022

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 July 9, 2022, and it’s a Saturday. Some kind of things…

• A general note apropos of basically everything: when a side of a battle realizes they’re going to lose, they start doing desperate things.
• Some of the things we’ve seen in the news lately is exactly that… the last gasp of a dying faction that is trying to remain relevant.
• I’ll give you some examples.
• Ohio House Republicans are advancing a bill that would require schools to teach both sides of the Holocaust.
• You read that right.
• In Tennessee, a court has ruled that a foster care/adoption agency that receives state funds can decide to not allow Jewish parents to adopt children. The ruling can be applied to any business who wants to hang a “No Jews Allowed” sign in their window in Tennessee.
• You read that right too.
• If you’re a normal person who finds this horrifying, and who wants the USA to continue its 246-year tradition of the separation of church and state, then plan on voting for candidates who don’t want to turn this country into a Taliban-like theocracy this fall.
• Sigh.
• Thousands of people stormed the residence of Sri Lanka’s prime minister and forced him to resign. Then they set the house on fire. This is a breaking story, but it doesn’t sound good. 
• President Biden signed an executive order to shore up protections for women seeking abortions and the agencies who provide them. I’m not sure how much good it will do for a poor person in a forced-birth state.
• As he also said, the fastest way to make this right is to add two additional pro-choice Senators this fall, and keep a pro-choice House, and then codify the right to abortion into national law.
• It’s not easy, but it is doable.
• I don’t want to waste much time on Elongated Muskrat, but for those who hadn’t heard… a few months ago, he made an offer to buy the social media micro-publishing platform Twitter for $44 billion. Knowing that it was likely that Musk was not serious in his intent to follow-through with the purchase, Twitter had a $1 billion bail-out clause if it didn’t happen.
• Yesterday, Musk officially pulled out of the deal, and is trying to wiggle out of paying the agreed-upon break-up fee. We’ll see how that plays out.
• If our friends in Canada have seemed unusually quiet recently, it’s because one of their main telecom giants, Rogers Communications, has had a huge outage that’s left everything from mobile phones to Internet to ATM and 911 emergency lines down.
• Fact: we (as in, most people on this planet) are all way too dependent on a small number of tech companies, and if something goes wrong and there’s little or no regulation that requires backup systems, it becomes a life-or-death situation for millions of people.
• What would you do with no Internet or mobile phone service?
• What would you do if your debit/credit card stopped working with no advance notice?
• How much cash do you have on you? I think I have $40.
• Side note to that story…  I felt badly for Canadian rock/pop band Metric, who released their first album since 2018 yesterday… right as no one in Canada was able to buy it, stream it, or even watch the videos. That sucks.
• Side note to that side note… I (being an American with Internet) was able to check it out and it’s… not that great. Ah well.
• From the sports desk… congrats to Elena Rybakina — who is definitely not Russian, since Russians were banned from the tournament — on winning the women’s final at Wimbledon. She beat Tunisian Ons Jabeur 3-6, 6-2, 6-2. The men’s final featuring Novak Djokovic and Nick Kyrgios is tomorrow.
• QotD: “True happiness comes from the joy of deeds well done, the zest of creating things new.” - Antoine De Saint-Exupery
• Today in history… Hadrian enters Rome (118). Henry VIII annuls his marriage to his fourth wife, Anne of Cleves (1540). Catharine the Great becomes Empress of Russia (1762). Argentina declares independence from Spain (1816). President Zachary Taylor dies suddenly (1850). The 14th Amendment is ratified, giving black people full citizenship and all people in the USA due process of law (1868). The first Wimbledon championships are held (1877). Homosexuality is legalized in New Zealand (1986).
• July 8 is the birthday of Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand II (1578), Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld (1932), actor Brian Dennehey (1938), author Dean Koontz (1945), murderer O. J. Simpson (1947), TV host and musician John Tesh (1952), politician Lindsey Graham (1955), actor Tom Hanks (1956), musician Courtney Love (1964), software developer Marc Andreessen (1971), and musician Jack White (1975).

I am bestowing upon thee a wealth of positive vibes and most excellent mojo. For those who are sad, I say that things always get worse before they get better, but long term, they always get better. I mean, not necessarily for you specifically, but overall. Enjoy your day.

Random News: July 8, 2022

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 July 8, 2022, and if you can believe it, it’s a Friday once again! My time is extraordinarily limited today, which sucks, but here’s some stuff regardless…

• Someone assassinated former Japan prime minister Shinzo Abe yesterday. It’s terrible.
• Japan has some of the world’s most strict gun laws, with nearly no gun deaths as a result. Case in point: in 2018, the entire country had nine deaths from firearms, which the USA in the same year had 39,740.
• The guy who killed Abe used a handmade shotgun of some sort.
• Japan has one gun for every 400 people. The USA has 480 guns for every 400 people.
• As with any leader, people were critical of Abe, calling him a right-wing nationalist and the like, which is all true. He was kinda the Japanese Trump. But assassination is never a good way to handle political issues. It leads to a) more assassinations and b) a martyr culture where many more people start emulating the actions of the deceased.
• Christianity, for example, is 2,000 years of that culture.
• Don’t assassinate anyone.
• Donald Trump’s White House counsel Pat Cipollone will be testifying today for the January 6 Select Committee. The testimony is behind closed doors, but is being videotaped and transcribed, and we’ll hear about it in a future public hearing.
• This is a big fucking deal. Cipollone could take the fifth, but experts seem to think it’s unlikely.
• Guess we’ll see.
• QotD: “It takes courage to grow up and become who you really are.” - e.e. cummings
• Today in history… Vasco da Gama sets sail on the first trip from Europe to India (1497). An 8.7 earthquake damages more than 600 miles of Chile’s coastline with a huge tsunami (1730). John Nixon delivers the first public reading of the Declaration of Independence (1776). St. John’s, Newfoundland burns down (1892). The Dow Jones hits its low point of the Great Depression, closing at 41.22 (1932). Reports come out about a UFO crash landing in Roswell, NM (1947). There’s a failed assassination attempt against Saddam Hussein (1982). Kim Jong-il assumes leadership of North Korea (1994). The final Space Shuttle mission launches (2011). 
• July 8 is the birthday of pharmacist Eli Lilly (1838), oil baron John D. Rockefeller (1839), fashion designer Hugo Boss (1885), politician George W. Romney (1907), rich guy and vice-president Nelson Rockefeller (1908), singer Jerry Vale (1930), Allman Bros drummer Jaimoe (1944), actor Jeffrey Tambor (1944), chef Wolfgang Puck (1949), weirdo Marianne Williamson (1952), actor Kevin Bacon (1958), musician Toby Keith (1961), musician Joan Osborne (1962), and musician Beck (1970).

I’m stressed and it’s only 8:30am. Sometimes stress is a natural part of life. We never think of it as a positive, and it’s usually not. But if you can turn it around and let it be a driving force to motivate you to get the shit done that needs doing, then you can thank your stress later when you’ve finished that shit successfully and are relaxed and happy. I hope you get to be relaxed and happy at some point today.

Random News: July 7, 2022

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 July 7, 2022, and it’s a Thursday. Here’s what I’m gonna tell ya…

• UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson has resigned. I’ve always had an admiration for UK leaders who actually leave office when they do something awful.
• Can you imagine a leader who lost the confidence of his country and yet still refused to leave office in a peaceful transferral of power?
• Oh wait… never mind.
• Johnson will remain prime minister until a suitable replacement is found. Unlike the USA, the UK has no equivalent to a vice-president waiting in the wings.
• My opinion, and that of many others who study political science, is that the executive branch (i.e., the President and his cabinet and agencies) is the least powerful of the three branches of government in the USA.
• The executive, judicial, and legislative branches are balanced, but not completely.
• We put way too much weight on the power of the President to affect change, and not nearly enough on our actual representatives.
• Speaking of Presidents, gas prices have dropped for 21 consecutive days. Thanks President Biden!
• Just kidding. Loudly for those in the back: PRESIDENTS DO NOT CONTROL GAS PRICES.


• Irony: the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, one Lindsey Graham, is refusing to comply with a subpoena from Georgia prosecutors about his role in attempting to overturn the 2020 election.
• Next time ol’ Lindsey issues subpoenas from his committee, I hope he expects a similar response, or lack thereof.
• Note: a subpoena is not a birthday party invitation. We normal people don’t have the option of saying we’re busy that day.
• In case you want to send thanks to the person who is making all this happen, your gratitude should go to Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis.
• Thanks!
• I went shopping on Tuesday as I always do, and among many other things, bought a bunch of bananas, also as I always do.
• Isn’t a “bunch” a bizarrely non-specific quantity? I mean, it is the official term for banana purchases beyond a single fruit. But any number of conjoined bananas is a bunch. Three banana? A bunch. Seventeen bananas? Also a bunch.
• What does a successful stripper and a giant gas planet have in common? It rains diamonds on Uranus!
• Ha ha.
• But seriously, both Uranus and Neptune appear blue due to methane in the atmosphere, which has carbon in it, and that carbon is under tremendous pressures, so deep inside those planets’ atmospheres, it actually is raining diamonds.
• True story.
• Apparently July 7 is World Chocolate Day. Of the many marketing-driven holidays, this one is perfectly fine by me.
• Life without chocolate would suck. There’s some alternate universe where chocolate was never a thing, and people are sad, and they don’t even know why.
• What are we missing in our universe that’s making us sad and we don’t know why? Probably a lot.
• Elon Musk had twins with one of his employees last year. He also has a bunch with his former wife, including another set of twins and a set of triplets, and a couple with the singer Grimes.
• He’s a weird lizard-person alien, isn’t he? I’m not saying he is, but he is.
• Don’t fuck employees. Rule of thumb. General good idea.
• We should talk about Britney Griner. She’s still being held prisoner in Russia. My personal feeling is that a person who wasn’t a Black lesbian would have been prioritized for diplomatic help by now.
• She pled guilty on drug charges, but who knows what led to that admission?
• Also from the sports desk… The Cleveland Browns have traded QB Baker Mayfield to the Carolina Panthers, ending a controversy that’s continued for months since the Browns picked up serial sex abuser Deshaun Watson for the QB job. The funny (not ha-ha funny) thing is that Watson may not even be able to play this coming season while handling his rapey stuff. 25 different women have accused him of sexual misconduct.
• QotD: “Election days come and go. But the struggle of the people to create a government which represents all of us and not just the one percent - a government based on the principles of economic, social, racial and environmental justice - that struggle continues.” - Bernie Sanders
• Reminder: abortion is health care.
• Today in history… Joan of Arc is acquitted via a retrial 25 years after her death (1456). Four nights of rioting against slavery abolitionists happen in New York City (1834). Four conspirators in Abraham Lincoln’s assassination are hanged (1865). Hawaii is annexed as a US territory (1898). The USA, UK, Japan, and Russia ban open-water seal hunting, the first international environmental treaty (1911). Sliced bread is sold for the first time (1928). Construction starts on Hoover Dam (1930). Howard Hughes crashes his plane into a neighborhood in Beverly Hills (1946). Sharia law begins in Iran (1980). Boris Becker wins Wimbledon at age 17 (1985). A New York court of appeals rules that women have the same right to go topless as men (1992). 
• July 7 is the birthday of Emperor Shirakawa of Japan (1053), composer Gustav Mahler (1860), baseball player Satchel Paige (1906), musician Mary Ford (1924), musician Doc Severinsen (1927), musician Joe Zawinul (1932), drummer Ringo Starr (1940), actress Shelly Duvall (1949), hockey great Joe Sakic (1969), and figure skater Michelle Kwan (1980).

You should have a great day today. You should register to vote, or confirm your voter registration. You should run for office. You should do things to help other people and/or animals and/or plants. You should have some chocolate and/or sex. Enjoy your Thursday.