04/18/23

Good morning! It’s Tuesday April 18th.

Tax day! So… pay your taxes!

Not sure what else to add about that. You gotta pay your taxes. No getting out of it. There’s even that famous saying – nothing in this life is guaranteed except great Kelly Clarkson singles and taxes.

And now, the news.

Ralph Yarl

-Ralph Yarl via AP News

Let’s start with a story that moved very fast between Sunday night and Monday.

Last Thursday, 16-year-old Ralph Yarl, who is Black, went to go pick up his siblings from a house in Kansas City, Missouri. He accidentally went to the wrong house, which makes sense when you know what the address is… I’m not going to repeat the address here because the house where the incident took place has already been vandalized. But the difference in the two addresses was Terrace vs St. Everything else was the same.

I had to read the address three times before I saw the difference.

So he went to the wrong house and when he knocked on the door, 84-year-old Andrew Lester, who is white, shot Ralph twice. Once immediately, and once after he was on the ground.

So that was Thursday.

And what happened after that?

Well, Ralph was rushed to the hospital of course. And Lester… slept in his own bed that night. And for a few nights following that. Because even though he SHOT a 16 year old TWICE, on his PORCH… he was not charged at all.

Gee, I wonder if that would be the case if Lester was black and Yarl was white.

Just kidding. I’m not an idiot. Of course I don’t wonder that. And of COURSE that would not be the case!

On Sunday, Yarl’s aunt created a GoFundMe to cover medical expenses, which is when this story really gained some much needed traction. Because everyone started sharing it on social media, including pushes to call or email the prosecutor’s office and demand that Lester is charged for the time he, allegedly, shot a 16-year-old twice for just… being at the wrong door.

As of this recording, the arrest warrant for Lester has been issued, but he has not yet been arrested.

Lester has been charged with assault, as well as armed criminal action. A hate crime charge is not a part of charges against him. The prosecuting attorney, Zachary Thompson, said Missouri’s hate crime law is considered a lesser felony than first-degree assault, and carries a less severe penalty.

Someone should… fix that part of the law.

This story is moving fast, and I will keep you updated when we have more.

As of this recording, Yarl is home and, according to a statement, “doing well physically,” but, of course, has a lot of emotional trauma to overcome.

Jayland Walker

-Jayland Walker via NY Times

In absolutely related news, an Ohio judge has decided there will be NO charges for the eight officers involved in the death of Jayland Walker.

Walker was a 25-year-old Black man who died after being shot 46 times by the police after an attempted traffic stop resulted in a chase.

Shot 46 times.

No charges.

What on earth are we even doing?

Chinese Police Outpost Charges

-via NY Times

Two men have been charged with running an unauthorized Chinese police outpost in New York’s Lower Manhattan. It’s one of more than a 100 of these offices around the world, and their purpose is to intimidate and control Chinese citizens while they’re abroad, as well as squash criticism of the Communist Party.

The two men have been arrested and charged with obstructing justice and conspiring to act as agents of the Chinese government.

DeSantis Attempts to Save Face Against Disney

-via CNN

Ron DeSantis, of the Just Take the L and Move On My Guy, DeSantis’ is ready to fight back at Disney. He’s not quite sure how yet, but here’s what he’s thinking so far:

He wants to build a prison, or competing theme park, near Disney World. OR he’ll raise their taxes.

This is the funniest thing in the world to me.

Let’s break it down.

Raise taxes? Um… okay. I guess. Sure feels like raising taxes on one specific company just because they’re not super into hating people like you are sets not the best precident, not to mention I don’t totally know how you’ll do it. But that certainly feels like… like if we’re going to pretend any of this is realistic, this is probably your best bet.

Next… so you’re going to build a prison next to Disney World? My guy – you got married at Disney World, so it’s wild to me that you are choosing to forget about the Disney bubble. You can go to Florida, sure. But going to Disney World and going to Florida are two different things. Once you land at the airport in Florida, you take an uber or hop on a Disney bus to the resort. And then that’s that. You are surrounded by Disney.

By the by… Florida has the third highest prison population (behind California and Texas). So perhaps they should stop building prisons because they’re just gonna want to fill them, and they’re not so good at fairly charging people.

Anyway, it’s a dumb idea.

Then we’ve got what can only be described as the dumbest possible idea. The actual dumbest idea. Build a competing theme park.

A theme park that can compete with Disney World.

What on earth? How dumb of an idea can he possibly come up with? Universal is the next competitor. So does his dumb brain think he can just… invent a theme park more successful than both Universal and Disney World? Do you think you’re smart enough for that? Hun… you are not.

Take the L and move on my guy.

This guy wants to be president! How much worse will his ideas be when he’s got 50 states to think about?

WGA Votes to Strike

-via NPR

And finally, after years or dwindling salaries and residuals brought on by an influx of streaming services, the Writers Guild has voted in favor of a strike if a deal for a new contract can’t be struck by the time their current contract ends. Which means that we could possibly be looking at a writers strike on May 1st.

So… here’s hoping they can get this solved by then!

And that’s it. That’s the news!

I’m proud of… writers and really all union workers who fight for their rights.

It’s also National Animal Crackers Day, and I’m proud of anyone who can honestly look at those crackers and be able to decipher which animal they actually are, or

But more than that… more than anyone who can tell me why they’re called crackers and not cookies… I’m proud of you!