04/20/23
Good morning! It’s Thursday, April 20th. Hehe
Um, no no… it’s… hey! It’s National High Five Day.
I LOVE a high five. Big high five guy. They’re just so fun!
And now, the news.
Supreme Court Extends Abortion Pill Stay
-via AP News
Let’s start with the Supreme Court. Why? Well, because we start low and then… well, I guess just stay there.
As you may remember, Wednesday was the deadline for the Supreme Court to decide if anyone with a uterus should be allowed to have rights. On Wednesday, they extended access of the pill until Friday. And what will happen on Friday? Well, hopefully by Friday they’ll have made their decision. Well, hang on, let me amend that. Hopefully by Friday they will decide that we should be afforded bodily autonomy and the pill will stay on the market.
What they are specifically trying to figure out whether to allow restrictions on the pill to take effect while the legal challenge to the FDA approval continues.
The justices gave no reason for the two-day extension or signal which way they’ll rule. Anyone’s guess. And what a cool rad thing that is, to just have rights be all up in the air with no way of knowing if we’ll get to keep said rights. V V neat
Federal Judge Denies Bragg’s Subpoena Block Request
-via CNN
On Wednesday, a federal judge denied Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg’s request for a temporary restraining order that would put a stop to the House Judiciary Committee’s subpoena of former prosecutor Mark Pomerantz.
So, while Bragg’s office will appeal the ruling, for now it looks like Jimmy Jords will get his way, and Pomerantz will need to head to the House and answer questions about Trump’s money crimes investigation, not to get more information on Trump’s crimes, but to make a mockery of the whole thing and, I guess, try and help Jords raise more money and social clout.
McCarthy’s Debt Ceiling Plan
-via Reuters
Kevin McCarthy has unveiled his plan to raise our national debt ceiling to $1.5 trillion. He would also like to cut spending by three times that amount.
Can you guess what he wants to cut? I bet you can if you try…
It would repeal the green-energy incentives signed into law, increase domestic oil and gas production, pull back unspent COVID-19 relief money, cancel the recent budget increase for the IRS, and impose stiffer work requirements for some benefit programs – aka, hey? Do you have cancer and you want health insurance and some government help with your bills? We’re gonna need you to pick up some shifts in between chemo appoints.
Oh, and of course it’s a big goodbye to student-loan forgiveness.
Obviously it will likely get rejected outright, but it will at least start the negotiation engines.
Oklahoma County Commissioner Resigns
-via NBC News
An Oklahoma county commissioner has resigned after secretly recorded footage of him talking about killing reporters and lamenting that you can’t lynch Black people anymore.
An elected official.
I’ve heard part of the tape, it’s heinous.
The Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation has launched an investigation.
A New Focus on “Stand Your Ground” Laws
In addition to Ralph Yarl, whose story is different because there was a very clear, undeniable, racial motivation to the shooting, I have two other shootings to tell you about.
First, Kaylin Gillis – a 20-year-old woman who, along with another car and a motorcycle, accidentally drove up the wrong driveway in rural upstate New York last Saturday. As they were driving away, the homeowner shot at the cars – and Kaylin was killed. They were driving away. Didn’t even get out of the car.
Then, in Texas, just after midnight on Tuesday, two cheerleaders were shot, one of the critically, after one of them accidentally tried to get into the wrong car in a supermarket parking lot.
Together, these shootings, particularly of Yarl and Gillis, have brought new attention to the Stand Your Ground law that allows people to use deadly force in public when they fear for their safety. Even, according to the state policy director for the Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence, “if it can be proven that you knew you had safe alternatives to force and violence by stepping away.”
At least 28 states do not require people to retreat from any place in which they are "lawfully present," and about 10 specifically use the phrase "stand your ground."
The last time so much attention was on the law was 2012, when George Zimmerman murdered 17-year-old Trayvon Martin while he was walking home.
We should have amended, if not outright ditched, the law then. Here’s hoping that, this time, we can make some much needed change for good. Because between birthday parties, dance halls, churches, schools, literally any other public place, and now u-turns and wrong doors… we’re running out of places to not be afraid we’ll be killed.
Florida Expands Hate
-via AP News
And finally… A bill to expand Florida’s anti-LGBTQ+ bill, aka Don’t Say Gay, has been approved by the state board.
This expansion bans classroom instruction about sexual orientation and gender identity in all grades. Previously it was banned up to third grade, but Ron DeSantis apparently didn’t think that was hateful enough. And so he personally requested the expansion. So now no one in Florida, including literal adults because this goes through 12th grade, will learn about sexual orientation and gender identity in school.
Absolutely heinous.
This bill is disgusting, hateful, and deadly.
And so is Ron DeSantis.
And that’s it. That’s the news.
I’m proud of… well I guess I’m proud of cheese fries. I guess. I mean… I don’t know. No reason not to, but now I’m thinking I’ve never had them. Hey, when is carne asada fries day? Because I am VERY proud of those.
But more than that… more than potatoes and cheese, which is wild because those are two great things… I’m proud of you.