07/13/23

Good morning! It’s Thursday, July 13th.

Beef Tallow Day.

Here’s something – I’m pescatarian as a lot of you know, mostly because I try to be as annoying as possible about it. But for some reason, on TikTok, I keep seeing all these videos about people cooking wagu beef. Probably because I watch them and so the app’s like – oh this person is super into it.

It’s something about the marbling… I don’t get it. But beef tallow is beef fat.

And now, the news.

Hackers in China Breach Government Emails

-via Bloomberg

Let’s start with tech talk… Hackers in China breached the email accounts of around 25 organizations, including, according to Microsoft, multiple government agencies. We don’t have a full list yet but the State department has confirmed that they are one of the organizations that was hacked.

The breach was first learned about mid-June, which I read as months ago, before I remembered that it’s July, not, you know, April. And so mid-June was just a couple weeks ago actually. Time, ya know?

Concerningly, the hacks appear to have begun May 15th and went undetected until June 16th. And it’s the fact that they were undetected for a month that’s really a bummer to hear.

Vegas Hostage Freed

-via AP News

In – Hey! Keep it together! Kelly Clarkson has a residency in your town! – news… a man has been arrested after he took a woman hostage for hours in Caesars Palace on Tuesday. No injuries were reported, though the man did throw furniture from the broken window of his 21st floor room down to the pool area.

Justice Thomas Takes Venmo, Apparently

-via The Guardian

So… just a warning… This is one of those stories that’s going to make you see red. Well, it made me see red at least.

Supreme Court Justice, and noted badman, Clarence Thomas, who takes private flights with nazi memorabilia collectors and is married to someone that is full on Q and sent some wildly embarrassing texts to Trump Chief of Staff to say “oh pretty please Marky Meads, please help do a coup for Trump”… um… is worse than we thought.

Or, maybe as bad as we thought but also dumb…

In some truly baller reporting, the Guardian found that several lawyers who had business before the Supreme Court, including one who just argued the affirmative action case, paid money to the Justice’s top aide, VIA VENMO.

And public Venmo at that.

They appear to have been in connection to Thomas’ 2019 Christmas party.

As happens with Venmo, the amounts are not disclosed but each payment was listed as: “Christmas party”, “Thomas Christmas Party”, “CT Christmas Party” or “CT Xmas party”

Can we PLEASE get some ethic laws rushed on over to the highest court in the land? Like, asap?

Trump Crime Update Time

-via NY Times (Ray Epps) and CNN (Joselyn Benson)

Okay, we’ve got two

Trump Crime Update Times

That aren’t about Trump, but also couldn’t be possible without Trump.

You’ll see.

So first we’ve got the story of Ray Epps, who was at the center of a January 6th conspiracy theory that Fox News glommed onto. The story, which I won’t go into much detail on because the whole thing about it is that it’s a lie, is that Epps was an undercover agent who instigated the violence at the Capitol on the 6th as a way to make Trump look bad.

Which is a wild theory on its own because like, Trump’s not good at much, but he’s great at making himself look bad. Perhaps his only skill.

Anyway, Epps is rightfully suing Fox News for an undisclosed amount after they received death threats and were forced to sell their Arizona ranch and wedding business.

Epps is a former Marine, who voted for Trump twice (once in each election. Not twice in one election.). And yet bing bong Tuck Carlson was like “yeah! He did it!” and then, AND THEN, Senator Tedward Cruz, and House Rep Thomas Massie, went on to echo those claims.

Sue em all, Epps.

And then, speaking of how the 2020 election didn’t have fraud by voters but it did have a dude who doesn’t know how to wear appropriately-lengthed ties instigate a deadly coup…

CNN is exclusively reporting that Michigan’s Secretary of State, and overall absolutely baller, Jocelyn Benson, was interviewed by Coach Beard last month to talk about the time that Trump tried to overturn the 2020 election because acknowledging that he lost would mean acknowledging that people don’t like him. And if he acknowledges that people don’t like him, he might have to acknowledge that he doesn’t like himself.

So now that makes two Secretary of States, and one high-ranking official from the GOP in a third state, that Coach Beard has interviewed.

Let me tell you something about Jocelyn Benson – no one’s stealing an election on her watch. Also, I don’t think she wears ties but if she did, you better believe they’d be appropriately-lengthed.

Big fan.

Actors Strike and Emmy News

-via CNN and Deadline (strike) and Deadline (Emmy’s)

Strike strike strike!

After an extended deadline, the SAG-AFTRA strike appears to be poised to strike starting today. I’m recording this Wednesday evening and there is no official news yet. However, unless there’s another extension, the current contract is up at 11:59 PM tonight. Well, last night. Wednesday night.

In a “isn’t timing a funny thing” bit of news… Emmy nominations came out on Wednesday morning. Succession earned the most nominations, with 27, followed by The Last of Us at 24, White Lotus at 23, and my heart of hearts Ted Lasso picked up 21.

Currently the Emmy’s are scheduled for September 18th but I BELIEVE… they could be rescheduled if the strike is still happening, since no one’s going to feel like doing a whole bunch of the celebrating of the industry by then.

Not that people are feeling like celebrating right now… although they backtracked after getting busted, the AMPTP got caught saying they basically will strike until the writers are desperate. Let real life human beings go broke and cripple a town that runs on an industry that just got back on its feet after the pandemic… all because multi-millionaires want to be multi-multi-millionaires. Truly disgusting.

By the by – here’s how much it would cost to fulfill the WGA contract demands: for 0.091 percent of Disney’s revenue, 0.214 of Netflix’s, 0.108 percent of Warner Bros. Discovery’s, 0.148 percent of Paramount Global’s, 0.028 percent of NBC Universal’s and 0.006 percent of Amazon’s.

So yeah – bring an industry to its knees for .091%.

Sidenote – speaking of the actors strike… striking actors are not able to appear for promotional events. So film premieres and also things like Comic-Con are going to be a little less star-studded.

And that’s it. That’s the news.

Oh! I’m mad now! I shouldn’t have ended on that story. I went back and forth on what to end with… I see now that I messed up.

I’m proud of unions. Union solidarity baybee.

And I’m proud of… those tiktok chefs. Some seem really cool. Some seem unhinged. Life, ya know?

But more than that… more than chef’s that I don’t know, if you can believe it… because you are also very talented… I’m proud of you.