03/07/24

Good morning! It’s Thursday, March 7th.

Alexander Graham Bell Day! On this day in 1876, Alexander Graham Bell got the patent for the telephone. And then 3 days later, on the 10th, he made the first phone call to his assistant, Thomas Watson, saying, “My. Watson, come here. I want to see you.”

Iconic and rude call. Like… it’s called a please. Ever heard of it?

Interestingly, Bell’s mother was deaf and his father was really influential in the deaf community and taught deaf students. Bell went on to marry a deaf woman and worked with the deaf community for the rest of his life.

And now, the news.

House Works to Avert Shutdown

-via CBS News

Stop me if you’ve heard this before…

On Wednesday, the House took their first steps in hoping to pass a short-term spending bill to keep the government open.

Yeah…

As a reminder, the one that they just passed only keeps part of the government open until Friday.

What’s that saying? The definition of insanity is letting Republicans be in charge of the government?

The bill passed on a 339-85 vote, with more Democrats than Republicans voting to keep the government open.

The Senate plans to move quickly to pass the bill. It’s the first of what will ultimately be a six-bill package to fund the government through the end of the fiscal year, which ends September 30th.

National Guard to Patrol Subways

-via NY Times

Citing January’s 45% increase in crime, when compared to last year, New York’s Governor Hochul announced that, starting this week, hundreds of National Guard soldiers and State Police officers join 1,000 additional officers Mayor Eric Adams added to the subways to guard the platforms and check bags.

Riders can opt out of the bag check, but the officers will have the option to refuse them admittance to the subway if they do so.

Armorer Found Guilty

-via ABC News

Hannah Gutierrez, the Rust armorer, has been found guilty of involuntary manslaughter in the on-set shooting of Halyna Hutchins, the cinematographer.

She faces up to 18 months in jail. A sentencing date has yet to be set, but she will remain in custody between now and then.

In the case, prosecutors successfully argued, "This case is about constant, neverending, safety failures that resulted in the death of a human being and nearly killed another."

And I just think that’s incredibly important to repeat here because this was so, so preventable. There are steps in place to prevent it. Over and over again, those steps were ignored and someone died because of it.

Just to give you an idea of what was happening on set, the ways gun safety was egregiously, purposefully, ignored… jurors saw stills actors pointing firearms at other crew members, including a minor actor. There’s also a picture of Gutierrez pointing a gun at her own face.

Experts also determined that there were live rounds in holsters as early as Oct. 10, 2021. Eleven days before Halyna was killed.

Alec Baldwin’s trial for his involuntary manslaughter charges will start in July.

Super Tuesday Fall Out

-via CBS News (Nikki Haley), NY Times (Dean Phillips), and The Guardian (Mitch McConnell)

And finally, let’s talk about a couple things that happened post-Super Tuesday.

First, Nikki Haley has, finally, dropped out.

In her speech she didn’t come out and endorse Trump but I really want to clarify because I keep seeing headlines about how she didn’t endorse. No, she didn’t come out and say she was supporting Trump. But she did say that Trump now needed to get the support of everyone, and she hopes he does.

She said she hopes he wins.

Which is a wild thing to say in general. Because of how Trump has 91 indictments, some for literal insurrection. But it’s also wild because she just spent the last couple seconds of her campaign talking about how bad he is.

But saying you hope he wins is kind of the same thing as an endorsement, so don’t get it totally twisted.

Don’t you worry though, because Trump did pick up an out and out endorsement. From Mitch McConnell.

But it was also such a classic Mitch moment, because he’s never once said anything with a spine. He said he was doing it because Trump clearly has the support of the GOP voters. But like… you absolute feckless loser, you are the one who let him get this far. You hate him. You literally could have said nothing, but instead you just… did this.

What a… uncool dude.

And over on the Democrats side… I assume after someone was like “woah, you’re running for president?” and he was like “oh shoot! Yeah I totally am lol… I should look into that,” Dean Phillips dropped out of the race and did out and out endorse Biden.

Marianne Williamson is still in the fight.

And that’s it. That’s the news.

It’s also national cereal day.

I love cereal. Honestly, of all kinds. It’s just… it’s nice. It’s a treat.

But more than that, because you are also a treat… I’m proud of you.