09/04/25
Good morning! It’s Thursday, September 4th.
National Wildlife Day
Fun fact – an animal qualifies as wildlife if it is nondomesticated and able to find its own food, shelter, and other baseline needs.
That… is Ruth.
I mean, she can find her own food (once I leave it out), this is her shelter so clock that, and cats, this is real, decide on their own whether to be domesticated or not. Dogs, as a species, are domestic animals. Cats, as a species, are not. They decide, individually, whether they want to be domesticated.
Which I find fascinating.
And now, the news.
Venezuela
-via BBC, CBS News, and NY Times
Starting in Venezuela with a couple of pieces of news.
First, on Tuesday night a federal appeals court rejected Trump’s use of the Alien Enemies Act to deport any Venezuelan… I mean he tried to say he was only doing it if they were a part of a genuinely violent Venezuelan gang, but instead he just had people scooping up Venezuelans, some of whom were literally here legally, and shipped them off to a factual torture prison, a designation they are proud of, in El Salvador.
Whoooo startin hot.
Startin hot because… because I’m… well because I’m a human being. And so of course this story is infuriating. But also because one of my best friends is from Venezuela and so this story always just… like… I’m a better person because she came here. Funnier, probably for sure, if you can even believe it. I’m a better person, this country is a better country because millions of people decided to come here. Made the brave decision to leave behind the life they knew and come here to this country. For a variety of reasons, but the underlying reason is that they just want to make a better life for themselves.
And because they are braver than Donald Trump could ever even imagine being, if he were to ever have an imagination, they are being punished.
I’m not saying this gang isn’t a dangerous gang. It is. But just scooping up Venezuelans rit-large is unacceptable. And so say the courts!
And by the way – there are still hundreds of Venezuelans, many of whom we don’t even know who they are, who are sitting in that torture prison in El Salvador.
Startin hot!
Expect this to go to the Supreme Court. All this ruling means is that he shouldn’t have done it. Trump says his hands are tied and he can’t bring anyone back from the prison, which is a documented lie, since he brought back Kilmar Abrego Garcia. And also cause he said it.
But in other Venezuelan news – on Wednesday morning we learned that the US military struck a drug-carrying boat that departed from Venezuela, but was in international water at the time of the attack.
This piece of news is especially interesting when paired with the news that there are three US warships, with 4,000 Marines, just off the coast of Venezuela, which Trump says have been placed in an effort to combat threats from drug cartels. On Tuesday, in reaction, Venezuela’s president dispatched warships and drones to patrol the coastlines of the country.
For what it’s worth – it’s possible this may have violated international human rights and maritime law, since it happened in international waters.
We call that a classic.
Mayor Adams
-via NY Times
In New York, as the general election for mayor ramps up, what’s a little president meddling I always say? (I never say that!) Apparently advisors to Trump have pitched the idea of offering current Mayor Adams a job in hopes of getting him out of the way and, in their eyes, hurting Democratic front-runner Zohran Mamdani’s chances of winning in November. The idea being that Adams voters would go to Cuomo.
No bad ideas in a brainstorm, I guess.
They are so terrible at this! They’re scramblin! People do not like Trump in New York! Do you really think that this is going to help anything? Mamdani is going to win double!
This guy came out of nowhere to win the primary which, in New York, because it is so deeply Democratic, basically means he has won the general.
Anyway, the point of this story is that the President of the United States is basically doing election fraud again by putting his little grub hands in the New York mayoral election.
So that’s something.
Vaccines
And how about a story about two very different takes on vaccines?
In Florida, the state’s Surgeon General is throwing caution to the wind and announced that the state is ending all vaccine mandates.
All of em.
"Every last one of them is wrong and drips with disdain and slavery."
I…
This includes the polio vaccine, chickenpox, measles, mumps, tetanus, all of em.
Slavery?
Meanwhile, on the clear other coast – California, Oregon, and Washington have decided to form what they’re calling a “health alliance” and the three of them will basically coordinate their own vaccine recommendations since the CDC’s recommendations are – hey, what if you just got sick? In its own vaccine, if you really think about it.
TBD on if insurance will cover the vaccine costs if they’re recommended by the states, but not federally, etc etc etc. I expect these answers will come but this announcement is a clear sign that not every state is going to fall in line to a guy who, and again we can’t stress this enough – offered to eat five more brain worms just to get onto a debate stage.
Epstein
-via The Guardian and Axios
On Wednesday, a group of Epstein survivors held a live rally to encourage Congress to release all of the Epstein files. Surprisingly, this is actually the closest Congress has gotten to releasing the files – if all 212 Dems sign, it only needs six Republicans to sign and the rumor is they’ve already gotten four.
They are… so brave.
212 Dems and 4 whole Republicans. Again, we are talking about the worst kind of crime. And all these Republicans are so mad. But also spineless.
What a ride.
Anyway, so they are close to getting a bill signed to release the files but in the meantime actually bravery was shown on Wednesday as, like I said, a group of Epstein survivors held a rally on the capitol and at one point said – you know what? We can also release a list.
"Several of us Epstein survivors have been discussing creating our own list of names. We know the names. Many of us were abused by them." This same woman added the list would be “compiled by survivors and for survivors” and that the public should stay turned for details.
Meanwhile, Trump, who was besties with Epstein but also pushed for the Epstein list to be released right up until he was like oh shoot I’m on it because again – ankles to the brain, ain’t none of it good, is still saying this is a hoax.
I’m not a fan.
Harvard Win
-via NY Times
On Wednesday, Harvard scored yet another win in their ongoing battle against the Trump administration after a federal judge ruled that the government, you’re literally never going to believe this, broke the law (must be an accident, they’d certainly never do it on purpose!) when they froze billions in research funds in the name of combating antisemitism.
Obviously this will continue its way up the judicial ladder but we love a win! In their the ruling, the judge said, “We must fight against antisemitism, but we equally need to protect our rights, including our right to free speech, and neither goal should nor needs to be sacrificed on the altar of the other. Harvard is currently, even if belatedly, taking steps it needs to take to combat antisemitism and seems willing to do even more if need be.”
Surprisingly, he didn’t add – Also, Elon Musk literally did a Nazi salute at one of your Dear Leader parties and you were like I’m fine with that and you dine with Nazis and you’re doing genocide and you don’t care about Jewish people you are just using them as a prop to carry out atrocities at home and abroad and once that isn’t working anymore, you will treat them like you treat every other person in this country that doesn’t fit perfectly into your white supremacist dream… badly. Really really badly.
Not sure why he didn’t add it. Ran outta time, I guess.
Let ‘em Fight
-via CNN
And finally, in Who Cares But It’s Fun to Watch News…
Newsmatch is suing Fox News for engaging in “an exclusionary scheme to increase and maintain its dominance in the market for US right-leaning pay TV news.”
But I also want a chance to trick people about elections and racism too!
I truly don’t care at all, I just think it’s silly. It’s all silly! Everything is silly!
I mean, the terrible terrible news they do isn’t. They’re horrible! More people should listen to this show. Tell your friends.
But whatever. Let them fight.
And that’s it. That’s the news.
I’m proud of… animals. Of all types, really.
And Ruth. She puts up with so, so much.
Also, in yesterday’s episode I said the world’s tallest building was 44 Kim’s but I was counting feet against inches… I did the math all wrong. I am… so sleepy. Anyway, it’s actually like 534 Kims.
Which I learned from my Stepdad who, frankly, was a little too eager to be right, so this is not a great moment for me.
But more than height, because there could be 535 of you and there still wouldn’t be enough… I’m proud of you.