(C) Daily Kos This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . Good News Roundup for Friday, June 7, 2024: Vive la Résistance! [1] ['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.'] Date: 2024-06-07 Welcome 🌻 to Friday’s Roundup of Good News! Today is 80 years plus one day after the Americans stormed the beaches in World War II. But I’ve been thinking about the resistance before they arrived — and after. Last October, the mother of an old friend of mine died at the venerable age of 100. She was originally French, and when she was in her 20s, she was in the resistance (then married an American GI and moved to New York). I have been thinking a lot about her time in the resistance. Those years must have been so frightening, and yet she was so courageous. She could not be sure who she could trust. She was also from the region of Normandy. What June 7th — le septième juin in 1944 — must have been for her! The day after the storming! I imagine she experienced a sense of hope but also the knowledge the job was not yet done. The Americans had landed, but the Nazis were still killing people. She was not yet safe. She had to take risks to persist. We can identify with her. We have made progress against the fascists, but the job is not yet done; our victory is not yet guaranteed. We may not be fighting bombs (though some would like to bomb us). But we are fighting hatred and lies, which may not kill us (at least not at once), but which can be much more insidious. We don’t know how we may be punished for showing compassion or for speaking the truth. But we have more people on our side, sometimes more than we know. And we can win even more, if we reach out to people. If you can, reach out to someone who might be low information. Let them know what is going on. Gnusies, I’m traveling today, so I can’t be with you. But you know what to do! Come on in, partake of the cold buffet, and enjoy what some of our allies are doing! Regular Scheduled Programming No one here is naïve; we are aware of the many who are fighting to destroy our country. Some of us expected it: the cheating, the lying, the chaos, and yes, even the attempts to cling to power despite the clear will of the people. But we are here to read the efforts and the positive results of those (including us and our fellow gnus) who are working so hard to save our country from those very bad people. We are furious with them for what they are doing and we are letting them know. Remember: 💙 There are more of us than there are of them. 💛 They are terrified when we organize. THERE IS LOTS OF EVIDENCE THAT THEY ARE TERRIFIED! 💔 They want us to be demoralized. The best way to keep up your spirits is to fight. So, take the time to recharge your batteries, but find ways to contribute to the well-being of our country and our world. 🗽 Biden as President ! 🗽 Biden, Harris and their administration have been hard at work. Here are the last week’s posts at the White House briefing room. 👎 Out with the Bad, In with the Good 👍 👎 Powerplants to 👍 Parklands Cristen Hemingway Jaynes EcoWatch There are currently more than 200 coal-fired power plants in operation in the United States, but the country has been scaling back since reaching its coal generation peak in 2011. By the end of 2026, the U.S. is projected to have retired half of its coal capacity. Coal plants emit toxic pollutants into the air, water and soil, leaving a legacy of contamination that must be cleaned up after their decommission. But what happens to coal plants after they shut down? Michigan’s Environmental Law & Policy Center (ELPC) sees retiring coal plants — once viewed as industrial scars on the landscape — as “canvases for the creation of new greenways, parklands, wildlife habitat, and clean energy development,” a press release from ELPC said. ✂️ With its new Power Plants to Parklands (P2P) initiative, ELPC plans to reinvision the redevelopment portion of the transition from wasteland to sanctuary. “Historically, coal plants were situated on lakes and rivers because of their reliance on water for cooling systems. As a result, these facilities often occupy marquee waterfront locations, making them prime for public use. However, retired coal plant sites are too often left as a blight in the community. Many are fenced off from the public, as off-limits as prisons,” the press release said. I hope Michiganders appreciate their 💙 trifecta! NRA money woes mean less money for lobbying Joanne Haner, OpenSecrets, Jimmy Cloutier, OpenSecrets at Raw Story Following years of legal setbacks, internal strife and declining revenue, the National Rifle Association reported spending $540,000 in federal lobbying spending during the first quarter of 2024 — the least amount of money the group has spent at the start of a year since 2009, according to lobbying disclosures reviewed by OpenSecrets. Last year, the preeminent gun rights group spent $2.3 million, a near-record low. In February, a New York jury found former NRA CEO Wayne LaPierre liable in a civil trial for misusing millions of dollars of the organization’s money to pay for his lavish lifestyle, including exotic getaways and trips on private planes. LaPierre resigned as executive vice president and CEO on the eve of the trial. 💣 Republicans: Party of Crimes and Chaos 💣 Lots of Rs not happy with tRump Kate Plummer Newsweek One in three Republican voters say they would have preferred a different candidate to Donald Trump for the upcoming presidential election. In March, the former president won enough primary races to secure the Republican nomination in the 2024 presidential election. However, according to a survey of 1,003 Americans by Canadian polling firm Leger, Trump does not command the full support of his base and 33 percent of this demographic would have preferred another politician. Meanwhile, this proportion is higher (47 percent) among Republican voters aged 18-34 years old. The survey was conducted between May 24-May 26. The margin of error is plus or minus 3.09 percent. Polls are not that reliable these days, but it’s an interesting data point. James Comer, China, and pot Roger Sollenberger The Daily Beast Rep. James Comer (R-KY) has for months used his power as House Oversight chair to assail Hunter Biden’s involvement in a failed business deal with a Chinese energy company. But The Daily Beast has obtained emails and other documents showing that when Comer was running for governor of Kentucky, he himself was involved in a failed Chinese business deal. It involved importing Chinese hemp seeds through Comer’s office—he was Kentucky’s agriculture commissionerat the time—to benefit a campaign donor’s company that Comer had fast-tracked for his industrial hemp pilot program. The documents—which The Daily Beast obtained after the Kentucky government released them to a third party in response to open records requests—contain a stunning revelation: While the emails show the involved parties clearly intended to import only legal hemp, two rounds of tests revealed the plants were essentially Chinese pot, containing illegally high levels of THC, the psychoactive compound that gives marijuana users a high. Does anyone know why they do things like this? x The RNC is a well-oiled machine. pic.twitter.com/LmBnO58qo6 — Ron Filipkowski (@RonFilipkowski) June 5, 2024 Because it could be incompetence. But it could also be a way to distract us. We have heard about a lot of money. But we have not seen the money. Where is the money? Ron Filipkowski: He raised over $200 million to fight “election fraud” in 2020-21. What happened to that money? He never even paid Rudy. He raised over $100 million to help GOP candidates in the midterms and spent 5% of it helping candidates. What happened to the rest? Where is it all going? And, from Scaramucci: Hmmm. Why is tRump closing his outreach offices if he has raised so much money? x He raised over $200 million to fight “election fraud” in 2020-21. What happened to that money? He never even paid Rudy. He raised over $100 million to help GOP candidates in the midterms and spent 5% of it helping candidates. What happened to the rest? Where is it all going? https://t.co/tolZPG1GIb — Ron Filipkowski (@RonFilipkowski) June 4, 2024 Another sign that tRump is not ahead: he’s trying to get Rs to vote early now. x On today’s Uncovered, I talked about how Trump has suddenly abandoned his position on early and mail-in balloting after his rantings cost Republicans in the 2021-22 elections, and the origin story of the conspiracy. Link to full show: https://t.co/kwFipv8whl pic.twitter.com/BO9LbEBwII — Ron Filipkowski (@RonFilipkowski) June 6, 2024 The problem is, once you have trained someone not to do something, it is really hard to get them to do it. They were told so many times that only votes on election day count — it was part of tRump’s strategy via the red mirage — I don’t think they can change this approach easily. 🚚 💙 Democrats Deliver 💙 🚚 Biden’s remarks — some of them — in France And we must remember: The fact that they were heroes here that day does not absolve us from what we have to do today. Democracy is never guaranteed. Every generation must preserve it, defend it, and fight for it. That’s the test of the ages. In memory of those who fought here, died here, literally saved the world here, let us be worthy of their sacrifice. Let us be the generation that when history is written about our time — in 10, 20, 30, 50, 80 years from now — it will be said: When the moment came, we met the moment. We stood strong. Our alliances were made stronger. And we saved democracy in our time as well. Attorney Garland speaks to some members of the House Thank you, Chairman Jordan, Ranking Member Nadler, and distinguished members of this Committee. Since I last appeared before you, the more than 115,000 employees of the Department of Justice have continued to work to fulfill our mission on behalf of the American people: to keep our country safe, to protect civil rights, and to uphold the rule of law. Just 10 days ago, we secured the extradition of one of the lead sicarios, or assassins, of the Sinaloa Cartel, one of the most dangerous drug trafficking organizations in the world. Just last month, we secured a 27-year prison sentence for a man who attempted to kill three NYPD officers in a terrorist attack in Times Square in 2022. In just the first three months of this year: We charged seven members of a hacking group backed by the Chinese government. We disrupted a botnet controlled by Russian intelligence services. And we seized over $108 million and 500,000 barrels of fuel that would otherwise have enabled the Government of Iran to further support Hamas, Hizballah, and other terrorist groups. We have continued our work to drive down violent crime — work that we know is paying off. Last year’s historic decline in homicides — the largest one-year decline in 50 years — is continuing. In the first quarter of this year, we have already seen an 18% drop in murders. We know we have much more work to do. We have also remained steadfast in our commitment to the Justice Department’s founding purpose to protect civil rights. We have aggressively investigated and prosecuted hate crimes that victimize individuals and terrorize entire communities. And we have brought to justice the perpetrators of those crimes — Like the defendant in Florida who attacked two Black women because of the color of their skin; The defendant in Michigan who defaced a synagogue with swastikas; The defendant in Missouri who set fire to a community Islamic Center; and The defendant in Tennessee who committed a series of arsons targeting Catholic, Methodist, and Baptist churches. We have worked to protect the reproductive freedoms that are protected by federal law. In Idaho, we sued to ensure that women in the state would have access to the emergency care guaranteed to them under federal law. We have continued to protect the right to vote, and to have that vote counted. We successfully challenged a redistricting plan in Galveston County, Texas. The district court recognized that the plan violated Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act by depriving the county’s Black and Latino voters of an equal opportunity to participate in the political process and elect a candidate of their choice. We have continued to prosecute fraud and challenge illegal monopolies that drive up prices for consumers. This year, we sued to break up Live Nation-Ticketmaster for its monopoly of the live concert industry. And we sued Apple for monopolizing smart phone markets. We have also continued to fulfill the responsibility that underlies all of our work — to uphold the rule of law. That is why we have worked to combat a worrying spike in threats of violence against those who serve the public. Those threats including targeting members of Congress, police officers, judges, jurors, election workers, and the Justice Department’s own employees. Let me be clear: if anyone threatens public servants with violence, we will hold them accountable. 💜 Unity? 💜 What General Eisenhower sent to the troops the night before D-Day: It is our turn to fight. As the Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin just said: “If the troops of the world’s democracies could risk their lives for freedom then, surely the citizens of the world’s democracies can risk our comfort for freedom now.” You can watch much of the actual celebration here: Also, all should be reminded — now that it is June 7 and not June 6 — how tRump called these people “suckers and losers.” And more: x A touching exchange between President Zelensky and American D-Day veteran: Veteran: "You're a savior of the people" Zelensky: "No no, you saved Europe." 🫡🇺🇸🇺🇦 pic.twitter.com/1OS5fSnXP1 — Republicans against Trump (@RpsAgainstTrump) June 6, 2024 Empty Greene tried to get the House to defund our commitment to NATO (which supports our troops, not the troops of other countries). Merci à Dieu, she only got 46 other Rs to vote for it: Giulia Carbonaro Newsweek A total of 46 House Republicans voted in favor of an amendment to defund NATO introduced on Tuesday night by Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, a loyal Donald Trump ally who has long opposed military and financial aid to Ukraine. Greene called for an amendment which would have struck over "$433 million in NATO funding" from the Military Construction and Veterans Affairs appropriations bill, she told members of Congress while speaking on the House floor. ✂️ But the amendment—which recalls the isolationist foreign policies of the Trump administration—ultimately failed, as 157 House Republicans voted against it, together with all 197 Democrats. 🌈 Rainbowmakers unite! x I love my city! In response to Gov. Ron DeSantis banning Pride lights being displayed on bridges in Florida this year, dozens of local residents used different color flashlights to project a rainbow on the Main Street Bridge in downtown Jacksonville. Picture: @JimmyMidyette pic.twitter.com/MBv3VQwVOH — Travis Akers (@travisakers) June 1, 2024 Under a deal reached on Sunday, Saudi Arabia and its allies will start increasing oil production from October. Although I don’t want more oil in the world, cheaper gas will help Biden in the election. x COLUMN: Under a deal reached on Sunday, Saudi Arabia and its allies will start increasing oil production from October. My take: "After relentlessly pursuing $100-a-barrel oil, the OPEC+ cartel has all but thrown in the towel."#OOTT @Opinion https://t.co/OtCuji4FUl — Javier Blas (@JavierBlas) June 3, 2024 📥 Actions You Can Take 📤 Tax-exempt organization complaint referrals. 13909. You can fill this out for the NRA and lots of other organizations. How about if some of us white folk go into some of the MAGA churches and video record what they’re saying? Voting rights. This may be the biggest issue threatening our democracy right now. Besides contacting your representatives at the state and federal level to do the right thing (depending on who they are), you can support and contact these organizations: ACLU — American Civil Liberties Union Democracy Docket — founded by Marc Elias, so important in fighting the challenges after the last election. Fair Fight — founded by Stacey Abrams 🌱Grass roots. Biden and Harris can do the top-down stuff, but we have to support from the bottom. I don’t know how to deprogram 75 million people, but some things have been written about, such as deep canvassing, and lots of people are talking about this. If you know someone (who did not storm the Capitol), then see if you can be pleasant. Instead of trying to reason with them (logic is obviously not their strong point) distract them with something else. We need to remove the sources of lies and to take down the temperature. If we get more of the Rs to wear masks and to get vaccinated and to vote for Ds, the country will be a better place. We need to coax some of them out of the rabbit holes and diffuse the anger and the crazy. 🏃 Run for something. If you want to run for something, but have no idea what to do, these people will help you. They also like money and volunteers to help those people who are running, so even if you’re not in a position to stand for office, you can help. Note: they are especially planning to target the 57 Rs in local governments who participated in the insurrection. 👎 Defund the seditionists. Defund the seditionists. This is a list with companies that sometimes have donated to the seditionists. The list is long. You will recognize many of the corporations, and you probably have a relationship with some — either you are a customer, a shareholder, or maybe even an employee. Contact them and compliment or complain, but let them know you are watching. Forward it to others. 🔎 Want to check out what’s going on with campaign contributions? Check out this diary. 👀 🐍 Schadenfreude 😈 This is really satisfying: Bannon ordered to prison! Starting July 1! x BREAKING: Steve Bannon has been ordered to turn himself into prison on July 1. By delaying his turn in, he will now be in prison during the lead up to the election. Story. https://t.co/4F3bQd6rJx — Ron Filipkowski (@RonFilipkowski) June 6, 2024 The DOJ is busy taking down criminals. Like this pharmaceutical money launderer in Texas Justice Press Release A Texas pharmacy owner was sentenced today to four years and four months in prison and ordered to pay over $59 million in restitution for paying illegal kickbacks and engaging in a money laundering conspiracy. According to court documents and evidence presented at trial, Richard Hall, 53, of Fort Worth, worked with others to create and market expensive compounded medications, which are intended to be custom-tailored to individual patient needs. Hall paid marketers to recruit area doctors to write prescriptions for these expensive compounded medications, including by creating so-called “investment opportunities” so that doctors who wrote prescriptions to the pharmacy could profit from the pharmacy operations. Hall paid illegal kickbacks to these marketers and engaged in a conspiracy to launder the unlawful proceeds. A federal jury in the Northern District of Texas convicted Hall in July 2023 of four counts of paying and receiving unlawful kickbacks and one count of conspiring to launder money. FAFO. Wisconsin indicts three tRump allies for the fake electors scheme in WI Melissa Quinn CBS News Washington — Three allies to former President Donald Trump were charged in Wisconsin on Tuesday in connection to an alleged scheme to send slates of fake electors to Congress after the 2020 presidential election and keep Trump in power for a second term. Kenneth Chesebro, James Troupis and Michael Roman each face one felony count of forgery, according to court records. The three are set to make their initial appearances in Dane County Circuit Court on Sept. 19, court records show. The charge carries a sentence of up to six years in prison and a fine of up to $10,000. tRump’s candidate loses x BREAKING: Trump-backed candidate for New Jersey's Republican Senate primary, Christine Serrano Glassner, loses big, in the latest sign of weakness for Trump's candidacy. https://t.co/kjqVdu2lFV — MeidasTouch (@MeidasTouch) June 5, 2024 I hope no one was hurt, but this seems like such a perfect metaphor: x If this doesn’t sum up #MAGA perfectly I don’t know what does. This jerkoff in my hometown Staten Island has his Trump Bus, and he smashed it on his way to the #TrumpRally with the other pimp @ScottLoBaido and America’s Embarrassment @RudyGiuliani. They both are embarrassments. pic.twitter.com/ygXweADafT — The Truth Matters (@StephenN55) June 2, 2024 It demonstrates the incompetence of the tRumpies. And the fact that it’s a bus makes me wonder if it is one of those buses used to bus in the same tRump supporters to many different rallies. 📣 Let’s Honor Truth ☀️️ This week we honor an Idaho (!!!) jury and Eric Posey, a drag queen who fought against defamation Praveena Somasundrum, Washington Post The day after Eric Posey put on three drag performances at a 2022 Idaho Pride event, a conservative blogger falsely claimed that he had exposed himself in front of children. Summer Bushnell, an Idaho resident who runs a conservative online blog, encouraged readers to share the posts, which included an edited, blurred video from Posey’s performance and contact information for local police and the state attorney general. Posey sued Bushnell in September 2022, accusing her of defamation. On Friday, a jury unanimously agreed, awarding Posey nearly $1.2 million in damages, his attorney confirmed to The Washington Post. In a statement provided by his attorney, Posey said he was grateful the jury “rejected the lies that put me in a dark place for nearly two years.” We thank Eric Posey — fighting against such lies is really hard — and the jury in Idaho!!! — who have made it riskier to be someone spreading lies, FAFO 🌹 Let’s Celebrate Love ❤️ Honoring those who went to defend democracy 80 years ago! Acts of courage and love. Goodable: This was the scene as hundreds of US Veterans arrived in Paris to commemorate the 80th anniversary of D-Day. More than 141, 000 Americans gave their lives to liberate Europe during WW2. Many of the survivors today are around 100 years old. x This was the scene as hundreds of US Veterans arrived in Paris to commemorate the 80th anniversary of D-Day. More than 141,000 Americans gave their lives to liberate Europe during WW2. Many of the survivors today are around 100 years old.pic.twitter.com/H95HLQnSHI — Goodable (@Goodable) June 2, 2024 And here they are being welcomed by the 1st lady of France: x Welcome to France, heroes. pic.twitter.com/q6HFecv9xX — Emmanuel Macron (@EmmanuelMacron) June 4, 2024 📎 Odds & Ends 📎 Increasing renewable energy in US brings in billions of benefits Cristen Hemingway Jaynes EcoWatch A new report by scientists at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and renewables consulting firm Clean Kilowatts has found that the United States’ increasing use of renewable energy has improved air quality and reduced the country’s greenhouse gas emissions while producing monetary benefits in the hundreds of billions of dollars. ✂️ The researchers found that the country’s reduction in the use of fossil fuels, coupled with an increase in wind and solar, slashed its carbon emissions by 992.1 million tons — equal to taking 71 million automobiles off the road each year. “Wind and solar generation reduce electric sector pollutant emissions and associated climate-related and air quality-related health damages,” the scientists wrote in the study. “From 2019 through 2022, wind and solar generation in the United States provided $249 billion dollars of climate and air quality benefits based on central estimates. In 2022, the normalized benefits were $143/MWh and $100/MWh for wind and solar, respectively, or $36/MWh and $17/MWh when only including air quality benefits. Combined, wind and solar generation led to 1,200 to 1,600 fewer premature mortalities in 2022.” Improved refrigeration could slash food waste Cristen Hemingway Jaynes EcoWatch This picture made me 😄 A new study by researchers at University of Michigan (UMichigan) has concluded that almost half of food waste globally — roughly 620 million metric tons — could be saved by food supply chains being fully refrigerated. Each year, approximately a third of worldwide food production goes to waste, a press release from UMichigan said. Meanwhile, according to the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization, roughly 800 million people go hungry. By fully refrigerating food supply chains — creating “cold chains” — greenhouse gas emissions related to food waste would be reduced by 41 percent globally, the study said. 🐦 I do a lot of other writing. A recent offering: the Crow Nickels (chronicles), a trilogy about crows who want to save birdkind from extinction: Hunters of the Feather, Scavengers of Mind and Familiars of the Flock (They’re really good! They’re really cheap! Buy and review or rate positively! And Hunters is also available on Audible!) Other stories, based on Jane Austen novels — such as The Meryton Murders — and others based on history and Greek mythology, such as Jocasta: The Mother-Wife of Oedipus, can be found here. All titles are available through Kindle Unlimited, but I only get paid if you turn the pages. 💙 What You Can Do to Rescue Democracy 💙 It turns out that participation in democracy is not just an every-four-years event but requires active participation, like, whenever you can find time. Current projects: Look in the comments for Progressive Muse’s report on Postcards to Voters And some other ideas: You can relax and recharge. You can join protests and freeway blog. You can help register new voters. You can smile. You can say something nice to friend or a stranger. You can get out the vote for special elections. You can reach out to upset Republicans. We need to win some back. You can share your ideas below. 🌻 💙 “Our history has been a constant struggle between the American ideal that we all are created equal and the harsh ugly reality that racism, nativism, fear, demonization have long torn us apart. The battle is perennial, and victory is never assured.” 💙 President Joseph R. Biden 🌹 🌹 🌹 [END] --- [1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2024/6/7/2244396/-Good-News-Roundup-for-Friday-June-7-2024-Vive-la-R-sistance?pm_campaign=front_page&pm_source=trending&pm_medium=web Published and (C) by Daily Kos Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified. via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds: gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/