In the News

Here is some stuff in the news today...

[Content Note: Death] "Dozens of family members walked in protest on Wednesday to the rescue site of a sunken cruise ship in the Yangtze River, asking for news of their relatives who are missing after the worst shipping disaster in modern Chinese history. Rescuers searched for more than 400 missing people, many of them elderly, but hopes of finding more survivors were fading. Only 14 people, including the ship's captain, have been found alive since the ship capsized in a freak tornado on Monday night with 456 people on board. Just 26 bodies have been recovered. Frustrated by the level of information coming from local authorities, about 80 family members took matters into their own hands and hired a bus to take them from Nanjing to Jianli county in Hubei. They were seen walking towards the rescue site late on Wednesday evening. 'This isn't going to be much use, we're just doing this for the government to see,' said Wang Feng, who organized the eight-hour bus trip."

[CN: Disenfranchisement] This is good news: "Democrats allied with Hillary Rodham Clinton are mounting a nationwide legal battle 17 months before the 2016 presidential election, seeking to roll back Republican-enacted restrictions on voter access that Democrats say could, if unchallenged, prove decisive in a close campaign. ...They include voter identification requirements that Democrats consider onerous, time restrictions imposed on early voting that they say could make it difficult to cast ballots the weekend before Election Day, and rules that could nullify ballots cast in the wrong precinct. The effort, which is being spearheaded by a lawyer whose clients include Mrs. Clinton's campaign, reflects an urgent practical need, Democrats say: to get litigation underway early enough so that federal judges can be persuaded to intervene in states where Republicans control legislatures and governor's offices." Voter ID requirements are not just "considered onerous" by Democrats. They're considered discriminatory and a violation of voting rights by anyone who actually gives a shit about voting rights, including the people who can't vote because of them, not all of whom are necessarily Democrats.

[CN: Police killing; disablism; racism] Another man of color has been killed by NYPD officers, after his mother called for help when he was having a manic episode. "An ambulance did come, eventually. But officers from the New York police department came first. An hour later, Reyes was pronounced dead at nearby St Barnabas hospital. Sierra may never know exactly what transpired during the nearly 20 minutes that, by her count, eight officers spent in the living room with her son. ...While police now maintain Reyes died from a cardiac arrest inside the ambulance on his way to hospital, Reyes's mother said she kissed her son's forehead before he left. He was, she argued, already dead." To protect and serve, they tell us.

[CN: War on agency] Oh fuuuuuuuuck: "A bill that would increase North Carolina's mandated waiting period for abortion from 24 hours to 72 hours received final approval Tuesday in the state's GOP-led senate, setting the stage for lawmakers in the house to force the governor's hand on a campaign promise not to create more abortion restrictions." I've nothing but cavernous contempt for the idea underwriting legislation like this that abortion-seeking people need time to "really think about" their choice, as if pregnant people haven't already thought about it by the time they show up at an abortion clinic.

[CN: War; terrorism] Dr. Louise Richardson, soon-to-be vice-chancellor of Oxford University, says "America's response the 9/11 terror attacks was an 'overreaction.'" Ya think?

[CN: Homophobia; prisoner rights] What the shit: Oklahoma's Department of Corrections "has halted all prison weddings—apparently to avoid having inmates enter same-sex marriages." Fuck off.

[CN: Misogyny] Welp: "In a recent press event, [Lily Tomlin and Jane Fonda, the two stars of Netflix's new show Grace and Frankie] revealed that while they are both the headliners and main characters of the new show, Martin Sheen and Sam Waterston, the supporting actors who play their gay ex-husbands, are making the same amount as them. 'That doesn't make us happy,' Fonda said. And Tomlin explained, 'No. The show is not 'Sol and Robert' [Sheen and Waterston’s characters]—it's 'Grace and Frankie.'"

Yayayayayayayay! "Janet Jackson to release first new album in seven years this fall." YES PLEASE!

Gleep glorp! "NASA has big plans to land the first humans on Mars by 2035, but getting there is going to take spacecraft of giant proportions—and larger than anything the agency has ever sent to the red planet before. Enter NASA's low-density supersonic decelerator (LDSD) project, which includes a genuine, bonafide flying saucer that could be what astronauts ride down to the surface of Mars for the first time in the not-too-distant future."

And finally! A video compilation of dogs' first days in their forever homes. Blub.