Players and teams in the English Premier League and the Women’s Super League, the top two soccer leagues in England, will lead a boycott of social media for three days as a protest to abusive and discriminatory posts directed at some players, ESPN reports.

“High-profile players such as Manchester United’s Marcus Rashford and Lauren James, Manchester City forward Raheem Sterling and Liverpool defender Trent Alexander-Arnold have reported that they have received racist abuse on social media platforms,” ESPN reports.

The soccer leagues have reported to social media platforms Facebook and Twitter that there has been an increasing volume of racist and threatening posts against players of color.  Many of the women have reported misogynist comments.  The leagues have requested the social media platforms improve comment moderation.

Ever the anti-intellectual, Fox News host (and man who Fox News actively says shouldn’t be believed) Tucker Carlson said in an interview with Outkick.com, a website that primarily covers sports, that college is a waste of time and people worsen themselves by attending.

“There is this idea that college improves your worth. Where is the evidence of that?” Carlson said, as he’s just asking questions and too lazy to read the available research himself.  “I’m sure that hard sciences do. If you’re an engineer or you are in medical school, you would learn discrete information, actual facts that you can use and that you need to know in order to join the profession that you want to join. But for kids like me who go in for liberal arts education, I believe it diminishes you.”

Carlson said that he actively encouraged his four children to skip college and go directly into a life of leisure living off Daddy’s money, leveraging his grifting to their financial benefit.  Having them attend college and learn things “terrifies [him].” 

Former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe appears closer to reaching a settlement with the federal government over his firing by Donald Trump two days before he would have received early retirement benefits, court documents indicate

Documents filed with the US Federal District Court in DC request the Court to delay deadlines for submission of documents by 45 days in order for the two sides to negotiate a settlement in the case.  Such a filing is indicative of the two sides drawing close to a deal and not wishing to burden the Court with unnecessary paperwork.

On March 16, 2018, McCabe by fired just two days before his 50th birthday, when he could have received early retirement benefits, allegedly based on an FBI Office of Personal Responsibility recommendation stemming from an Inspector General report that McCabe had given information to the media in an unauthorized manner. 

Yahoo News: “A federal investigation into whether U.S. Representative Matt Gaetz trafficked a minor for sex will not be derailed by his assertion that a veteran asked his father for money to pay for the release of an American held by Iran, a law enforcement source familiar with the investigation said. Investigators believe the purported scheme to free Robert Levinson, a former FBI agent who disappeared in Iran in 2007, lacked credibility, the source said. Another U.S. official familiar with the case noted that Levinson’s family in March 2020 publicly accepted U.S. government assessments that he died in Iranian custody. Federal investigators are examining the purported attempt while separately also looking into whether Gaetz, a Florida Republican, may have violated sex trafficking laws by paying travel expenses for a 17-year-old female, the law enforcement source said. ”

“‘One has nothing to do with the other,’ the source said. Gaetz has not been charged with any crime, has called the accusations false and has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing. Former U.S. Air Force officer Bob Kent on April 5 told Michael Smerconish’s Sirius Radio program that he met with Matt Gaetz’s wealthy father Donald Gaetz in March and sought a ‘$25 million loan’ to ‘buy back’ Levinson from the Iranians. The elder Gaetz is a Florida State Senator who was the founder of a healthcare company. Kent did not respond to requests for comment. Matt Gaetz said in a statement last month that he and his family had ‘been victims of an organized criminal extortion involving a former DOJ official seeking $25 million while threatening to smear my name.’ A spokesman for Gaetz and his family has told Reuters that the family ‘has cooperated with the FBI regarding the evidenced extortion attempt … They will not comment further on the extortion matter at this time so as not to harm the investigation.'”

The Indonesian Navy declared the submarine KRI Nanggala 402 was destroyed and lost at sea after finding debris from the sub during its search efforts north of Bali, the Associated Press reports.  The 53 submariners aboard are presumed dead.

The sub was participating in torpedo exercises on Wednesday when contact with it was lost.  Search crews from Indonesia, Singapore and Australian were dispatched to the area, and the US Navy also sent ships and aircraft to help.  The submarine was conducting a dive in waters 2,000 to 3,000 feet deep when the accident apparently occurred.  The exact nature of the accident is unknown.

Navy Chief Yudo Margono told a press conference in Bali, “If it’s an explosion, it will be in pieces. The cracks happened gradually in some parts when it went down from 300 meters to 400 meters to 500 meters. … If there was an explosion, it would be heard by the sonar.”

The Maryland Attorney General’s office announced Friday that it would undertake a review of cases overseen by former Chief Medical Examiner David Fowler after Fowler testified for the defense in the Derek Chauvin trial, the Baltimore Sun reports.

The state AG’s office received a letter, written by Roger A. Mitchell, the Medical Examiner of Washington, DC and co-signed by more than 400 other doctors from around the country, stating that Fowler’s conclusions in his testimony were far outside the bounds of medical science and called into question his conclusions in other cases.

“Dr. Fowler’s stated opinion that George Floyd’s death during active police restraint should be certified with an ‘undetermined’ manner is outside the standard practice and conventions for investigating and certification of in-custody deaths. This stated opinion raises significant concerns for his previous practice and management,” the letter said.

Who says Hollywood doesn’t honor conservatives?

Trump lawyer (and Nosferatu cosplayer) Rudy Giuliani and pillow huckster (and advocate for martial law) Mike Lindell took home awards for their performances during this year’s Golden Raspberry Awards, honoring cinematic underachievement, CNN reports.

Giuliani took a solo award for Worst Supporting Actor for his role in “Borat Subsequent Moviefilm.”  He also shared the award for Worst Screen Combo with his pants for his performance in the same film.

Lindell, however, was the big winner of the night, taking home the coveted “Worst Picture” and “Worst Actor” awards for his so-called documentary “Absolute Proof,” which claimed to provide undeniable evidence of fraud in the November 2020 presidential election. 

Looking at details surrounding Florida HB-1 has me questioning my own sanity.  I’m writing things that I look at and say “You sound like the guy who goes around insisting that the FBI is reading all of his e-mails.” It makes sense to me but the conclusions are admittedly a bit far flung…then again, this era that we’re living in is pretty far flung, and the GOP really does appear to have gone batshit crazy under Trump, so I’m posting the first paragraph of the long magazine style essay that I’m working on (my big end of the month magazine style piece for the Globe and Intelligencer) and I wanted to hear the response of the Nat Zero community as to whether I should keep going with this or dial it down a notch. Please sound off and let me know in the comments.

“Republican Party leaders have rejected a plea to let Orthodox Jews and others with religious obligations on Saturdays vote absentee in the GOP’s May 8 nominating convention, in which the party will choose its candidates for governor and two other statewide offices. Four rabbis wrote to state GOP Chairman Rich Anderson and members of the party’s governing board this month, asking that anyone with religious objections to the date be allowed to cast an absentee ballot. That option already is available to active-duty military personnel. From every Friday at sunset until nightfall Saturday, Orthodox Jews ‘do not drive, use electronic devices, employ handwriting instruments (e.g. pens, pencils), among other prohibited activities,’ the rabbis wrote. ‘As such, it would be impossible for Jews of faith to vote in your unassembled convention.'”

“Jews voting absentee could list rabbis as references to verify their religious obligation, wrote the four: Rabbi Sender Haber of B’nai Israel Congregation in Norfolk; Rabbi Dovid Asher of Keneseth Beth Israel in Richmond; Rabbi Aaron Margolin of Chabad Lubavitch of Tidewater in Norfolk; and Rabbi Leibel Fajnland of Chabad Lubavitch of Reston and Herndon. But the state GOP’s governing body – which was bitterly divided for months over whether to hold a primary or convention, and is torn over how to tally convention ballots – rejected the rabbis’ request at a meeting Thursday night. After emotional debate, a narrow majority of State Central Committee members voted in favor of allowing absentee voting for religious reasons, but the measure failed to win the 75 percent supermajority needed to change the party rules” – Washington Post.

New York Times: “Twenty-four-hour voting was one of a host of options Harris County introduced to help residents cast ballots, along with drive-through voting and proactively mailing out ballot applications. The new alternatives, tailored to a diverse work force struggling amid a pandemic in Texas’ largest county, helped increase turnout by nearly 10 percent compared with 2016; nearly 70 percent of registered voters cast ballots, and a task force found that there was no evidence of any fraud. Yet Republicans are pushing measures through the State Legislature that would take aim at the very process that produced such a large turnout.”

“Two omnibus bills, including one that the House is likely to take up in the coming week, are seeking to roll back virtually every expansion the county put in place for 2020. The bills would make Texas one of the hardest states in the country to cast a ballot in. And they are a prime example of a Republican-led effort to roll back voting access in Democrat-rich cities and populous regions like Atlanta and Arizona’s Maricopa County, while having far less of an impact on voting in rural areas that tend to lean Republican. Bills in several states are, in effect, creating a two-pronged approach to urban and rural areas that raises questions about the disparate treatment of cities and the large number of voters of color who live in them and is helping fuel opposition from corporations that are based in or have work forces in those places. In Texas, Republicans have taken the rare tack of outlining restrictions that would apply only to counties with population of more than one million, targeting the booming and increasingly diverse metropolitan areas of Houston, Austin, San Antonio and Dallas. The Republican focus on diverse urban areas, voting activists say, evokes the state’s history of racially discriminatory voting laws – including poll taxes and ‘white primary’ laws during the Jim Crow era – that essentially excluded Black voters from the electoral process.”

“Conor McGregor has purchased a pub in Dublin which was the scene of one of his most infamous moments in recent years. The Irishman was caught on camera allegedly punching a man at the bar back in 2019, and not only has the UFC superstar now bought the pub, he has seemingly decided to ban the man who he had the altercation with. McGregor confirmed a report from The Currency, while also adding the man who had a disagreement with him is not welcome. McGregor quoted the report on Twitter and added: ‘Ye and your mans barred.’ The pub was the scene of a scuffle between McGregor and a man in 2019, with the MMA fighter apologising and made to pay a £860 (€1000) fine by the Dublin District Court” – The Independent.

Reuters: “China will discuss building a defence system against near-earth asteroids, a senior space agency official said on Saturday, as the country steps up efforts towards realizing its longer term space ambitions. Zhang Kejian, head of the China National Space Administration, didn’t provide any further details in his opening remarks at a ceremony for China’s space day in the eastern city of Nanjing. China has made space exploration a top priority in recent years, aiming to establish a programme operating thousands of space flights a year and carrying tens of thousands of tonnes of cargo and passengers by 2045.”

As the coronavirus pandemic was just starting its spread around the United States last spring, orders were handed down at the California Air National Guard to put one of their F-15C fighter jets on standby to buzz potential protesters and rioters upset about masking orders or food shortages.

According to reporting by the Los Angeles Times, the orders to ready the fighter were sent in March 2020 through unusual channels:  phone call or text messages, not the normal written orders that would’ve left a paper trail.  That diversion from the norm made some within the Guard concerned the possible flights would be used inappropriately.

Lt. Col. Jonathan Shiroma, the commander of the California Air National Guard, denied that an F-15C was ever put on alert to respond to domestic unrest.  “We do not use our planes to frighten or intimidate civilians,” Shiroma wrote in an email to the Times.

• The US policy to defeat the coronavirus in the US should actually concentrate on vaccinating Americans AND people worldwide.  To do that, the US should suspend patent protections for nine months for vaccines developed in the US.  Jonas Salk never patented the polio vaccine so it could be used and distributed around the world.  We should follow his model.  
• Chauvin deserves jail for murdering George Floyd.  The officers who let him kneel on a man’s neck for nine minutes also deserve to face justice and should never wear a badge again.
• I wish people who stand behind the “Blue Lives Matter” movement–and yes, police officers should be able to go home safely after their shifts–need to remember that more cops die by suicide than on the job every year by a factor of ten.  Fund their health care–and mental health care.  
  Read More ▶ “Random thoughts Friday, Volume XVI”

On the anniversary of Donald Trump telling people to ingest disinfectants and use ultraviolet lights (externally and internally), a Florida preacher and his three adult sons have been arrested by federal law enforcement for selling a “miracle cure” for the coronavirus made of industrial bleach, WKMG Orlando reports.

The self-proclaimed archbishop of the Genesis II Church of Health and Healing in Bradenton, Florida, 62-year-old Mark Grenon and his sons Jonathan, 34, Jordan, 26, and Joseph, 32, have each been charged by the US Department of Justice with one count of conspiracy to commit fraud and two counts each of criminal contempt.

The Grenons’ church marketed chlorine dioxide as a “Miracle Mineral Solution” that can cure cancer, autism, malaria and COVID-19.  Upon ingestion, the chemical becomes an industrial bleach used in treating textiles, industrial water, pulp and paper; it will, in fact, prevent the spread of disease by killing the host. 

Alabama Republican Governor Kay Ivey signed a law Friday banning transgender athletes from participating in K-12 sports, becoming the latest Republican-run state to enact restrictions on LGBTQ people, the Associated Press reports.

In announcing the bill, the governor’s office sent an email to schools telling them that the schools “may never allow a biological male to participate on a female team.”  It made no mention of having transgender boys playing on a “female” team.

“HB 391 is nothing more than a politically motivated bill designed to discriminate against an already vulnerable population. By signing this legislation, Gov. Ivey is forcefully excluding transgender children. Let’s be clear here: transgender children are children. They deserve the same opportunity to learn valuable skills of teamwork, sportsmanship, and healthy competition with their peers,” Human Rights Campaign President Alphonso David said in a statement.

HB-1 is  the infamous anti-protest bill that was was recently passed in Florida.  An analysis of the bill’s language and behavior of various groups aligned with former President Donald Trump suggest the bill is intended to promote attacks on civil rights activists by simplifying the legal defense for acts of vehicular homicide.  Oklahoma recently passed a similar bill HB-1674, that provides similar protections.  These laws may be referred to as “James Alex Fields” laws, a reference to the Trump supporter who drove his car into a crowd of civil rights activists who had gathered in Charlottesville, Virginia to protest against the “Unite the Right” Trump rally.  Fields has since been convicted for the murder of Heather Heyer, who was killed when he plowed his car into the crowd, and for causing injuries to over a dozen other activists.

“A brief weekend pause in the Arizona Senate’s election audit that a judge ordered on Friday won’t happen because the Arizona Democratic Party declined to put up a $1 million bond that the judge requested to cover any expenses that the Senate wrongfully incurs due to the halt. Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Christopher Coury ruled that the audit must halt from 5 p.m. Friday to noon on Monday. But that order was contingent on the Arizona Democratic Party, which brought the lawsuit seeking to block the audit, posting a $1 million bond to cover any expenses that the Senate wrongfully incurs due to the delay. The Senate’s lease of Veterans Memorial Coliseum, where the audit is being conducted, ends on May 14.”

“Roopali Desai, the Democrats’ attorney, said the party won’t put up the bond. That means the audit will continue uninterrupted. Nonetheless, the audit will still have to comply with several other orders Coury issued during a hearing on Friday. The judge ordered the Senate and its audit team to comply with all laws governing the right to a secret ballot and the confidentiality of voter registration data, and to provide copies of all relevant policies and procedures to the court, which the audit team has never made public. He also ordered that the auditors use only red pens on the audit floor, an issue that came up after an Arizona Republic reporter who’s working as a volunteer observer noted that the auditors were using blue pens. State election rules require that only red pens be used near ballots because the tabulation machines that are used to count them will read any markings made in blue or black ink” – Arizona Mirror.

Los Angeles Times: “Political engagement by young Americans has surged to a historically high level, and that’s not good news for the Republican Party, according to the findings of the annual Harvard Youth Poll. A dozen years ago, after President Obama’s election, 24% of Americans younger than 30 reported themselves to be politically active, according to the poll, conducted by the Harvard Kennedy School’s Institute of Politics. At the time, the Obama campaign was widely credited with having energized young Americans. Today, that engaged number stands at 36%, maintaining an extraordinarily high level seen during last year’s election. Young Black Americans report the most political engagement – 41%, the survey found.”

“Political engagement is highest among students in four-year college, who make up about one in five young people, and among those with college degrees, who are about one in four of Americans younger than 30. But even among the roughly half of young people who don’t have a degree and aren’t enrolled in a four-year college, engagement has risen. The figures show ‘the highest level of political engagement that we’ve ever seen in our poll,’ said John Della Volpe, the director of polling at the institute, who has supervised the youth survey since 2000. The survey, which questioned 2,513 Americans ages 18 to 29 and has a margin of error of 2.6 percentage points, also found striking optimism: Fifty-six percent say they are more hopeful than fearful about America, a big rise from four years ago, when 31% said they were hopeful. The increase in hopefulness is particularly large among Black and Latino young people, with roughly seven in 10 saying they are hopeful about the country, compared with about two in 10 Black youths and three in 10 Latino youths in 2017.”