Bedtime stories
Trying out something new starting tonight: A Sunday night edition of this newsletter to send you to bed with just enough stories that you'll want to wake up for more Monday morning!
Goodnight, mittens. Goodnight, kittens! As I write this it’s the last hour of Sunday, Jan. 22, 2023. Thanks for checking in before putting the phone or laptop away!
Here Now The News
GUNMAN IDENTIFIED: Police identified the man suspected of carrying out a mass shooting in Monterey Park, Calif. Saturday night as Huu Can Tran, 72. He died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound after a standoff in Torrance, Calif. Tran is suspected of opening fire at a dance studio in Monterey Park, killing 10 people and injuring at least 10 more as the city’s large Asian American community celebrated Lunar New Year weekend. — CNN
BATON ROUGE CLUB SHOOTING: A dozen people were shot in a lounge early Sunday morning. Police have not announced an arrest or a motive. — The Advocate
ORLANDO LGBTQ+ CLUBS TARGETED: Police are looking for a man who smashed eight windows at the Southern Nights complex, which houses District Dive, Southern Craft and Southern Nights. The violence was caught on surveillance video early Wednesday. The clubs operated normally following the attack, with police stationed outside Southern Saturday night and security officers screening patrons, as per usual. — WESH-TV
BIDEN DOCUDRAMA: The New York Times reports President Biden’s lawyers told the Department of Justice they had no reason to believe there were documents anywhere other than his private think tank office in Washington, D.C. But on Friday, at the invitation of those lawyers, FBI agents turned up six more documents at the president’s Wilmington, Del. residence. Some of them date back to Biden’s years as a U.S. Senator. — NYT
“Abortion Is Healthcare”
WOMEN MARCH ON 50th ANNIVERSARY OF ROE v. WADE: From Hartford to Honolulu, marchers marked the 1973 Supreme Court decision that enshrined reproductive rights, the ruling overturned by conservative justices in 2022. Organizers, who began the march six years ago following the inauguration of former President Donald Trump, focused on restoring or protecting reproductive rights at the state level. — NYT
Elon Musk on LGBTQ+ Rights: “The pendulum has swung a bit too far”
TWITTER BOSS WEIGHS IN ON HOCKEY PRIDE NIGHT CONTROVERSY: Last week, a Russian-born player for the Philadelphia Flyers decided he would not don a rainbow-colored jersey and he sat out the team’s Pride Night warmup, citing a religious objection. This resulted in a backlash from LGBTQ+ folx and allies, and support from conservatives and religious freedom activists. Then Elon Musk offered his view, as I reported for the Los Angeles Blade.
More Transphobia from The New York Times
ANOTHER ONE-SIDED “REPORT” IN THE NYT: Why is this latest item from The Times problematic? Check out this thread by Phoebe Petrovic.
Trans Joy in Hartford
WELCOME BACK, SOPHIE! French Canadian author and cartoonist Sophie Labelle visited Hartford, Conn. Thursday night to discuss her Assigned Male web comics and novels. PFLAG sponsored her talk, hosted by the Metropolitan Community Church. Here’s just one example of her work:
Following her talk, Labelle signed copies of her novels, comics and posters.
And LaBelle was kind enough to take questions from this reporter (her answer in Tuesday’s newsletter!), sign a comic for a special trans girl I know, and pose for a photo, too! Thanks, Soph!
What’s Happening Monday
IT’S TAX FILING SEASON! The Internal Revenue Service will start accepting returns for 2022 starting Monday.
EQUALITY CONNECTICUT LAUNCH: Organizers of this new LGBTQ+ rights organization will announce its formation at the Legislative Office Building in Hartford, Conn. Monday morning at 10 a.m. Matt Blinstrubus is EQCT’s Executive Director. He’ll be joined by State Rep. Jeff Currey (D-East Hartford), Kia A. Baird of OutCT, Bilal Tajildeen, the founder of It's Time Waterbury, Gretchen Raffa of Planned Parenthood of Southern New England and life coach Tony Ferraiolo of Health Care Advocates International. RiseUP will also be there and we’ll have more in Tuesday’s newsletter.
WALL STREET WATCH: The Wall Street Journal reports the conversation around stocks will be dominated by Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA), Microsoft (MSFT), Visa (V), Mastercard (MA), Johnson & Johnson (JNJ), and Boeing (BA) as those giants report earnings this week.
BRITISH AMBULANCE WORKERS STRIKE: This will impact both England and Wales, the BBC reports.
TRANSPHOBE TO PUBLISH ESSAY BY YOURS TRULY: Colin Wright’s Substack, Reality’s Last Stand, invited me to submit an essay about why pronouns are important. It’s set to publish Monday morning. Hmmm.
So now you’ve got an idea of what’s happened and what will happen, but there’s so much more to tell! That will just have to wait until tomorrow morning. So, put away the phone, close the laptop, and get some Zzzzs. Thank you, my subscribers, and to all y’all: good night, good luck and be well.
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