Is there anything worse than the Monday after a long weekend? We spent our weekend being lazy and stuffing our faces with leftovers while watching the second season of MST3K on Netflix, and this did not prepare me for a Monday, y’all.
5 Things to Read Today
🌀 The Atlantic: The Three Most Chilling Conclusions From the Climate Report
The Trump administration issued their climate change report, dumping it out on Black Friday when no one would be paying attention. They didn’t want you to pay attention to it because the report basically says, “Hey, if we don’t start doing something about all this right now, we can all kiss our asses goodbye.”
🇲🇽 NPR: U.S. Agents Spray Tear Gas At Migrants, Briefly Close Tijuana Border Entry
There about 5,000 migrants now camped on the southern border near Tijuana. Sunday morning, Border Patrol closed the busiest port of entry, the San Ysidro port, to car and foot traffic for awhile. For reference, that port has around 90,000 people a day passing through.
The migrants, many of whom are trying to seek refugee status – legally, mind you – were irate and headed towards the border. Things escalated. There were Mexican police in riot gear, Border Patrol, and rock-throwing, and a group of migrants tried to sneak under the fence at the border. So Border Patrol started firing tear gas into the crowd.
The crowd which was at least partly made up of mothers and young children. They fired across the border into a sovereign nation.
So that happened. And it kind of sounds like this isn’t the first time it’s happened? Like, is tear gassing attempted refugees a regular thing? I don’t know, and I’m not finding any information about it.
At any rate, we tear gas women and children at the border, now. That’s a thing America does.
But don’t worry – Fox News says it’s fine. One of their Sunday commentators said, of tear gas, “It’s natural. You could actually put it on your nachos and eat it.”
I mean, you can eat sriracha sauce, too, but I wouldn’t recommend putting it in a child’s eyes.
🔥 Earther: Camp Fire Now Completely Contained, With 85 Confirmed Dead and Hundreds Still Missing
The fire isn’t out yet, but they’ve established a firm fire line around it, so it’s not expanding anymore. So far, the fire has burned “13,696 single residences, 276 multiple residences, 528 commercial properties, and 4,293 other structures had been destroyed, with 153,336 acres burned.”
🥗 Vox: It’s still not safe to eat romaine lettuce
You still can’t eat any romaine lettuce, although the CDC is getting closer to nailing down the issue. Maybe it’s safe if you spray tear gas on the romaine?
📰 NPR: The Political News Didn’t Stop Over Thanksgiving. Here’s What You Missed
To wrap things up, here’s a quick round-up of what happened over the holiday weekend. Highlights include Chief Justice John Roberts chewing out Trump, Trump going to bat for Saudi Arabia, who definitely murdered the hell out of a US resident journalist, House subpoenas for former FBI Director James Comey and former Attorney General Loretta Lynch, and more.
Notes & Thoughts 