January 1, Democratic congresswoman arrested during voting rights protest

Salutations Middle Americans,

Congresswoman Joyce Beatty, D-Ohio, was one of nine people arrested during a voting rights protest at the Capitol this past week. Beatty, who serves as the chair of the Congressional Black Caucus, shared a photo on her Twitter account of US Capitol police officers putting a zip-tie on her and escorting her out of the building. “Let the people vote. Fight for justice,” the Tweet read. Beatty had been part of a protest calling on the Senate to pass the For the People Act — the sweeping election reform bill. The act passed through the House in March, but it is being held up in the Senate due to a Republican filibuster.

Senior Biden administration officials overseeing an intelligence review into the origins of Covid-19 now believe the theory that the virus accidentally escaped from a lab in Wuhan is as credible as the possibility that it emerged naturally in the wild — marking a dramatic shift from a year ago when Democrats publicly downplayed the so-called lab leak theory. For now, both theories lack definitive evidence, and officials think we may never know the truth. “We’re hoping to find a smoking gun, but it might not happen,” said Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines.

Turns out your old car may have increased in value. This year, the average used vehicle with between 100,000 and 110,000 miles on its odometer is worth about $16,500, about a 30% increase in value from last year. “Back in the day, it was like ‘A hundred thousand miles? You’re stranded,’ whereas today it might be ‘My phone doesn’t hook up because it’s too old,” said data analyst Ivan Drury. “It doesn’t matter what age or mileage you have, your vehicle value is probably more than you ever thought.”

Remember Tiger King? Turns out the titular character, Joe Exotic, will get a shorter prison sentence for his role in a murder-for-hire plot and violation of federal wildlife laws. Exotic, real name Joseph Maldonado-Passage, was sentenced to 22 years in federal prison for trying to hire two different men to murder animal rights activist Carole Baskin. A three-judge panel for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit in Denver found that the trial court wrongly treated those two convictions separately in calculating his prison term under sentencing guidelines. “People should know what they saw on television isn’t the full truth. It isn’t even the tip of the iceberg. It was snowflakes on the tip of the iceberg, largely manufactured by those who wanted to see Joe Exotic in jail for their own benefit,” said Maldonado-Passage’s attorney John M. Phillips.

Beachgoers in the Tampa Bay area have experienced some unpleasant sights and smells lately. Throngs of fish were killed by a red tide, a large bloom of toxic algae that typically appears on Florida’s Gulf Coast once a year. “The bay is really hurting right now,” said lifetime resident of Pinellas County, Maya Burke. “It’s significant numbers of dead fish all up and down the food chain, from small forage fish all the way up to tarpon, manatees, dolphins. … If it’s swimming in the bay, right now it’s washing up dead.” The Pinellas County solid waste division reported that 600 tons of dead sea life have been collected by cleanup crews since late June.

A fresh plethora of potentially incriminating Ghislaine Maxell court documents was recently unsealed. The 52 documents largely pertain to a past defamation lawsuit filed by one of Jeffrey Epstein and Maxwell’s accusers, Virginia Roberts Giuffre. The records show Giuffre’s lawyers’ apparent incredulity with Maxwell’s “extraordinary lack of involvement in the abuse” which they found to be “further proof of malice.” Maxwell is currently awaiting criminal trial in the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn for allegedly procuring underage girls for Epstein to abuse during the 1900s and early 2000s. She’s pleaded not guilty, and her trial is expected to start in the fall.

Be well,

Fraser Dixon

Sources

• Democratic congresswoman arrested during voting rights protest at Capitol
• Senior Biden officials finding that Covid lab leak theory as credible as natural origins explanation
• Old cars with more than 100,000 miles are worth real money now
• Court orders shorter sentence for ‘Tiger King’ Joe Exotic
• At Least 600 Tons Of Dead Fish Have Washed Up Along Tampa Bay’s Shore
• Fresh trove of Ghislaine Maxwell court documents released