Lunchtime Reads for the First Day of Autumn (September 22)

Good afternoon! It’s finally fall, y’all! To celebrate here in Middle Georgia, Mother Nature is giving us a full day of rain/mist, but at least it’s not hot. I’ll take it.

It’s also Hobbit Day, which is Bilbo and Frodo Baggins’s birthday. Here’s where I make some enemies: I’m just not a Lord of the Rings person. I’ve tried, I promise, but the books get too in the weeds for me.

Anyway, let’s move on to the news…

Pat Conroy

• Former President Donald Trump is still sending letters to Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger regarding his desire to overturn Georgia’s 2020 election results.
• The State Election Board dismissed the illegal voting claim against Herschel Walker’s wife, Julie Blanchard, yesterday. (Alternate link.)
• The Office of the Inspector General has found that the Georgia Department of Revenue’s Office of Special Investigations improperly used money seized in tax investigations. (Alternate link.)
• Attorney General Chris Carr has added our state to the lawsuit fighting against the Biden Administration’s impending COVID vaccination mandates. (Alternate link.)
• Meanwhile, hospitals are still swamped with COVID patients, and the state ranks near the bottom for folks vaccinated against flu, giving our flu season the potential to be severe.
• Also, morgues are running out of space due to the sharp uptick in COVID deaths.
• Riceboro Mayor Joe Harris has died from COVID complications. He was 35 years-old.
• Yet, Governor Brian Kemp keeps talking about a nonexistent HIV vaccine in his attempts to sell his “mandates don’t work” excuse for doing little about the state’s COVID crisis.
• Though the focus has been all about crime in Atlanta, non-metro counties have seen a 21% increase in violent gun crime between 2019 and now. (Alternate link.)
• There is a bus driver shortage in Atlanta (and elsewhere).
• A Gainesville woman has been arrested after she threw a puppy into the sea off of Tybee Island.

Alice Walker

• The House has passed a bill to suspend the debt ceiling in order to avoid a government shutdown.
• The potential shutdown is pitting Republicans against corporate America.
• Two former GOP Treasury Secretaries tried to smooth talks between GOP Senate Leader Mitch McConnell and current Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen over the debt ceiling to no avail. (Alternate link.)
• New data from Johnson & Johnson has found two doses of the company’s COVID shot significantly increase protection against the virus, and they have forwarded this study to the FDA for review.
• Texas Governor Greg Abbott has thousands of state vehicles lined up at the Mexican border to prevent Haitian refugees from entering the country. Here is a good explainer for why there’s an influx of Haitians seeking refuge. (Alternate link.)
• Abortion clinics in Louisiana and Oklahoma are seeing lots of women from Texas since Governor Abbott signed the state’s anti-abortion law into effect. (Alternate link.)
• Meanwhile, anti-abortion advocates in Texas have their tail feathers in a wad because the first two cases suing a doctor for providing an abortion to a woman in the state aren’t from true believers.
• LGBTQ+ veterans discharged under the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy are now eligible for full VA benefits.
• Former President Donald Trump has sued the New York Times and his niece over the disclosure of his tax records. (Alternate link.)
• Former President Trump still hasn’t given up on overturning the 2020 election, it seems.
• President Joe Biden has doubled the number of COVID vaccinations the U.S. will donate globally.
• The UN’s health agency has set a higher bar for air quality.
• 300 protesters stormed the Namibian parliament as it was set to vote on a compensation package from Germany stemming from the 1904-1908 genocide against the Herero and Nama people.
• A top adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has survived an assassination attempt. (Alternate link.)
• Germany will hold an election on Sunday, and it’s too close to call.
• Australia says France should not have been surprised about its decision to cancel their submarine contract. In case you’re wondering why France is so angry, here’s a good explainer. (Alternate link.)

Flannery O’Connor

• Researchers are testing nanobodies from llamas to see if they might be a possible COVID therapy.