Monday, November 18th, 2024 Today, President Biden has authorized Ukraine to use long range US weapons inside Russia; a woman testified to the House Ethics Committee that she witnessed Matt Gaetz commit statutory rape of a minor; Trump’s secretary of defense pick Pete Hegseth paid a woman to keep quiet about sexual assault; Senate Democrats call for a probe of Elon Musks government contracts in light of his ties to Russia; a look into the Republican false flag effort to turn off Harris voters; and Allison and Dana deliver your Good News.
Monday, November 18th, 2024
Today, President Biden has authorized Ukraine to use long range US weapons inside Russia; a woman testified to the House Ethics Committee that she witnessed Matt Gaetz commit statutory rape of a minor; Trump’s secretary of defense pick Pete Hegseth paid a woman to keep quiet about sexual assault; Senate Democrats call for a probe of Elon Musks government contracts in light of his ties to Russia; a look into the Republican false flag effort to turn off Harris voters; and Allison and Dana deliver your Good News.
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Stories:
Trump team weighs Pentagon pick after sexual assault allegation surfaces (Wahington Post)
Inside the Republican false-flag effort to turn off Kamala Harris voters (Washington Post)
Senators Call for Probe of Musk’s SpaceX Contracts Over Russia (Bloomberg)
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hHello and welcome to the Daily Beans for Monday, November 18, 2024. Today, President Biden has authorized Ukraine to use long range US Weapons inside Russia. A woman testified to the House Ethics Committee that she witnessed Matt Gaetz commit statutory rape of a minor. Trump's Secretary of defense pick Pete Hegseth paid a woman to keep quiet about sexual assault. Senate Democrats call for a probe of Elon Musk's government contracts in light of his ties to Russia and a look into the Republican false flag effort to turn off Harris voters. I'm Alison Gill.
And I'm Dana Goldberg.
Hello, my friend. Happy Monday. Did you have a restful self care full weekend?
I would love to say I did. I think this happens toward the end of almost every year. Um, my immune system was like, we had a good run. So if I sound more raspy than normal, I have one more gala of the year and it's tonight. So I apologize ahead of time, but hopefully it's not too distracting. Other than that, I literally rested the entire weekend.
Well, I think you sound like butter, my friend. I think you sound wonderful.
Like butter.
Uh, like butter. So this is cool. President Joe Biden has authorized Ukraine to use powerful American long range weapons for limited strikes inside Russia in response to North Korea's deployment of thousands of troops to aid Moscow's war effort. That's according to two senior U.S. officials. So we don't know if this was just authorized or if it has been for a minute. We, uh, also don't know what kinds of weapons stockpiles we're sending over. I know he's pushing that last 6 billion out the door and I think they're trying to work on releasing that 300 billion in seized Russian assets to be handed over. Um, so this is actually, you know, my first thought was, oh, well now, like, yeah, right. But if you think about it, remember when right before Donald Trump left office, he authorized the withdrawal from Afghanistan and then Joe Biden had to do that. And you know, obviously it didn't go as smoothly as we would have liked. Uh, but he kept the promise, uh, that the previous administration made. First of all, Biden's like a super institutionalist. I wasn't expecting him to do anything like this. This is pretty Baller. For him. Yeah, for him to put, uh, a fine point on it. But, like, also, this is going to make it harder for Donald Trump to stop aid to Ukraine. He probably will still do it.
Right.
But it's going to look a lot worse for him.
Yeah, it's going to look a lot.
More beholden to Putin when he does. So this is kind of like a little grenade, a little present, um, a little turd in the punch bowl for Donald Trump. And I hope there's more to come. Uh, but I honestly didn't expect to see this from President Biden. So I'm grateful that he's doing it, although I understand, you know. Well, it's a little late now, but I think, uh, it will make a difference, uh, at least marginally for how Trump decides to respond once he gets into office. So good news there. Um, we also have a lot of news to get to today, including good news. So let's get to it. Let's hit the hot notes. Hot notes. All right, everybody. First up from the Post and content warning for sexual assault. And stop me if you've heard this one before. Pete Hegseth, President elect Trump's pick for Secretary of Defense, paid a woman who accused him of sexual assault as part of a non disclosure agreement.
I feel like I've heard this before.
Have you heard this one before?
I have.
Stop me. Oh, stop me. Oh, you know, but that guy, too, anyway, he did this, though he maintained that their encounter was consensual, according to a statement from his lawyer Saturday and other documents obtained by the Washington Post. So all of these, you, uh, know, Trumpers mag of people who are like, she's just making this accusation out. No, these are statements from his lawyer. So I just want to put that under the record. Hegseth attorney, who happens to be none other than Tim Parlor.
Oh, uh, geez.
Yeah. Said that they just don't. They're scraping up the bottom of the barrel for attorneys over on that side. Said that Hegseth was, quote, visibly intoxicated at the time of the incident and maintained that police who were contacted a few days after the encounter by the woman concluded that the complainant had been the aggressor in the encounter. Police have not confirmed that statement from Tim Parlator. Hegseth agreed to pay an undisclosed amount to the woman because he feared that the revelation would, quote, result in his immediate termination. From Fox News, where he worked as a host. The statement came after a detailed memo was sent to the Trump transition team this week by a woman who said she is a friend of the accuser. The memo, a uh, copy of which was obtained by the Post, alleged that he raped the then 30 year old conservative group staffer in his room after drinking at a hotel bar. The person who sent the memo to the transition team did not respond to request for comment from the Post. The accuser, whose identity has not been made public, filed a complaint with the police alleging she was sexually assaulted days after the October 7, 2017 encounter in Monterey, California, but the local district attorney did not bring charges. Police confirmed that they investigated the incident though after she threatened litigation in 2020 four years ago, Hegseth made the payment and she signed a non disclosure agreement. The detailed four page memo about the incident has set off debate among senior Trump transition officials, but so far Trump has stood behind his pick. Spokesman Steve Chung earlier this week said, quote, president Trump is nominating high caliber and extremely qualified candidates to serve in his administration. Mr. Hegseth has vigorously denied any and all accusations and no charges were filed. We look forward to his confirmation as United States Secretary of Defense so he can get started on day one to make America safe and great again. The documents from Hegseth's attorney and the memo to the transition team from someone who said she was a friend of the woman and was present and involved in the case, tell drastically different stories about what happened seven years ago at the Hyatt Regency Monterey, although both sides agree that Heth did have a sexual encounter with a woman there. Hegseth, whose second wife had filed for divorce the previous month, had traveled to Monterey to speak to a California Federation of Republican Women conference. Afterward, according to his lawyer, he went to the hotel bar with a group of attendees. The memo sent to the Trump team, the details of which have not been previously reported, said the woman identified in the memo only as Jane Doe, was there with the California Federation of Republican Women. The woman was staying at the hotel with her small children and her husband. According to the memo which laid out the woman's complaint, one of her responsibilities at the conference was to make sure he made it back to his room and left in time the next morning for the 90 minute drive to the airport. So good that we have someone in control of the military that has to be watched by a 30 year old woman to make sure he can get back to his hotel room and up in the morning. At some point in the evening, the complaint alleged, Jane Doe received a text from two women at the bar who told her that Heth was getting pushy about his interest in taking them upstairs to his room. Jane Doe, who was nearby, came over and talked to the two women, and after they left, she, quote, remembered sensing that Heth was irritated. What happened next is in dispute. According to the memo, Jane Doe, quote, didn't remember anything until she was in Heth's hotel room and then stumbling to find her hotel room. The memo said her memory of six to nine hours was very hazy and that her husband was searching for her and was relieved when she finally showed up. The following day, the woman returned home and had, quote, a, um, moment of hazy memory of being raped the night before and then had a panic attack. The woman then went to the emergency room where she received a rape kit examination that was positive for semen. The woman gave county authorities a statement about what happened. Now her statement has not been released. The city of Monterey said in a statement Thursday that its police department investigated a sexual assault allegation against Heth, but no charges were filed. The friend of Jane Doe wrote in the memo, she had been in the presence of the woman at various events for 15 years and, quote, had never known her to be irresponsible, drunk, or even questionable, of questionable character. Hegseth, according to the statement provided by his lawyer, encountered the woman at the party at the bar and said that she went with him to his room. Afterwards, witnesses, quote, said that Mr. Hegseth was visibly intoxicated, but the complainant was not, and she led him by the arm to his hotel room. The statement from Hegseth's lawyer said this. He said that video surveillance confirmed the two were walking with arms locked together and that the woman was smiling. Oh, no, not smiling.
Right. That must. That must mean consent for any man.
Of course. That's what. That's what that means. Right. According to Hegseth's lawyer, once the two were in his room, the woman did not leave and was, quote, the aggressor in initiating sexual activity. Yeah, sounds like with all his, you know, second wife who just filed for a divorce and him trying to get two women to go upstairs with them. Yeah, sounds like she was right. After the encounter, the woman, quote, expressed concern because she had not gone back to her room. Hegseth told police that she planned to tell her husband she'd fallen asleep on the couch in another guest's room. That's according to the statement. He's lawyer also alleged that the medical examination of the woman produced, quote, no evidence that sexual contact was non consensual and that the police investigation found no evidence to support charging him. The woman's friend said in her memo to transition officials that she believed no charges were brought because the woman, quote, could not recall all the details. And it became a he said, she said situation. That's very common, by the way. Dean Flippo, the Monterey county district attorney at the time of the incident, said in an interview Saturday that he had no recollection of the allegations. But he said he had never heard he's name until he read the news of the potential nomination for the Pentagon job. Quote, I, uh, just have no recollection of the incident at all and hadn't heard the name before, he said. Flippo, who ran the office for nearly 30 years until January 2019, said he would counsel his staff to alert him if a case had the potential to become high profile, such as allegations involving Hollywood stars. Quote, I would hope my staff would see that if something had the potential of publicity, that they would let me know so we could prepare to handle it, But I just have no recollection of this instance. Now. Flippo, now in his mid-80s, okay. Said the office took allegations of sexual assault seriously, collected as much evidence as possible, and tried cases that thought it could prove, quote, is there proof beyond a reasonable doubt? That's what we have to have is a responsibility to our business. That's what goes into the question of do we go ahead with the prosecution? The current DA, Janine Pacioni, didn't respond for request for comment. And sometime after the incident, the woman and her husband hired a lawyer, quote, to ensure Hegseth didn't get off without punishment, unquote. And that's according to the memo. Hegseth's lawyer proposed they sign a non disclosure agreement, the details of which are not public. The agreement was signed about two and a half years after the assault, and that's the alleged assault, according to Hegseth's lawyer. Heg says attorney said two years after the incident, the woman, quote, began to make noise about filing a lawsuit, prompting Hegseth's attorney to send a cease and desist. Par la Tor provided a copy of that letter to the post dated February 2, 2020, with the recipient's name redacted, in which parlour Tor wrote, quote, should you choose to proceed with the filing of a frivolous lawsuit against my client, my client has directed our firm to pursue all available remedies against you. The letter went on to say, Both you and Mr. Hegseth have spouses, families and children that you undoubtedly both love very much, and a public fight is not in anyone's best interest, especially in a case like this where both the law and the facts are against. In December 2020, the woman hired a lawyer who entered into negotiations about the matter. In his statement, the lawyer said that Hegseth strongly felt he was a victim of blackmail and innocent collateral damage and a lie that the complainant was holding onto to keep her marriage intact. However, quote, knowing that it was the height of the MeToo movement, Hegseth ultimately decided to enter into a settlement for significantly reduced amount. A statement did not specify the requested or reduced amount or when it was paid. So that's what's going on over in the Trump transition team with Hegseth.
Oh boy. Thanks ag. Next up from abc. And because this is the Trump administration, we have yet another content warning. Unfortunately for sexual assault and statutory rape. An attorney representing two women who were witnesses in the House Ethics Committee's investigation into now former Rep. Matt Gaetz calling the release of the committee's report telling ABC News that one of his clients testified that she witnessed the Florida congressman having sex with a minor. He had sex with her in front of other people, quote, my client testified to the House Ethics Committee that she witnessed Matt Gaetz having sex with a minor. Florida attorney Joel Leopard. That's what he told ABC News, quote. As the Senate considers former Rep. Gates's nomination for Attorney General, several questions demand answers. This is from. Leopard went on to say what if multip credible witnesses provided evidence of behavior that would constitute serious criminal violations. Democracy demands transparency. Release the Gaetz ethics report now. He represents two women who sat for closed door testimony with the committee over the summer. Gaetz, who President elect Donald Trump selected this week. I can't stop laughing. I mean it's all you can do is laugh. He selected him to serve as Attorney General. Uh, he's long denied any wrongdoing including that of having inappropriate relationship with a minor. The Justice Department declined to charge Gaetz last year after a years long investigation into the allegations. Everyone was confused as to why. In a statement issued in response to Leopard's claim, a spokesperson for Gaetz said, quote, Merrick Garland's DOJ cleared Matt Gaetz and didn't charge him. Are you alleging Garland as part of a cover up? I didn't say cleared. I mean just didn't charge him. Two witnesses who ABC News is not naming. Both allegedly ATT parties with the congressman. Gates's one time friend Joel Greenberg. He's currently serving an 11 year prison sentence after reaching a deal with prosecutors in May of 2021 in which he pleaded guilty to multiple federal crimes including sex trafficking of the woman when she was A minor and introducing her to other, quote, adult men who also had sex with her when she was underage. According to Greenberg's plea deal, the woman, who ABC News is not identifying met Greenberg online in 2017 and began meeting him in hotels and house in the middle district of Florida where he, quote, introduced the minor to other adult men who engaged in commercial sex acts with the minor in the middle District of Florida. This is all from court documents at the time. The minor, quote, represented that she was an adult on the website where she met Greenberg. And according to his plea deal, he acknowledges that he, quote, acted in reckless disregard of the fact that the minor was less than 18 years old when he engaged in commercial sex acts and had a reasonable opportunity to observe that she was underage. Leopard statement comes after attorney John Clune, who represents the former minor at the center of the probe, called for the release of the Ethics Committee's report on Thursday. House Speaker Mike Johnson said on Friday that he does not think the House Ethics Committee should release the findings of its investigation into Gaetz now that the Florida Republican is no longer a member of Congress. He said, quote, I believe it's very important to maintain the House's tradition of not issuing ethics reports on people who are no longer members of Congress. I think it would open a Pandora's box or, I don't know, incriminate other fucking people in the House. That's what I think.
We don't want to open the Pandora's box of letting people know that congressmen, uh, are involved in statutory rape.
I know. God, what would that do? Hold people accountable.
Right. And I loved your tweet, by the way, or whatever we call tweeting on blue sky. When you're like, yeah, um, and if they release that report, then Mike Johnson's son's porn monitoring app is going to go off the charts.
Yeah, yeah. After Mike Johnson read the ethics report, of course he didn't release it. And his son's phone got a notification.
God. Anyway, this is just again, like, um, you know, just because charges aren't filed doesn't mean that it didn't happen with.
Right.
Whether it's with Heth or Matt Gaetz, many people don't report their rape because of that. So. And just incidentally, the reasoning, the very bare bones reasoning that we got through public reporting from a source, by the way, not from the doj, um, officially, but from a source, was that they didn't bring charges because the two witnesses here.
Mhm.
Would not be seen as credible because they worked for escort services. And one Worked in the porn industry, which I think is bullshit, but that is the reason they felt that they couldn't convince a jury. And then the other witness, of course, is Joel Greenberg, who's a giant piece of shit. So, yeah, yep, those were their reasons. It is very difficult to bring a case for sexual assault. However, not knowing somebody is 17 is not a reason. It doesn't get you off the hook for sex trafficking. So to me, it doesn't fucking matter what any of these women do. Yeah, uh, I think this case should have been brought. All right, now, next up from the Post. Muslims in Michigan began seeing pro Israel ads this fall praising Harris, Kamala Harris for marrying a Jewish man and backing the Jewish state. Jews in Pennsylvania, meanwhile, saw ads from the same group with the opposite message. Harris wants to stop US armed shipments to Israel. Another group promoted Kamala's, quote, bold progressive agenda to conservative leaning Donald Trump voters, while a third filled the phones of young liberals with videos about how Harris had abandoned the progressive dream. Black voters in North Carolina were told Democrats wanted to take away their menthol cigarettes, while working class white men in the Midwest were warned that Harris would support quotas for minorities and deny them Zin nicotine pouches. What voters had no way of knowing at the time was that all of these ads were part of a single $45 million effort created by political advertisers to Tesla founder Elon Musk, who had previously worked in the presidential campaign of Ron DeSantis. And that's according to a presentation about the group's efforts obtained by the Washington Post. The project, funded with anonymous donations, micro targeted messages across battleground states, often with ads that appeared to be something they were not. A tactic the organizer sometimes referred to internally as false positives. With digital spots, direct mail, text messages, influencer marketing, and mobile billboards. The overall project was a high tech experiment in misdirection, an old political tactic that has been sharpened in recent decades with increasingly precise targeting techniques. Ads tested better if Muslims felt they were seeing a message meant for Zionists. Bernie Bros felt they were hearing from the far left. And Zin Bros felt like they were hearing from activists who wanted a world without gas powered vehicles, a ban on fracking, and affordable housing for undocumented Americans, policies Harris did not actually support during her campaign. Quote, the worst part is Kamala Harris talks out of both sides of her mouth, unquote. That's one of the ads which was designed by Trump supporters to look as if it was advocating for leftist priorities like free health care and a break on tuition. The entire effort grew out of research by, quote, Building America's Future. That's a conservative political nonprofit that was founded during the first Trump administration by Republican consultants Genera Peck and Phil Cox, with others at P2 Public Affairs. Peck and Cox, former advisors to the DeSantis campaign, were top strategists for a separate effort, America PAC, the super PAC funded by Musk to support Trump. Musk donated to Building America's future in 2022, according to a report in the Wall Street Journal then. The group's leaders have declined to comment on their donors. Starting in February, Ryan Tyson, a former pollster for DeSantis, began holding a series of about 25 focus groups with specific communities of targeted voters, with most out of the research effort focused on likely Democrats who were uncertain about voting. The goal was to figure out how to help Donald Trump win during a campaign in which Democrats were vastly outspending Republicans on digital advertising. Quote, clearly you had a white liberal demographic that hated Donald Trump. That was without question. You could see that coalition everywhere. But once you get past white progressives, every other historical demographic stronghold for the Democrats just started to drop off. That's what Tyson said about his effort. Quote, what did exist was a tremendous amount of voters on the left that were disaffected, and the only persuasion question was whether they could be persuaded to vote. The effort worked in concert with a separate project by the Trump campaign to depress turnout for Harris, knowing that Trump would be unlikely to drastically expand his vote totals in 2020, Trump received about 74 million votes to Joe Biden's 81 million. In 2024, Trump received a little less than 76 million to Harris's 72.6 million votes. In other words, Trump's total went up slightly, while Harris dropped by about 8 million votes. Quote, the entire goal of the campaign was to push her numbers down. That's a top Trump campaign advisor who, like others interviewed for the story, spoke on a condition of anonymity. Building as America's Future tried to focus its spending, where the Trump campaign's top advisers publicly signaled an interest investing heavily in Muslim communities that the campaign was targeting and seeking to magnify the candidate's appearance on podcasts with significant white male audiences. Quote, we studied the strategy that was put in place by Susie Wiles and Chris Lacivita and James Blair very closely, Peck said. And we did what outside groups can do. We tried to amplify and support the direction in which they were taking the earned and paid media. They also deployed multiple brands to place the ads concealing their common origin. Future Coalition PAC, Duty to America PAC, Americans for Consumer Protection, and Progress 2028. Those are three of them. Three. Just three of them. According to the people involved, one part of the effort, under the banner of Americans for consumer protection, targeted 2.7 million voters with more than 247 million ads and 70 million video compilations that effortlessly also advertised about the Biden administration's support for a ban on menthol cigarettes to black voters. In Ohio, where Republicans successfully defeated Democrat Senator Sherrod Brown. Building America's Future also hosted 18 events around the country, including a gathering of farmers in Pennsylvania that aimed to promote Republican Senate candidate Dave McCormick, who was projected by the Associated Press as winning the race against Bob Casey, who has still declined to concede. A recount effort was launched Thursday. I think it was because it was in the margin, quote, the key to most of our creative was homing in on the idea that the Biden Harris administration had misplaced priorities. That's, uh, what the group wrote in an after action report obtained by the Post. Instead of banning menthols, our ads argued Biden and Harris should be focused on lowering costs and fixing the chaos of the country. So this was a very psychographically targeted campaign that spent millions funded by dark money to suppress voter turnout on the Democrat side.
Thanks so much, Allison. Um, last in this segment is from Bloomberg. Two Democratic U.S. senators called for an investigation into Elon Musk's involvement in contracts between the US government and his company SpaceX. Citing national security concerns raised by his reported contact with President Vladimir Putin and other Russian officials. The senators asked the Departments of Defense and justice in a letter Friday to investigate whether the alleged communications, quote, should force a review of Musk's continued involvement in SpaceX's contracts with the government.
Yes.
Yes, it should. Quote, these relationships between a well known US adversary and Mr. Musk, a beneficiary of billions of dollars in US government funding, pose serious questions regarding Mr. Musk's reliability as a government contractor and a clearance holder. This is what the letter said. The two senators who signed the letter are Jack Reed of Rhode island and who's also the chairman, by the way, of the Armed Services Committee, and Jean Sheikin of New Hampshire, quote, communications between Russian government officials and an individual with a security clearance have the potential to put our security at risk. They do. And, um, so does a president who is at serious debt, by the way. Okay. Must role in the government as well as access to sensitive information is likely to expand when President elect Donald Trump takes office in January. Already he's emerged as a close ally and confidant, joining Trump on calls with world leaders, including Ukraine's Vladimir Zelensky, and being appointed to lead government cost cutting efforts. The letter, as well as a separate request to the Secretary of the Air Force, cited a Wall Street Journal report last month that Musk had been in contact with Putin and other Russian officials since 2022. Those contacts include Deputy Chief of Staff Sergio Kirienko, who the US has accused of masterminding Moscow's efforts to influence the 2024 presidential campaign. I don't know if you saw this too. Musk was like anyone talking about, you know, interference in this election is going to have hell come down on them or something bullshit like that. On X, he's a mess. Musk's sometimes erratic behavior has complicated his deep relations with the Pentagon, mainly through SpaceX's work on satellite launches and through the Starlink satellite based Internet service which has been crucial for Ukraine in its war against Russia. Despite those concerns, the US has sustained multiple contracts with his companies. The senators described SpaceX as, quote, deeply integrated into our defense and intelligence space programming. They also said the company holds more than 700 million in contracts for Space Force's national security space launch program, is building an exclusive satellite network for Space force through its Starshield unit, and has 1.8 billion classified contracts with the National Reconnaissance Agency. And this is what they wrote. While commercial integration in space is key to our ability to innovate, it relies on contractors to exhibit responsible behavior in dealing with some of the most sensitive capabilities. And we know that that is not the case with Elon Musk.
Yeah, and you mentioned uh, Star Shield and uh, I tell you where that comes from. Do you remember when Elon Musk purposefully shut off Starlink in Ukraine?
I sure do.
And said, oh, you know, I just don't want to be part of any war. I just don't want to be part of being possibly responsible for World War Three. That's why I did that. Uh, and I don't want Starlink. I don't want my stuff being used in war.
Such bullshit.
Right around that time he created Star Shield, which is specifically a communication satellite system for war.
Mhm.
And got like hundreds of millions in contracting for that. I don't know why I can't like, you know, I thought, oh, maybe Biden, you know, letting uh, Ukraine strike deep into Russia with the arrival of North Korean troops, okay, that's like leaving a Easter ah, egg for the Trump administration. But I can't figure out why we've waited until now to question Elon Musk's.
I don't understand either.
Ability to hold government contracts and a clearance. It's fucked up. Anyway, they sent the letter. Um, so nothing like a good, strongly worded letter.
No shit.
Yeah. Um, all right. Anyway, I know that this is, like, kind of a downer of a show, but we do have the good news coming up. And so I, you know, when I go through all of the news, because I know a lot of you don't want to watch the news right now, and I try to pick up what's important and bring it to y'all. Sometimes it's not the best, uh, or the most, uh, optimistic, but I. But I think it's important to know.
Absolutely.
So, anyway, thanks for listening, and we'll be right back with the good news after these messages. We'll be right back.
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Everybody, welcome back. It's time for the good news everyone. Then good news everyone. Good news, good news. And if you have any good news at all, good news confessions, corrections, especially pronunciation corrections, please send them to us. And the way to get your good news submitted is to pay your POD pet tax, which means attach a photo of your pod pet. And if it's a shelter pup, we'll try to guess the breeds. If you want us to, if you want to give us the answers, we can try to guess those. Our producer does this cool thing where they hide the answer. He hides the answers at the end so that we don't know. Um, and we always, you know, honor system, but we respect it. And if you don't have a pod pet, you can send us an adoptable pet in your area. If you don't have that, send us any animal photo. We'll play any guessing game. It doesn't matter. Then if you don't have that, send us your baby photos, especially babies on like holiday photos. I love those so, so much. And then of course we have shout outs, whether it's to a spouse, a loved one, a kid, a parent, a self shout out, um, or a shout out to a government program that's helped you, whether it's Medicare, Medicaid, Section 8, $35 insulin, um, Head Start, WIC, SNAP, preschool lunches, and of course, um, we before, you know, aside from the Affordable Care act, we can't forget student debt forgiveness. Send that to us as well. Hopefully we'll see some movement on that student debt forgiveness program here.
Absolutely.
In the next couple of months. And you can send it all to us by going to DailyBeansPod.com and clicking on Contact. And a reminder, you can see the pod pet picks and the baby pics. If you become a patron to the show. The good news pics are at the bottom of the show, notes of each Patreon episode. That's just one of the many perks of subscribing. You also get these shows ad free and you get them early. And uh, you can become part of our, uh, sort of private online groups on our Discord and our private, uh, Facebook group. You know, we have all these really cool discussions and so you want to do that, you want to sign up, you can do it at dailybeans.supercast.com or you can do it at patreon.com Mueller she wrote. And you know, for those of you who are patrons, uh, to the Jack podcast and the Beans Podcast, I know that the Jack, I know you're like, well, the Jack podcast is going away. There's going to be a new podcast in its place with both me and Andy McCabe. So you will, you will automatically still have access to that show, uh, instead of the Jack podcast if you're at that level. So don't worry, you're going to get your two shows. And then if you're interested in getting access to that second show as well, which we're still thinking of a name for, um, you can again sign up at the $5 level. Anyway, thank you so much everybody for supporting us because we couldn't do this without you. And I know it's a tough time and a lot of people are backing away from. But we'll continue to bring you the curated headlines in context with appropriate profanity. All right, first up, Kim, um, pronoun. She and her hi Queens. I'm the gal who brought the term framily to you. Well, my Australian framily has been checking in daily. They, like the rest of us, are in complete shock. I've hesitated sharing my good news because of the state of our country, but oofta. I feel like I need to shout from the rooftops about pslf. After enduring the devastating loss of two siblings in a year, I found myself at a crossroads. The heartbreaking experience led me to pursue a career as a school counselor, A path I felt compelled to take in order to support and guide young people who might be struggling. After a two year degree in hotel management ten years before, I made the decision to start back to school at the age of 31 with an associate's degree and then move into my bachelor's. And in 2010, I graduated with a three year master's degree in counseling Education school counseling. And I racked up $125,000 in student loans. Through the seven years of obtaining my degrees, my loan payments increased year over year and this year up to $1,900 a month. That's more than my mortgage and more than my monthly childcare. I had no idea how I was going to make these payments. I qualified for a few programs to bring the payments down, but really, does that make it better? I, uh, will still be carrying this debt for years. In September, I received notification that my interest was going to increase, bringing my student loans to a total of $235,000 in March. Jesus of 2025. Happy birthday to me. My heart stopped and I just stared at the letter. The interest would be 100% more than my actual loans that I took out. How can this be fair? Yes, I signed the line, knew and what I was getting into. Then the changes happened and the interest rates increased. This loan would follow me to death and there was no way I'd be able to pay it off in this lifetime. But I'm thrilled to announce a big shout out and thank you to former President G.W. bush for signing the College Cost Reduction Access act of 2007, written by Democrats when they controlled the House and the Senate. And a shout out to thank current President Joe Biden for making sure the program works. I received my notification that my PSLF was approved in October, resulting in a staggering $185,000 in loans forgiven.
Wow.
This relief, uh, has been transformative, allowing me to focus on my passion of helping students without the burden of insurmountable debt. I'm truly grateful that it happened when it did. Continued. Thanks to you both for being a bright spot in darkest of times. A picture of my bright spot. My son. He and I are at our first of many school field trips for him. He started kindergarten this fall. I am a late in life mom who struggled with infertility. I was 45 when he was born. Look at this beautiful picture of Kim and the baby.
Absolutely gorgeous.
I love that man. Um, 185,000 forgiven. That's incredible. Kim, thanks for sharing that story.
Yeah, that's awesome. This one's from Karen. Not that Karen pronoun. She and her hello beautiful and brilliant Beans. I'm still in disbelief that the election went the way it did. I had to take time to be in my feelings for a bit. I spent the last eight days in Canada which started with forgetting my passport on my bedside table and spending the day at Buffalo Passport Office getting an emergency replacement. My picture was lovely, puffy eyes and all. I wanted to give a shout out to the amazing team there. Security guards and staff were so kind and helpful. My grief over the election came out in that office. The cafe next to the office. The salty chef was so great. They let me sit there while I was waiting and they kept me in warm apple cider for nearly three hours. I don't know who they were, but on this rough day they brought me some peace and understanding. Thanks. Buffalo, New York. I gave up nearly every other podcast in the week. By Tuesday I was back on the Beans. You two reflected my feelings and helped me find some kindness and joy in this fucked up time. My podcast Tax is my Kitty Mocha who is also my podcast. She loves to help me while I am recording my training sessions. She was a rescue from a family with allergies. She's so pretty. She had all four Paws declawed. So all she had as defense was biting. She has learned to trust us now. Biting is almost never only when she gets really wound up. Thanks again for being a voice in this quagmire that is the US today.
What?
Um.
A sweet baby. And how cool you record training sessions, Karen.
I love that.
Yeah, look for the helpers, right?
You got to. You have to.
The helpers. All right, next up from Jared. He and him. Protests against a proposed law erupted in Parliament as Hickory Protest March made its 10 day journey to Auckland. The law purports to remove race from politics, treating all New Zealanders the same. In doing so, it overwrites the Treaty of Waitungi. The law would remove the oversight of the Waitangi Tribunal, which negotiates reparations to correct past wrongs of the Crown New Zealand Parliament decisions made in the name of the monarchy. It also requires that new laws and government services make allowances for the indigenous Maori to ensure equal outcomes, not just equal inputs. The Libertarian ACT Party of New Zealand is pushing this through as part of a three way coalition agreement with the Conservative quote National Party and the Nationalist New Zealand First Party. The bill passed its first reading in Parliament the other day, first of three stages. As the voting concluded, the Maori party tore up a copy of the bill and performed a haka to the face of David Seymour, the leader of the ACT party. Tip of the hat to Nick at Stray Dog nz. And here we'll have a video of this haka. I think a lot of us have probably seen it on social media.
Unfucking believable power behind this woman who starts it and the fierceness and the people and I can only imagine the energy in that room. It was extraordinary.
It's brilliant to watch. We'll have a link to it in the show. Notes. Thank you Jared for sending that in.
Thanks AG for that story. This one's from Chris Pronouns he him in California. Hello Beans, Queens. I'm recovering journalist and Albuquerque transplant living in the East Bay suburbs. I'm married with a nine year old daughter. That means the world to me. Was listening to the show last week when AG was talking about how angry you felt with some of your online interactions last year. I've been feeling that way and have been reassessing how I'm going to engage on social media. I think when it was Twitter and Facebook I was spending too much time and negative energy arguing with Maggas. I feel like a worse person after these arguments. After the experience during the first administration and even through the Biden years. I decided I need to take a break for my insanity. Yes, I'll be bold in stating my m opinion, but I'm no longer too engaged. Haven't decided whether I'm going to keep my Twitter account, but so far my time on Blue sky is feeling much more positive and refreshing. For my pet tax, I'm sending you you my most recent and favorite picture of my greyhound, Starla. Keep up the good fight and the good news. We'll need it to get through this.
Thanks, Chris. Albuquerque transplant, living in California.
Love, uh, it.
Best of both worlds.
Me too, Chris, by the way. Me too.
Yeah, no, I get it. I actually took my Blue sky app icon on my phone and put it where my Twitter icon used to be.
Smart.
Really smart move Twitter, like six pages down in the back of, like, the rest of the apps that I don't use anymore. And it's now where I go first thing for news and social media. And my blood pressure has taken a nosedive thanks to that.
Uh, fabulous.
A healthy one, you know, not like too low.
Uh, totally.
But yeah, Twitter's just making makes you so mad, you know, I can feel.
The doom m scrolling. And the drug that it clicks off in your brain. It makes you keep going and going and refreshing. Refreshing. That shit is real. Put your phone down, go outside.
Look at this great photo.
It's fabulous.
The daughter's a pilot, the greyhound's the plane, and dad's got a bomber jacket on. I love it. Chris, thank you for that. Uh, next up, from Terry. As much as I miss the person I was before the election, I also look forward to the new, more resilient person I'll be in a couple of years. Oh, wow. This pick isn't exactly a frog orgy, but when I checked the water meter, I felt I had disturbed nature in some way. That's great.
Oh, my God.
Thank you for that. Thank you.
Close this out, sweetheart. That was. That was a short one.
All right, From John H. Hi, you too. Longtime listener in Bend, Oregon. I got to meet Dana at her comedy show, which was super exciting. Plus, there were some jokes permanently etched in my brain.
Hopefully in a good way.
Right? Yeah, it happens that way. Uh, national politics can be overwhelming, so I decided to focus on local. Despite never having done anything political other than volunteer for things, I decided to put my energy into getting a measure passed here in Deschutes County. Hope I'm pronouncing that right, John. I wrote the measure language, I organized volunteers. I got over 7,000 signatures, which got my measure on the November ballot. And despite the awful news of the night, my measure passed with flying colors. And now this county, which has been led by three people since 1916, will be adding two seats in 2026.
Nice.
It's easy to get overwhelmed, but, uh, by everything. But I hope people realize that their local community is going to be so, so important right now. And then even making small, incremental, positive change locally makes the world a better place also. Glad to find you on Blue Sky. Cheers. And then look, he's doing the air guitar with.
Love it.
Expand the county commission. Vote yes on measure nine. 173. Congratulations, John, and thanks to everybody for sending in your good news. Really needed it this week and, um, today, and we're going to keep needing it, so please send it to us dailybeanspod.com, click on Contact. Any final thoughts today, my friend?
No. I will miss you all tomorrow. As I. Like I said, I got my last work gala. It's for Stonewall in Initiative in New York, and we'll be raising money for safe spaces for LGBTQ people across the country.
Uh, you're amazing, my friends. I'm constantly in awe by one more. All the work that you do.
Thank you, dear.
One more for now.
That's right. One more this year until someone else emails me.
Exactly. Anyway, we'll see you all tomorrow. I'll be in yours tomorrow. Dana will be back the next day, but I'll be holding down the fort. Until then. Please take care of yourselves, take care of each other, take care of the planet, take care of your mental health, take care of your framily. I've been AG and I've been dg. I still want to keep going at the end there. I still want to.
We'll figure out something that makes it run smoothly.
It's the muscle memory. Um, but, you know, we'll see you tomorrow. Them's the Beans. The Daily Beans is written and executive produced by Allison Gill with additional research and reporting by Dana Goldberg. Sound design and editing is by Desiree McFarland with art and web design by Joel Reeder with Moxie Design Studios. Music for the Daily Beans is written and performed by they Might Be Giants and the show is a proud member of the MSW Media Media Network, a collection of creator owned podcasts dedicated to news, politics and justice. For more information, please visit mswmedia.com msw media.