I have a lot of great news today as we Good News Roundup writers do every day!
But as we all know, most news articles are NOT good news. So what do we do when we see article after article of bad news?
Everyone has their own techniques for maintaining their mental health amongst the onslaught of panic porn. Here are ten of mine:
Goody’s Tips For Handling Bad News Headlines:
1. I remind myself that bad news sells. If it bleeds, it leads. And that has never been more true than in the digital era where clicks = bucks. So just because you look at the news and see bad story after bad story, it doesn’t mean that everything is bad.
2. When I see a negative headline, I ask myself if it is conveying any new information, or just prognosticating about a possible negative future. If there is no new information, I don’t read it (I already know about Republican efforts to subvert elections, thank-you-very-much I don’t need to read someone freaking out about it).
3. Similarly, before you read it, ask yourself, who is that article for? If it is an article about an issue you are already aware of and worried about, it isn’t for you. Do you really need another article about that? Perhaps you have a friend who doesn’t follow politics at all. It might be useful to let her know about the threats to democracy. Perhaps share it with people who need to be made aware, but don’t destroy your mental health for zero benefit. If you are already aware, why read it again? It isn’t for you. It won’t help you.
4. If you do see a distressing headline that conveys new information, you may find, when you read the article, that it isn’t as bad as the headline makes it sound. Writers don’t write their own headlines — people interested in the bottom line do. Check out the actual article, it might help you feel better.
5. Did you read something really depressing? Ask yourself what you can do to help. Take action. It takes less than a minute to call your representatives, for example. Do that. Can you donate money? do that. Action will make you feel better!
6. Did you read something really depressing? Head over to Daily Kos and read that day’s GNR. Then read the comments for more good news. Try to get some balance.
7. Did you read something really depressing? Ask yourself if it is a done deal you read about or a warning about how bad things COULD get. If it is more of a warning (and almost all these articles are) then remind yourself of all the time that doom and gloomers were wrong. And act (see point 5) to ensure that this is one of those times.
8. Do you feel hopeless and the previous items didn’t help? Walk away from the news for a while. Call a friend. Go for a walk. Play with an animal. Watch an old favorite show. Exercise. Enjoy the enjoyable things in your life. We all need a balance between caring about the world at large and the future and enjoying the wonderful blessings available to us right now. Make sure you are finding that balance.
9. Don’t read the comments. Don’t read the subtweets. Research suggests that foreign agents — with the goal of diving us — produce and amplify a huge amount of that content. So you will be depressing yourself for no reason and making no one happy but Putin. You don’t want to make Putin happy, do you?
10. Finally, remember that some “bad news” headlines are just people being way too focused on one tiny moment in time. Oh no, something didn’t pass today/happen today/work right away! The sky is falling! Some things take time. And one thing not passing isn’t “ruining the Democrats agenda!” Despite the fact that some version WILL pass, this president and congress has been more productive than any in my memory. So don’t let the hot story of the moment color your view of a long period of time.
the bottom line is that we can’t avoid bad news. And we don’t want to. No one benefits when we bury our heads in the sand. So what we need to do is figure out ways to deal with it. And one of those is also making room for good news.
So let’s move on to some great news from this week!
Biden and the Democrats are Doing Great Things
After decades, some of America’s most toxic sites will finally get cleaned up
New funding and the revival of a long-lapsed tax on chemical makers in the bipartisan infrastructure law mean cities like Newark will get money to restore toxic Superfund sites.
President Biden signed legislation reviving a polluter’s tax that will inject a new stream of cash into the nation’s troubled Superfund program. The renewed excise fees, which disappeared more than 25 years ago, are expected to raise $14.5 billion in revenue over the next decade and could accelerate cleanups of many sites that are increasingly threatened by climate change.
The Superfund list includes more than 1,300 abandoned mines, radioactive landfills, shuttered military labs, closed factories and other contaminated areas across nearly all 50 states. They are the poisoned remnants of America’s emergence as a 20th-century industrial juggernaut.
US makes abortion pills by mail permanent, not just for pandemic
US President Joe Biden's administration on Thursday passed a rule making abortion pills accessible by mail permanently, not just for the Covid pandemic, a rare win for the pro-choice movement in the country's increasingly bitter battle over reproductive rights.
The decision overturns a previous in-person requirement described as burdensome by activist organizations such as the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) but also health groups such as the American Medical Association (AMA).
that is a REALLY big deal. It could give access to a lot of people
Senate passes Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act, in major step toward holding China accountable for repression in Xinjiang
The Senate on Thursday approved a bipartisan measure that would ban imports from China’s Xinjiang region unless the importer can prove they were not made with forced labor, in a major step toward holding China accountable for its repression of the mostly Muslim Uyghur minority.
The Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act was passed by the House earlier this week and now heads to President Biden’s desk. The White House indicated Tuesday that Biden will sign it into law.
Biden Halts Federal Aid to New Fossil Fuel Projects Overseas
The Biden administration has ordered an immediate halt to new federal support for coal plants and other carbon-intensive projects overseas, a major policy shift designed to fight climate change and accelerate renewable energy worldwide.
The wide-ranging directive for the first time bars U.S. government backing for future ventures, potentially affecting billions of dollars in annual funding as well as diplomatic and technical assistance.
Rotten awful people have rotten awful week
It sure would be nice if the GOP had to waste a bunch of money on something….
GOP agrees to pay up to $1.6 million of Trump’s legal bills in N.Y. probes
The Republican Party has agreed to pay up to $1.6 million in legal bills for former president Donald Trump to help him fight investigations into his business practices in New York, according to Republican National Committee members and others briefed on the decision.
The party’s executive committee overwhelmingly approved the payments at a meeting this summer in Nashville, according to four members and others with knowledge of the situation who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe a private meeting of the executive committee.
That means the GOP’s commitment to pay Trump’s personal legal expenses could be more than 10 times higher than previously known.
Trump’s longtime accountant testifies to N.Y. grand jury in criminal probe
A longtime accountant for former president Donald Trump — who helped prepare Trump’s taxes and the financial statements his company used to woo lenders — testified recently before a New York grand jury investigating Trump’s financial practices, according to two people familiar with that investigation.
Florida man gets 5 years for assault in Capitol riot, the longest sentence yet
A Florida man was sentenced Friday to just over five years in prison for assaulting police officers during the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol.
The sentence, of 63 months, was the longest one yet imposed among the more than 150 defendants who have pleaded guilty to taking part in the siege.
"It has to be made clear that trying to violently overthrow the government, trying to stop the peaceful transition of power, and assaulting law enforcement officers in that effort is going to be met with absolutely certain punishment," said U.S. District Judge Tanya S. Chutkan.
Judge sets January arguments for lawsuits seeking to hold Trump accountable for US Capitol riot
Three civil lawsuits from lawmakers and Capitol Police officers that seek to hold Donald Trump and his closest advisers accountable for the US Capitol riot are moving forward after months of inaction.
Judge Amit Mehta of the DC District Court has set oral arguments on whether the cases -- which are separate from the congressional or criminal investigations -- should be dismissed for January 10.
But the lawsuits' movement comes as the US House unearths more evidence of the Trump White House wanting to derail Congress from certifying the 2020 presidential vote.
Hey remember a few years ago when all the news was about how Europe was totally and forever lost to the far right and doom and gloom was the only appropriate response? Well how about this:
In a bad sign for Boris Johnson, Britain’s Conservatives lose Parliament seat they held for nearly 200 years
Boris Johnson’s ruling Conservative Party lost a seat Friday that it had safely held for almost 200 years, in a fresh blow to the British prime minister that renewed questions about his leadership.
The Liberal Democrats won North Shropshire in central England after the seat became vacant following a sleaze scandal that engulfed Johnson’s Conservative Party. The pro-Brexit district had sent a Conservative politician to Parliament since its formation in 1832.
Dominion Voting wins key decision in lawsuit against Fox News
A judge in Delaware has found that Fox News' coverage of election fraud after the 2020 election may have been inaccurate, and is allowing a major defamation case against the right-wing TV network to move forward.
Judge Eric Davis of the Delaware Superior Court declined to dismiss Dominion Voting System's lawsuit against Fox News in a significant ruling Thursday.
The ruling will now allow Dominion to attempt to unearth extensive communications within Fox News as they gather evidence for the case, and the company may be able to interview the network's top names under oath.
Fox's worst week? Dominion ruling adds to drumbeat of bad news for the network
On Sunday the Fox News Channel's news facade was chipped away when Chris Wallace decamped to CNN. On Monday the hypocrisy of Fox's biggest stars was highlighted by a bipartisan House committee. On Tuesday the network belatedly and weakly defended itself. And the week wasn't even half over yet.
Thursday, Fox was set back in court in a big way. As Katelyn Polantz reports here, "a judge in Delaware has found that Fox News' coverage of election fraud after the 2020 election may have been inaccurate, and is allowing a major defamation case against the right-wing TV network to move forward."
Perdue rejected GOP appeals to skip governor race
A majority of Georgia's Republican state senators quietly sent former Sen. David Perdue a letter last month asking him not to run for governor, Axios has learned. Weeks later, Perdue forged ahead and announced his primary challenge to incumbent Gov. Brian Kemp.
Why it matters: Former President Donald Trump's campaign against "disloyal" Republicans has set off GOP worries around the country about the risk of dividing, weakening or radicalizing the party. Nowhere has the dynamic played out more openly so far than Georgia.
Brad Parscale Says Jan. 6 Panel Subpoenaed His Phone Records
The Jan. 6 Committee now appears to be looking into former Trump campaign manager Brad Parscale, with Parscale telling The Daily Beast late Wednesday night the committee investigating the attack on the Capitol had subpoenaed his phone records from November through January.
Parscale said he had received a notice from his phone carrier earlier in the day and “just agreed.”
Kroger, the U.S. grocery giant, eliminates paid Covid-19 leave for unvaccinated workers.
Kroger, the national supermarket operator and one of the nation’s largest retailers, has restructured its Covid-19 benefits for unvaccinated employees and will charge some of them if they remain unprotected, a spokeswoman for the company confirmed on Wednesday.
Two Jan. 6 Organizers Are Coming Forward and Naming Names: ‘We’re Turning It All Over’
After losing faith in Trump, the pair plan to hand over text messages, Instagram direct messages, and other documents related to the planning of the Jan. 6 rally on the Ellipse where Trump spoke
Good Virus News
South Africa Hospitalization Rate Plunges in Omicron Wave
South Africa delivered some positive news on the omicron coronavirus variant on Friday, reporting a much lower rate of hospital admissions and signs that the wave of infections may be peaking.
Only 1.7% of identified Covid-19 cases were admitted to hospital in the second week of infections in the fourth wave, compared with 19% in the same week of the third delta-driven wave, South African Health Minister Joe Phaahla said at a press conference.
Health officials presented evidence that the strain may be milder, and that infections may already be peaking in the country’s most populous province, Gauteng.
Other Good News
2021 was a game-changing year for trees
the year started out bleak for some of the nation’s most important forest ecosystems. The outgoing Trump administration slashed federal protection for Alaska’s Tongass National Forest — the world’s largest intact temperate rainforest — and finalized a rule to stop protecting more than 3 million acres of the Pacific Northwest that’s home to the northern spotted owl, a threatened bird.
Biden reversed these policies, and others, after taking office.
“We’ve now had 12 months to get us back to where we were in 2016,” said Aaron Weiss, deputy director at the Center for Western Priorities, a research and advocacy group. “I don’t know if you can call that progress as much as it is stopping the bleeding.”
But in January, Biden also announced that the US would aim for “30 by 30” — a goal of conserving at least 30 percent of the nation’s land and water by 2030, which dozens of other countries have committed to.
“We’ve never seen a president make that kind of big conservation promise right off the top,” Weiss said.
This year also ushered in major pledges and financing for trees. At the UN’s big November climate conference in Glasgow, more than 100 global leaders vowed to end deforestation by 2030 — a commitment that governments and private companies backed with $19 billion. In April, a number of countries, including the US and Norway, also launched a coalition that will pay countries that can show they’re preventing deforestation.
On the Lighter Side
Save Democracy
What can you do to save democracy?
Most important: DON'T LOSE HOPE. This is a giant and important fight for us but, win or lose, we keep fighting and voting and organizing and spreading truth and light. We never give up.
That is it for today.
I am lucky and proud to be in this with you ✊🏾✊🏻💙💚💛💜🧡✊🏽✊🏻