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Good News Roundup 8-9-23: Post Pollworking Goodness [1]

['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.']

Date: 2023-08-09

Good morning, Gnusies, to this post special election roundup. I normally don’t report on political good news, but I live in Ohio, and I work the polls. I wasn’t sure I’d have news of the special election’s results for you.

Oh, how I was (joyously, hilariously) wrong.

We had multiple people checking with friends, family, and news following returns while we were shutting down our location after closing the polls last night. The election was called before we left the building, less than an hour after polls closed.

WE WON. WE WON WE WON WE WON.

Republicans (and donors) wasted a whole lot of money. A whole lot of money.

They also bit off more than they can chew.

I work at a location in downtown Cleveland (Cuyahoga County). The following include my own anecdotal observations, comparing yesterday’s election with past elections I’ve served at the same location (or the same precincts, since the location itself changed for COVID):

There are 3 precincts in my polling location. We had almost 800 people vote (either normally or provisionally) and had to turn a number of people away for various reasons (mostly wrong precinct).

If we ever had a stretch of time longer than 3 minutes long without at least one voter in the room, I would be shocked. (That is insane for an election at my location. ANY election, in my experience of over a decade serving the polls.)

for an election at my location. ANY election, in my experience of over a decade serving the polls.) LOTS of young people. Lots of college students and young adults. They came in pairs and trios and small groups, and you could tell because the first one(s) through the scanner line would be waiting for the other(s). (Maybe someone started a voting buddy system?)

Lots of families. Kids. Dogs. People before work, after workouts, dressed up for concerts, decked out in scrubs and work uniforms. (Comparatively speaking, far fewer business suits than I’ve seen in the past.)

Lots of disabled folks came out. Lots. Like, numbers I have never seen, using equipment I have rarely seen used more than once in an election and rarely even then.

Bottom line:

The only time I’ve ever seen higher turnout is during a presidential general election, and demographics came out to vote that haven’t in the few that I’ve participated in, at least not to the extent that they did yesterday.

Yesterday was a marathon of epic proportions, but the atmosphere was almost celebratory. People were excited and grateful, polite and happy to be there and follow instructions. There was an air of “I’m going to flex my civic power and I’m not gonna be shy about it.” It was as if everyone knew the outcome as a foregone conclusion but wanted to make sure they were included in the massive outcry of “NOT ON OUR WATCH.”

ANYWAYS. Back to our regularly scheduled reprieve from politics.

A little bit abbreviated this morning, between the avalanche of political stuff and the death spiral that is, was, Xitterspace.

Anyways. On with the show!

x YouTube Video

I love living in the future.

Newly Identified Lipid in Breast Milk Might Reduce Cerebral Palsy in Infants In experiments using neonatal mice, researchers at Duke Health have identified a fatty molecule in breast milk that triggers a process in which stem cells in the brain produce cells that create new white matter, reversing the injury. ... “Developing therapies for children -- especially such medically fragile children -- is very difficult to do because there are justifiably strict safety concerns,” Benner said. “The fact that this molecule is already found in something that is safe for premature babies – breast milk – is extremely encouraging. “It’s been known that fats in breast milk benefit a child’s brain development, but there are many types of fats in breast milk,” Benner said. “This work has identified a lipid molecule in breast milk that promotes white matter development. Now, we can begin to develop a therapy that isolates and delivers this lipid in a way that is safe for the unique challenges of these infants.” ... The fatty molecule identified in the study will be administered intravenously to patients in an upcoming clinical trial. This is significant because many of the infants who are part of this vulnerable population also have gastrointestinal issues and cannot safely be given milk or medication by mouth. … “The timing of brain injury is extremely difficult to predict, thus a treatment that could be safely given to all preterm babies at risk would be revolutionary,” said Agnes Chao, M.D., a former fellow in the Division of Neonatology and first author of the paper.

Riddle me this! What mystery has the JWST found for us recently?

James Webb Space Telescope spies giant cosmic question mark in deep space (photo) It's unclear exactly what the question mark-shaped object might be, but its color and shape give us some idea. "It is probably a distant galaxy, or potentially interacting galaxies (their interactions may have caused the distorted question mark-shape)," representatives of the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) in Baltimore, which manages JWST's science operations, told Space.com. According to STScI, the object's red color in the JWST image tells scientists that the object, whatever it may be, is quite distant. Even more exciting, this might be the first time astronomers have seen the cosmic question mark. "This may be the first time we've seen this particular object," STScI added. "Additional follow-up would be required to figure out what it is with any certainty. Webb is showing us many new, distant galaxies — so there's a lot of new science to be done!"

Somehow, I got hooked on SciShow YouTube videos and branched out into a whole bunch of sister and related channels and now I’m watching vlogbrothers. Which is pretty awesome because Coffee, and apparently Awesome Coffee is a Thing that Exists and is helping improve the lives of people in many places. (If anyone else is a fan of Hank Green, he’s doing well and on the road to recovery!)

x YouTube Video

Something something turtles Dr. Seuss politics...NEVERMIND. Have some good news about sea turtles!

Palm Beach County Smashes All-Time Record for Sea Turtle Nests: 21,800 and Counting Palm Beach County has already shattered the record for the number of turtle nests recorded during a single nesting season on Juno Beach, with three months of counting still to come. By Sunday, the 9.5-mile Juno Beach in the northern part of the county had seen 21,872 mostly-loggerhead sea turtle nests, compared to an end-season total of 18,132 nests last October. “We are so excited to break this all-time nesting record and can’t wait to see if each sea turtle species breaks its individual record,” Dr. Justin Perrault, vice president of research at Loggerhead Marinelife Center, said in the news release. The overwhelming majority, around 15,000 of the nests, belong to the loggerhead species, but green and leatherback sea turtles also nest there. All of these species are considered vulnerable or endangered. … In recent years, some US Gulf Coast and Atlantic states have seen record increases in turtle nests, projecting an image of the United States as a turtle sanctuary since any turtle that hatches there will return year after year to lay their eggs on the same beach they were born on.

Apparently, the BBC has picked up news of Ohio’s election results. So I’m dragging in news from Australia for you. How about some predatory marsupials? Probably not the one you’re thinking of.

Threatened western quolls breeding at Wheatbelt site for the first time in 100 years About 30 western quolls were released at the Mount Gibson Wildlife Sanctuary in the Wheatbelt earlier this year. … The Australian Wildlife Conservancy is monitoring their reintegration as part of a project which released 10 different animal species at the Mount Gibson reserve. … Senior field ecologist Georgina Anderson said the quolls are starting to show signs of adapting to their new home. "We're detecting them lots, finding them in dens, and we've now detected females with pouch young, so we've had some successful breeding," she said. ... Before being released, 16 of the quolls were fitted with radio tracking collars which allowed researchers to monitor the animals using drones.

That’s about it for me, today, gnusies! Be kind to each other, yourselves, those you care about, those who are strangers.

Play us out.

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[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/8/9/2185756/-Good-News-Roundup-8-9-23-Post-Pollworking-Goodness

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