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shadowkatBaking Apple Cinnamon Muffins for the week ahead and watching S6 of Call the Midwife on Netflix.
Below is the Good News Report from The American Resistance & It's Global Allies - because we all need a little good news? As always, good news is in the eye of the beholder or mileage may vary on this.
1. The Conservation Fund purchases North America’s largest blackwater swamp, saving over 350,000 acres of designated wilderness from a mining company.
https://augustafreepress.com/news/conservation-funds-purchase-of-georgia-florida-wildlife-refuge-saves-land-from-mining-company/?sh_kit=7a2950363f4b90b1881ae76c68d24551846eea9063b67a6a14e9fa39bc419e40
"The Conservation Fund has purchased North America‘s largest blackwater swamp which extends from southern Georgia into northern Florida and saved it from a proposed deep earth mine.
The Okefenokee National Wildlife Refuge is no longer available for mining purposes. The Trail Ridge site was owned by Twin Pines Minerals LLC and the subject of a six-year effort by conservation-minded Georgians and folks throughout the South to protect the Okefenokee."
2.California takes steps to protect school and college students, school staff, and hospital patients from unjust ICE enforcement activity.Governor Newsom signed the nation’s strongest protections into law to limit tactics being used by Trump’s federal “secret police,” protect children at schools, and patients in public hospitals from Trump’s lawlessness.
https://www.gov.ca.gov/2025/09/20/governor-newsom-signs-laws-to-protect-school-children-and-hospital-patients-and-limit-fear-tactics-used-by-trumps-secret-police-force-to-terrorize-communities/
3. California’s Supreme Court unanimously rules that state regulators were given undue deference in the decision to roll back rooftop solar panel credits for homeowners.
https://www.cbsnews.com/sanfrancisco/news/california-supreme-court-rooftop-solar-credits-cpuc-environmental-groups/
4. Maine fast-tracks plans for renewable energy projects before climate-friendly government incentives are removed under the budget passed this summer. The state is prioritizing projects built on PFAS-contaminated land as it looks to kickstart installations that can help it reach 100% clean energy by 2040.
https://www.canarymedia.com/articles/clean-energy/maine-fast-track-tax-credits
5.Three chemical and materials companies will pay the state of New Jersey up to $2B in a settlement over the environmental hazards of PFAS. "DuPont and two other companies will settle environmental claims concerning PFAS, commonly referred to as "forever chemicals," and pay New Jersey up to $2 billion, the companies announced Monday."
https://www.cbsnews.com/philadelphia/news/dupont-pfas-settlement-chemours-corteva-new-jersey-repauno-parlin/
6.Walmart said it is planning to remove synthetic dyes from all its private label store-brand foods by the start of 2027 (Wall Street Journal).
7.Australia funds solar microgrids to replace diesel in First Nations communities.
https://www.pv-magazine.com/2025/08/20/australia-funds-solar-microgrids-to-replace-diesel-in-remote-first-nations-towns/
8. NIH races to spend 2025 grant budget
The US National Institutes of Health (NIH) is on track to dole out its entire US$48-billion budget by the end of the fiscal year on 30 September, despite the administration of Donald Trump laying off thousands of the agency’s workers and delaying meetings to review research grants. The agency’s staff banded together to “clean up the mess”, an NIH programme officer told Nature, and ensure that the funds were invested in science. Although the agency’s budget will be spent, many fewer new projects will be funded because of a government directive to award large sums to research projects upfront.
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-025-03168-4
9. Energy-related carbon dioxide emissions in the U.S. have decreased by 20 percent since 2005.
https://www.utilitydive.com/news/energy-co2-carbon-emissions-falling-states-natural-gas-renewables/760374/
10. The city of San Francisco moves to ensure that substantial renovations to existing buildings are all-electric.
https://www.canarymedia.com/articles/carbon-free-buildings/san-francisco-renovations-gas-ban
11.A new report by the Redstone Strategy Group shows that community-based climate mitigation efforts yield meaningful impacts with strong returns on investment.
https://grist.org/solutions/new-report-shows-how-local-climate-activism-leads-to-remarkable-gains/
12. China pledges emissions reduction by 2035
Chinese president Xi Jinping has announced that, by 2035, China will reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 7-10% from their peak level. In 2020, Xi pledged that China’s CO2 emissions would reach their peak before 2030, a milestone some researchers think might have been reached already. As the largest emitter in the world, the pace of China’s cuts will have profound global impact: if met, this target would be the equivalent to “three UKs completely decarbonizing over the next decade”, says climate physicist Piers Forster. But the goal — a proportion of an undefined amount — leaves room for short-term increases, and anyway might not be enough to keep warming below the 1.5-2 ℃ set in the Paris agreement.
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-025-03166-6
13. A federal court overturns the Dept. of Energy’s stop-work order on Rhode Island’s Revolution Wind project—an offshore wind farm that’s already 80% complete and will power 350,000 homes.
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/policy/3818607/federal-judge-lifts-trump-stop-work-order-rhode-island-offshore-wind-project/
14. Sens. Tammy Baldwin (D–WI) and Lisa Murkowski (R–AK) introduce a bipartisan bill to reestablish the national emergency suicide prevention hotline for LGBTQ+ youth.
https://www.them.us/story/lgbtq-youth-suicide-hotline-bill-status-988
15.On the 70th anniversary of Emmett Till’s death, the Civil Rights Cold Case Records Review Board oversees the release of thousands of pages of the Till lynching investigation into the National Archives.
https://chicago.suntimes.com/news/2025/08/22/emmett-till-records-archive-history-black?sh_kit=7a2950363f4b90b1881ae76c68d24551846eea9063b67a6a14e9fa39bc419e40
16.Four Chicago-area residents with mobility disabilities file a federal class-action lawsuit against the city for being in violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act due to inaccessible sidewalks, curb ramps, and public pedestrian ways.
https://chicago.suntimes.com/news/2025/09/10/chicago-pedestrian-ways-violate-ada-requirements-lawsuit-alleges
17. Investment in renewable power rose by 10 percent in the first half of 2025, the Guardian reports, and, in spite of Trump’s cynical efforts, 19 American states and 304 large companies—together representing nearly two-thirds of US corporate revenues—remain committed to “net zero.”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/sep/23/global-investment-in-renewable-energy-up-10-on-2024-despite-trump-rollback
18, New Hampshire and Vermont—following on the inspiration of Germany and, kind of surprisingly, Utah—are considering legislation to usher in “balcony solar.” These are inexpensive, plug-in PV systems that help homeowners and apartment dwellers offset soaring energy bills, and that can pay for themselves in four to five years, even without tax breaks or net metering.
https://www.canarymedia.com/articles/solar/vermont-new-hampshire-plug-in-balcony-legislation
19. Could this be the start of the US solar revolution Bill McKibben called for in a recent Mother Jones essay?
https://www.motherjones.com/environment/2025/07/rooftop-solar-grid-power-green-permits/
20.US autism research gets $50-million boost
Last week, Donald Trump prompted fierce pushback from scientists over an event at which he repeated poorly evidenced claims that taking the painkiller Tylenol (also known as acetaminophen and paracetamol) during pregnancy is linked with autism in children. But the same event brought welcome news to scientists: a US$50 million investment into research that studies how interacting genetic and environmental factors contribute to autism, with a focus on reproducibility. “This is where the field needs to be going in searching for the complex causes of autism,” says psychologist Helen Tager-Flusberg, the founder of the Coalition of Autism Scientists. However, some researchers are worried about political interference in the studies.
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-025-03126-0
21. About 1 million Earths could fit inside the Sun.
https://interestingfacts.com/fact/about-1-million-earths-could-fit-inside-the-sun/?lctg=6ff42290-162d-4646-9f7c-3bcb33e246fc
22.The number of animals farmed for their fur has fallen dramatically over the last decade. [Can we just not do it at all? Honestly, we don't need furs. We already raise sheep and alpaca.]
https://thehappybroadcast.com/news/fur-production-has-plummeted-by-85-over-the-past-decade
23. Gavin Newsom announces that any California university that caves to Trump and signs his “loyalty pledge” will be immediately defunded.
“CALIFORNIA WILL NOT BANKROLL SCHOOLS THAT SELL OUT THEIR STUDENTS.”
24. The Guardian covers how the ICE deployment in Chicago has been "met by a defiant wave of sustained protests."
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/video/2025/oct/02/how-chicago-is-resisting-donald-trumps-immigration-crackdown-video
25. “The purpose of these grants is to promote artistic expression, not to hire people to be a mouthpiece for the government.” The ACLU challenged the Trump administration's new NEA guidelines to protect our right to freedom of expression — and won.
https://thepublicsradio.org/arts-and-culture/why-rhode-island-latino-arts-fought-the-trump-administration-in-court/
26.Multiple law enforcement agencies were seemingly in a standoff with dozens of protesters outside an Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility near Chicago where Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem was spotted.
https://www.cnn.com/2025/10/03/us/illinois-broadview-ice-protests?Date=20251003&Profile=CNN
27. New Mexico to be first state to launch universal child care system, governor announces.
https://www.abqjournal.com/news/article_346f2dd2-4d94-46fd-bc34-615af7b64079.html
28.Newsom signs bill giving 800,000 Uber and Lyft drivers in California the right to unionize
https://apnews.com/article/lyft-uber-rideshare-driver-union-california-68c0e55f90b779ae38e315538087d1b3
29.U.S. solar will pass wind in 2025 and leave coal in the dust soon after. Solar and wind represent about 11% to 12% of the energy mix each, while coal sits just under 15%. Developers brought online 16 GW of solar out of a total 21.5 GW electric generation capacity cumulatively added through July in 2025, said the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. There is currently about 5 GW more wind than solar actively deployed in the United States.
https://pv-magazine-usa.com/2025/10/01/u-s-solar-will-pass-wind-in-2025-and-leave-coal-in-the-dust-soon-after/
30. A children's orchestra based in one of Liverpool's most deprived communities has been described as having "some of the most inspirational kids you could meet".
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cp8wp6lp6rzo
31. A Minnesota school's solution to student conflict: 'Stop everything' and talk it out. These conferences are an everyday occurrence at the Friends School. Small stations are set up in the halls where students can submit a written request for a mediated conference with their peers — and sometimes their teachers — if they have a disagreement. Caroline Schnieders, who runs the school’s conflict resolution program, said the conferences are a big part of the school’s culture, so kids don’t hesitate to request them. “We basically stop everything. If there's a conflict, we’ve got to resolve the conflict in order to learn,” said Schnieders. “We also have this daily system in place that allows it to happen without us having to rearrange anything or disrupt anything."
https://www.mprnews.org/story/2025/10/03/st-paul-friends-school-conflict-resolution
32.Billionaire MacKenzie Scott gifts $70 million for historically Black universities MacKenzie Scott awarded the United Negro College Fund with a $70 million gift towards strengthening historically Black colleges and universities.
https://abcnews.go.com/US/video/billionaire-mackenzie-scott-gifts-70-million-historically-black-126039611
33.'We can end HIV': Groundbreaking preventative drug to be rolled out for $40 a year from 2027
Global health agencies announced Wednesday that generic versions of a groundbreaking injectable drug to prevent HIV will be made available from 2027 at around $40 a year in more than 100 low and middle-income countries, a move hailed as a potential gamechanger in the fight against the AIDS epidemic.
https://www.france24.com/en/health/20250925-groundbreaking-hiv-prevention-injection-to-be-rolled-out-for-40-dollars-a-year-from-2027
34.Something is working’: UN climate chief optimistic about green transition. Cleaning up industry and the global economy will produce massive economic dividends for countries that grasp the opportunity – as the example of China has shown, the UN climate chief has said, before a crunch summit of world leaders this week. In a last-ditch call to heads of government summoned to New York by the UN secretary general this week, Simon Stiell, the executive secretary of the UN framework convention on climate change, said governments would almost certainly fail to come up with the climate commitments needed to fulfil the Paris agreement before a deadline this month, but they could still reset their economies to reap the advantages of low-carbon growth.
“We’re moving in the right direction,” he said. “Not fast enough, not deep enough, but [the progress countries have made on moving to a low-carbon economy] is showing that something is working. We need to find all the levers that are available to us, to see how we can accelerate further.”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/sep/20/simon-stiell-un-climate-chief-climate-progress-green-transition
35.HIV Drug Resistance Is Declining Over Time
https://www.poz.com/article/hiv-drug-resistance-declining-time
36. 5-Year-Old Girl Goes Home with New Heart After Spending Almost 1,000 Days in Hospital: Sienna Barton, a 5-year-old from Utah underwent a successful heart transplant earlier this year
https://people.com/5-year-old-girl-goes-home-new-heart-after-almost-1000-days-hospital-11822467
37.One of the cruellest and most devastating disease, Huntington's, successfully treated for first time
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cevz13xkxpro
38. The Bright Side: Earth's ozone layer is healing thanks to international action, UN says: The Earth's protective ozone layer is on track to fully recover by mid-century, according to a report from the UN's World Meteorological Organization released Tuesday. The bulletin hailed the success of international agreements like the Montreal Protocol, crediting them with sharply reducing the use of ozone-depleting chemicals and slowing the annual growth of the Antarctic ozone hole.
https://www.france24.com/en/environment/20250916-un-says-ozone-layer-is-healing-hole-could-disappear-within-decades
39.£10m in fines paid by water firms funds restoration of sewage-polluted waterways Fifty-one projects have won funding, including restoring riverbeds in Exmoor National Park and tackling septic tank spills into Windermere.
https://www.independent.co.uk/climate-change/news/government-anglian-water-thames-water-yorkshire-water-north-yorkshire-b2838696.html
40.Girl shot in head at Annunciation goes back to school with classmates. A girl who was shot in the head during the mass shooting at Annunciation Catholic Church and School on Aug. 27 is now back at school.
Lydia Kaiser suffered a traumatic brain injury from a bullet and underwent two surgeries following the shooting, according to her parents. She is among the 21 who were injured in the shooting, in addition to two who were killed. Harry and Leah Kaiser said Lydia was “making remarkable progress in her recovery” just over a week after the incident. Days later, Lydia was discharged from Children’s Minnesota. Annunciation School resumed classes for elementary and middle school students on Sept. 16. A verified GoFundMe update shared Lydia had another surgery that week, but she was able to join her classmates not long after.
https://www.mprnews.org/story/2025/10/02/annunciation-shooting-victim-lydia-kaiser-goes-back-to-school
41. Melinda French Gates launches $100 million push for women's health research.
https://www.reuters.com/business/healthcare-pharmaceuticals/melinda-french-gates-launches-100-million-push-womens-health-research-2025-09-10/
42.Whales Are Trying to Communicate With Us Through Water Bubbles: For the first time, humpback whales have been documented emitting “rings of water bubbles” in a possible attempt to communicate with humans. The discovery provides new insights into “non-human intelligence” and may help shape strategies in the search for life beyond Earth.
Magnificently, for the first time in history, humpback whales have been documented attempting to communicate with humans through aquatic signals. Just like smokers who create rings of smoke, these whales were observed forming rings of water bubbles — a form of communication that gives us a fascinating glimpse of their cognitive complexity.
https://ovniologia.com.br/2025/09/whales-are-trying-to-communicate-with-us-through-water-bubbles-reveals-seti.html
43.After 40 years and $84M in cleanup, Muskegon Lake comes off toxic list
https://www.mlive.com/environment/2025/10/after-40-years-and-84m-in-cleanup-muskegon-lake-comes-off-toxic-list.html
44.Local nonprofit helps people with intellectual disabilities find work.
https://www.fox23.com/news/good-news-local-nonprofit-helps-people-with-intellectual-disabilities-find-work/article_50436b6f-3dc5-4ebd-bcab-ded9637413e9.html
45.London’s infamous ‘Wet Wipe Island’ finally cleared of 5 million wipes. Some 114 tonnes of material, including towels, scarves, trousers and even a set of false teeth, have now been removed
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/wet-wipe-island-thames-london-cleared-hammersmith-bridge-b2824711.html
46.Plastic bag bans work: New study confirms drop in beach litter where laws are in place.
https://happyeconews.com/plastic-bag-bans-work/
Here's a flower:
Below is the Good News Report from The American Resistance & It's Global Allies - because we all need a little good news? As always, good news is in the eye of the beholder or mileage may vary on this.
1. The Conservation Fund purchases North America’s largest blackwater swamp, saving over 350,000 acres of designated wilderness from a mining company.
https://augustafreepress.com/news/conservation-funds-purchase-of-georgia-florida-wildlife-refuge-saves-land-from-mining-company/?sh_kit=7a2950363f4b90b1881ae76c68d24551846eea9063b67a6a14e9fa39bc419e40
"The Conservation Fund has purchased North America‘s largest blackwater swamp which extends from southern Georgia into northern Florida and saved it from a proposed deep earth mine.
The Okefenokee National Wildlife Refuge is no longer available for mining purposes. The Trail Ridge site was owned by Twin Pines Minerals LLC and the subject of a six-year effort by conservation-minded Georgians and folks throughout the South to protect the Okefenokee."
2.California takes steps to protect school and college students, school staff, and hospital patients from unjust ICE enforcement activity.Governor Newsom signed the nation’s strongest protections into law to limit tactics being used by Trump’s federal “secret police,” protect children at schools, and patients in public hospitals from Trump’s lawlessness.
https://www.gov.ca.gov/2025/09/20/governor-newsom-signs-laws-to-protect-school-children-and-hospital-patients-and-limit-fear-tactics-used-by-trumps-secret-police-force-to-terrorize-communities/
3. California’s Supreme Court unanimously rules that state regulators were given undue deference in the decision to roll back rooftop solar panel credits for homeowners.
https://www.cbsnews.com/sanfrancisco/news/california-supreme-court-rooftop-solar-credits-cpuc-environmental-groups/
4. Maine fast-tracks plans for renewable energy projects before climate-friendly government incentives are removed under the budget passed this summer. The state is prioritizing projects built on PFAS-contaminated land as it looks to kickstart installations that can help it reach 100% clean energy by 2040.
https://www.canarymedia.com/articles/clean-energy/maine-fast-track-tax-credits
5.Three chemical and materials companies will pay the state of New Jersey up to $2B in a settlement over the environmental hazards of PFAS. "DuPont and two other companies will settle environmental claims concerning PFAS, commonly referred to as "forever chemicals," and pay New Jersey up to $2 billion, the companies announced Monday."
https://www.cbsnews.com/philadelphia/news/dupont-pfas-settlement-chemours-corteva-new-jersey-repauno-parlin/
6.Walmart said it is planning to remove synthetic dyes from all its private label store-brand foods by the start of 2027 (Wall Street Journal).
7.Australia funds solar microgrids to replace diesel in First Nations communities.
https://www.pv-magazine.com/2025/08/20/australia-funds-solar-microgrids-to-replace-diesel-in-remote-first-nations-towns/
8. NIH races to spend 2025 grant budget
The US National Institutes of Health (NIH) is on track to dole out its entire US$48-billion budget by the end of the fiscal year on 30 September, despite the administration of Donald Trump laying off thousands of the agency’s workers and delaying meetings to review research grants. The agency’s staff banded together to “clean up the mess”, an NIH programme officer told Nature, and ensure that the funds were invested in science. Although the agency’s budget will be spent, many fewer new projects will be funded because of a government directive to award large sums to research projects upfront.
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-025-03168-4
9. Energy-related carbon dioxide emissions in the U.S. have decreased by 20 percent since 2005.
https://www.utilitydive.com/news/energy-co2-carbon-emissions-falling-states-natural-gas-renewables/760374/
10. The city of San Francisco moves to ensure that substantial renovations to existing buildings are all-electric.
https://www.canarymedia.com/articles/carbon-free-buildings/san-francisco-renovations-gas-ban
11.A new report by the Redstone Strategy Group shows that community-based climate mitigation efforts yield meaningful impacts with strong returns on investment.
https://grist.org/solutions/new-report-shows-how-local-climate-activism-leads-to-remarkable-gains/
12. China pledges emissions reduction by 2035
Chinese president Xi Jinping has announced that, by 2035, China will reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 7-10% from their peak level. In 2020, Xi pledged that China’s CO2 emissions would reach their peak before 2030, a milestone some researchers think might have been reached already. As the largest emitter in the world, the pace of China’s cuts will have profound global impact: if met, this target would be the equivalent to “three UKs completely decarbonizing over the next decade”, says climate physicist Piers Forster. But the goal — a proportion of an undefined amount — leaves room for short-term increases, and anyway might not be enough to keep warming below the 1.5-2 ℃ set in the Paris agreement.
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-025-03166-6
13. A federal court overturns the Dept. of Energy’s stop-work order on Rhode Island’s Revolution Wind project—an offshore wind farm that’s already 80% complete and will power 350,000 homes.
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/policy/3818607/federal-judge-lifts-trump-stop-work-order-rhode-island-offshore-wind-project/
14. Sens. Tammy Baldwin (D–WI) and Lisa Murkowski (R–AK) introduce a bipartisan bill to reestablish the national emergency suicide prevention hotline for LGBTQ+ youth.
https://www.them.us/story/lgbtq-youth-suicide-hotline-bill-status-988
15.On the 70th anniversary of Emmett Till’s death, the Civil Rights Cold Case Records Review Board oversees the release of thousands of pages of the Till lynching investigation into the National Archives.
https://chicago.suntimes.com/news/2025/08/22/emmett-till-records-archive-history-black?sh_kit=7a2950363f4b90b1881ae76c68d24551846eea9063b67a6a14e9fa39bc419e40
16.Four Chicago-area residents with mobility disabilities file a federal class-action lawsuit against the city for being in violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act due to inaccessible sidewalks, curb ramps, and public pedestrian ways.
https://chicago.suntimes.com/news/2025/09/10/chicago-pedestrian-ways-violate-ada-requirements-lawsuit-alleges
17. Investment in renewable power rose by 10 percent in the first half of 2025, the Guardian reports, and, in spite of Trump’s cynical efforts, 19 American states and 304 large companies—together representing nearly two-thirds of US corporate revenues—remain committed to “net zero.”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/sep/23/global-investment-in-renewable-energy-up-10-on-2024-despite-trump-rollback
18, New Hampshire and Vermont—following on the inspiration of Germany and, kind of surprisingly, Utah—are considering legislation to usher in “balcony solar.” These are inexpensive, plug-in PV systems that help homeowners and apartment dwellers offset soaring energy bills, and that can pay for themselves in four to five years, even without tax breaks or net metering.
https://www.canarymedia.com/articles/solar/vermont-new-hampshire-plug-in-balcony-legislation
19. Could this be the start of the US solar revolution Bill McKibben called for in a recent Mother Jones essay?
https://www.motherjones.com/environment/2025/07/rooftop-solar-grid-power-green-permits/
20.US autism research gets $50-million boost
Last week, Donald Trump prompted fierce pushback from scientists over an event at which he repeated poorly evidenced claims that taking the painkiller Tylenol (also known as acetaminophen and paracetamol) during pregnancy is linked with autism in children. But the same event brought welcome news to scientists: a US$50 million investment into research that studies how interacting genetic and environmental factors contribute to autism, with a focus on reproducibility. “This is where the field needs to be going in searching for the complex causes of autism,” says psychologist Helen Tager-Flusberg, the founder of the Coalition of Autism Scientists. However, some researchers are worried about political interference in the studies.
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-025-03126-0
21. About 1 million Earths could fit inside the Sun.
https://interestingfacts.com/fact/about-1-million-earths-could-fit-inside-the-sun/?lctg=6ff42290-162d-4646-9f7c-3bcb33e246fc
22.The number of animals farmed for their fur has fallen dramatically over the last decade. [Can we just not do it at all? Honestly, we don't need furs. We already raise sheep and alpaca.]
https://thehappybroadcast.com/news/fur-production-has-plummeted-by-85-over-the-past-decade
23. Gavin Newsom announces that any California university that caves to Trump and signs his “loyalty pledge” will be immediately defunded.
“CALIFORNIA WILL NOT BANKROLL SCHOOLS THAT SELL OUT THEIR STUDENTS.”
24. The Guardian covers how the ICE deployment in Chicago has been "met by a defiant wave of sustained protests."
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/video/2025/oct/02/how-chicago-is-resisting-donald-trumps-immigration-crackdown-video
25. “The purpose of these grants is to promote artistic expression, not to hire people to be a mouthpiece for the government.” The ACLU challenged the Trump administration's new NEA guidelines to protect our right to freedom of expression — and won.
https://thepublicsradio.org/arts-and-culture/why-rhode-island-latino-arts-fought-the-trump-administration-in-court/
26.Multiple law enforcement agencies were seemingly in a standoff with dozens of protesters outside an Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility near Chicago where Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem was spotted.
https://www.cnn.com/2025/10/03/us/illinois-broadview-ice-protests?Date=20251003&Profile=CNN
27. New Mexico to be first state to launch universal child care system, governor announces.
https://www.abqjournal.com/news/article_346f2dd2-4d94-46fd-bc34-615af7b64079.html
28.Newsom signs bill giving 800,000 Uber and Lyft drivers in California the right to unionize
https://apnews.com/article/lyft-uber-rideshare-driver-union-california-68c0e55f90b779ae38e315538087d1b3
29.U.S. solar will pass wind in 2025 and leave coal in the dust soon after. Solar and wind represent about 11% to 12% of the energy mix each, while coal sits just under 15%. Developers brought online 16 GW of solar out of a total 21.5 GW electric generation capacity cumulatively added through July in 2025, said the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. There is currently about 5 GW more wind than solar actively deployed in the United States.
https://pv-magazine-usa.com/2025/10/01/u-s-solar-will-pass-wind-in-2025-and-leave-coal-in-the-dust-soon-after/
30. A children's orchestra based in one of Liverpool's most deprived communities has been described as having "some of the most inspirational kids you could meet".
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cp8wp6lp6rzo
31. A Minnesota school's solution to student conflict: 'Stop everything' and talk it out. These conferences are an everyday occurrence at the Friends School. Small stations are set up in the halls where students can submit a written request for a mediated conference with their peers — and sometimes their teachers — if they have a disagreement. Caroline Schnieders, who runs the school’s conflict resolution program, said the conferences are a big part of the school’s culture, so kids don’t hesitate to request them. “We basically stop everything. If there's a conflict, we’ve got to resolve the conflict in order to learn,” said Schnieders. “We also have this daily system in place that allows it to happen without us having to rearrange anything or disrupt anything."
https://www.mprnews.org/story/2025/10/03/st-paul-friends-school-conflict-resolution
32.Billionaire MacKenzie Scott gifts $70 million for historically Black universities MacKenzie Scott awarded the United Negro College Fund with a $70 million gift towards strengthening historically Black colleges and universities.
https://abcnews.go.com/US/video/billionaire-mackenzie-scott-gifts-70-million-historically-black-126039611
33.'We can end HIV': Groundbreaking preventative drug to be rolled out for $40 a year from 2027
Global health agencies announced Wednesday that generic versions of a groundbreaking injectable drug to prevent HIV will be made available from 2027 at around $40 a year in more than 100 low and middle-income countries, a move hailed as a potential gamechanger in the fight against the AIDS epidemic.
https://www.france24.com/en/health/20250925-groundbreaking-hiv-prevention-injection-to-be-rolled-out-for-40-dollars-a-year-from-2027
34.Something is working’: UN climate chief optimistic about green transition. Cleaning up industry and the global economy will produce massive economic dividends for countries that grasp the opportunity – as the example of China has shown, the UN climate chief has said, before a crunch summit of world leaders this week. In a last-ditch call to heads of government summoned to New York by the UN secretary general this week, Simon Stiell, the executive secretary of the UN framework convention on climate change, said governments would almost certainly fail to come up with the climate commitments needed to fulfil the Paris agreement before a deadline this month, but they could still reset their economies to reap the advantages of low-carbon growth.
“We’re moving in the right direction,” he said. “Not fast enough, not deep enough, but [the progress countries have made on moving to a low-carbon economy] is showing that something is working. We need to find all the levers that are available to us, to see how we can accelerate further.”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/sep/20/simon-stiell-un-climate-chief-climate-progress-green-transition
35.HIV Drug Resistance Is Declining Over Time
https://www.poz.com/article/hiv-drug-resistance-declining-time
36. 5-Year-Old Girl Goes Home with New Heart After Spending Almost 1,000 Days in Hospital: Sienna Barton, a 5-year-old from Utah underwent a successful heart transplant earlier this year
https://people.com/5-year-old-girl-goes-home-new-heart-after-almost-1000-days-hospital-11822467
37.One of the cruellest and most devastating disease, Huntington's, successfully treated for first time
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cevz13xkxpro
38. The Bright Side: Earth's ozone layer is healing thanks to international action, UN says: The Earth's protective ozone layer is on track to fully recover by mid-century, according to a report from the UN's World Meteorological Organization released Tuesday. The bulletin hailed the success of international agreements like the Montreal Protocol, crediting them with sharply reducing the use of ozone-depleting chemicals and slowing the annual growth of the Antarctic ozone hole.
https://www.france24.com/en/environment/20250916-un-says-ozone-layer-is-healing-hole-could-disappear-within-decades
39.£10m in fines paid by water firms funds restoration of sewage-polluted waterways Fifty-one projects have won funding, including restoring riverbeds in Exmoor National Park and tackling septic tank spills into Windermere.
https://www.independent.co.uk/climate-change/news/government-anglian-water-thames-water-yorkshire-water-north-yorkshire-b2838696.html
40.Girl shot in head at Annunciation goes back to school with classmates. A girl who was shot in the head during the mass shooting at Annunciation Catholic Church and School on Aug. 27 is now back at school.
Lydia Kaiser suffered a traumatic brain injury from a bullet and underwent two surgeries following the shooting, according to her parents. She is among the 21 who were injured in the shooting, in addition to two who were killed. Harry and Leah Kaiser said Lydia was “making remarkable progress in her recovery” just over a week after the incident. Days later, Lydia was discharged from Children’s Minnesota. Annunciation School resumed classes for elementary and middle school students on Sept. 16. A verified GoFundMe update shared Lydia had another surgery that week, but she was able to join her classmates not long after.
https://www.mprnews.org/story/2025/10/02/annunciation-shooting-victim-lydia-kaiser-goes-back-to-school
41. Melinda French Gates launches $100 million push for women's health research.
https://www.reuters.com/business/healthcare-pharmaceuticals/melinda-french-gates-launches-100-million-push-womens-health-research-2025-09-10/
42.Whales Are Trying to Communicate With Us Through Water Bubbles: For the first time, humpback whales have been documented emitting “rings of water bubbles” in a possible attempt to communicate with humans. The discovery provides new insights into “non-human intelligence” and may help shape strategies in the search for life beyond Earth.
Magnificently, for the first time in history, humpback whales have been documented attempting to communicate with humans through aquatic signals. Just like smokers who create rings of smoke, these whales were observed forming rings of water bubbles — a form of communication that gives us a fascinating glimpse of their cognitive complexity.
https://ovniologia.com.br/2025/09/whales-are-trying-to-communicate-with-us-through-water-bubbles-reveals-seti.html
43.After 40 years and $84M in cleanup, Muskegon Lake comes off toxic list
https://www.mlive.com/environment/2025/10/after-40-years-and-84m-in-cleanup-muskegon-lake-comes-off-toxic-list.html
44.Local nonprofit helps people with intellectual disabilities find work.
https://www.fox23.com/news/good-news-local-nonprofit-helps-people-with-intellectual-disabilities-find-work/article_50436b6f-3dc5-4ebd-bcab-ded9637413e9.html
45.London’s infamous ‘Wet Wipe Island’ finally cleared of 5 million wipes. Some 114 tonnes of material, including towels, scarves, trousers and even a set of false teeth, have now been removed
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/wet-wipe-island-thames-london-cleared-hammersmith-bridge-b2824711.html
46.Plastic bag bans work: New study confirms drop in beach litter where laws are in place.
https://happyeconews.com/plastic-bag-bans-work/
Here's a flower:
no subject
Date: 2025-10-06 02:09 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-10-06 12:04 pm (UTC)(Of course, I'll have to convince my allergist that despite what the blood work shows - I have allergies. LOL! Note to self - do not get blood tests on allergies, unless I've been off allergy meds for at least two weeks.)