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DAN GAINOR: November’s Nuttiest News: An Elvis judge, COP chaos and more media lunacy
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Here’s your round up of the seven wildest stories from last month. Let’s get started with the blazing insanity of a climate conference in Brazil and then look at six others.
1. COP Chaos
It’s November, and that usually means the eco-loons come out of the woodwork. For the past several years, November has brought the annual meeting of the Conference of the Parties, or COP. This year was COP30, held in Brazil and drawing more than 56,000 delegates and business representatives from around the globe. Yep, you made the connection — that’s a carbon footprint the size of a small city, flying all around the world to protest … the use of carbon.
It was far worse than that. First, there’s the massive highway they built right through the Amazon to get to the conference instead of, you know, doing it online. According to the BBC, that meant eight miles of “a new four-lane highway cutting through tens of thousands of acres of protected Amazon rainforest.”
The highway had been proposed back in 2012, “but it had repeatedly been shelved because of environmental concerns.”
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Then rooms at the event were so expensive even some of the delegates balked at the cost. (And most weren’t paying for themselves.) So Brazil brought in two large cruise ships to house poorer delegates. One of them advertised that it “offers 11 restaurants, 12 bars, 3 swimming pools, and 8 hot tubs.” Life’s tough working to save Mother Earth. That’s not a climate event — it’s a 56,000-person group vacation.
2. The less-than-excellent Mr. Burns
We’re talking Ken Burns, sometime historian and all-around lefty. Burns is in the news for his new documentary series on the Revolutionary War. I’ll leave fact-checking that to actual historians. I’m here to mock Burns for his elitist view of rural America. Burns was interviewed on Bulwark’s “How to Fix It” podcast, and he decided to shill for his paymasters in formerly public media.
According to Burns, defunding public media will hurt us in non-blue America. “It’ll hurt mostly rural communities — maybe that’s their intention. There’ll be news deserts.”
That’s right, folks in rural America must not have things like the internet to find news. He sounds like he expects us to be upset because we can’t hear NPR while sitting in our outhouse and drinking our moonshine.
Ken Burns speaks onstage during the New York premiere of PBS’ “The American Revolution,” featuring Ken Burns and Tom Hanks, during the 2025 Atlantic Festival on September 18, 2025, in New York City. (Michael Loccisano/Getty Images)
Rural America barely even notices public media. Those outlets are designed for upscale urban audiences who are more than 90% liberal. A country boy can survive … without NPR’s ever-left spin on the news.
3. A Toast to the Post
Things are changing in the opinion section of The Washington Post. In an effort to reach out to other voices, the paper launched a new section called Ripple. Depending on your age, that might mean what happens when you toss a pebble into a pond. Or it could conjure images of the great Redd Foxx playing Fred Sanford in “Sanford and Son.” His preferred drink on the show was a fortified wine called Ripple. For oldsters like myself, one wonders if the other names they considered were Mad Dog, Night Train or Thunderbird.
Things are changing in the opinion section of The Washington Post. (Kevin Carter/Getty Images)
4. Farmers No Longer Dig It
Change, as we learned from President Barack Obama, is often not so good. Such is the fate for the Farmers’ Almanac. The almanac is, well, buying the farm. No, not that almanac, the other one — or, as The Associated Press put it, “not to be confused with its older, longtime competitor, The Old Farmer’s Almanac in neighboring New Hampshire.”
Still, this Maine-based almanac has 208 years under its prodigious belt, and AP says, “it’s believed to be the oldest continually published periodical in North America.”
The Maine State Capitol in Augusta. (eyecrave productions via Getty Images)
All that is ending in 2026 due to a “chaotic media environment.” The staff has nothing to be ashamed of. They outlasted more than half the newspapers I ever worked for. Chaotic, indeed.
5. Down on the Farm
And while we are down on the farm, let’s talk sheep, followed by goat cuddling. The Washington Post ran a feature on a farmer who rescues gay sheep, under the memorable headline, “I love your sweater. Is it made from gay sheep wool?”
According to the Post, “As many as one in 12 male sheep are non-procreative but show an — ahem — interest in other rams.” So the farmer, whose sheep carry names like “Marvin Gay,” did “a fashion hookup with Grindr,” appropriately the gay hookup site. Together, they launched a fashion show “to promote Rainbow Wool.” The title of the show: “I Wool Survive.”
Not to be outdone, USA Today marked Thanksgiving by writing about “turkey cuddle therapy.” “Cuddling turkeys, in particular,” we are told, “can be profound.” But don’t you dare touch a turkey without its permission. “All interaction between guests and animals happens on the animals’ terms − in other words, the turkey needs to choose me,” wrote the author.
I will tell you, I cuddled some turkey on Thanksgiving — along with mashed potatoes, stuffing, cranberry sauce and pumpkin pie.
A Thanksgiving dinner featuring cooked turkey and more. (iStock)
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6. House Hating
The media are bombarding us with well-earned complaints about how expensive life is for most Americans and how hard it is to buy a house. Leave it to lefty Vox to zig while the entire world zags. Vox ran a piece in November headlined, “Why owning a house is overrated.”
Yeah, building equity and having a place you can fix up and call home — what craziness. What followed was an interview with Jerusalem Demsas, editor-in-chief of The Argument, who argues: “Homeownership is overrated.” Now, I agree houses don’t always go up in value, but to come out against the American Dream is uniquely liberal.
Yes, houses don’t always go up in value, but to come out against the American Dream is uniquely liberal.
7. Hunka Hunka Burnin’ … Law
Movies that involve quirky judges are more honest than we want to admit. A Missouri judge is losing his job for wearing an Elvis wig and playing “The King” during court cases.
St. Louis Judge Matthew Thornhill “faces a six-month unpaid suspension under the deal he reached with the state,” according to AP. After that, he gets 18 more months on the bench before he steps down, possibly to go on tour. (People magazine even had photos of him as Elvis.)
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The Commission on Retirement, Removal and Discipline went after his love for the “King of Rock ‘n’ Roll,” noting how he posed “with staff in a plastic Elvis wig and sunglasses” and sang from the bench.
(St. Louis Judge Matthew Thornhill.)
The Elvis-is-everywhere schtick allegedly violated rules on “order and decorum,” despite 35 letters backing the judge’s character. So the judge was judged and found wanting.
On the bright side, he might have the makings of a sequel to “My Cousin Vinny.”
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Connecticut
Remaining GOP candidates for Connecticut governor vie for Erin Stewart supporters
NEW HAVEN, Conn. (WTNH) — With Republican Erin Stewart suspending her campaign for Connecticut governor on the eve of the party convention, state Sen. Ryan Fazio is now the favorite to win the Republican endorsement.
Up until Thursday morning, Fazio was locked in a head-to-head match-up with Stewart, who had long been considered the favorite to win the Republican endorsement at Saturday’s convention.
With Stewart’s exit, the 36-year-old now stands as one of two remaining Republican candidates. Stewart has thrown her support behind Fazio, perhaps best known for his crusades against Connecticut’s high energy costs, a move that could help consolidate support among party delegates.
Fazio first spoke with News 8’s Chief Political Correspondent Mike Cerulli on Thursday.
“Listen, I expect to fight on this campaign all the way through,” Fazio said. “I don’t expect anything; I’m entitled to nothing. I need to earn everything as a candidate, and our campaign has that exact attitude. So, we’re gonna work extraordinarily hard every single day to win the support, to earn the support of every single Republican delegate, every single Republican primary voter, and every single voter irrespective of their background or their party affiliation in November. This is too important not to.”
The other remaining Republican candidate is 77-year-old Betsy McCaughey, the cable TV host and former New York lieutenant governor. Can she secure 15% of the delegates this Saturday and automatically trigger a primary?
“I’ve been calling Erin Stewart’s delegates all day, and in fact, I want to call Erin Stewart, expressing my concern and saying I wish her and her family well,” McCaughey told News 8’s Chief Political Anchor Dennis House. “This is a difficult time. And then I’ve called many of Erin Stewart’s delegates, and I’m sure I’ll reach all of them and meet with them tomorrow. And I’m asking, please join me in launching the Connecticut comeback.”
Stay with News 8 on air and online all day Saturday as we bring the vote count and let you know if we are heading for a primary showdown in August.
The Collapse of a Campaign
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Maine
Maine Trash Kings turns clutter into cash across Searsport
SEARSPORT, Maine (WABI) – A new Searsport business sees other people’s trash as an opportunity.
Maine Trash Kings got its start at the beginning of April, and with spring cleaning underway, the founders say the business is booming.
“It’s been really good, we started at the beginning of this month, and we just started posting around on Facebook ads and word of mouth. It’s gone really good, just kind of blown up from there,” Alex Dakin, co-founder of Maine Trash Kings, said.
Maine Trash Kings is run by two Searsport High School students. They both say they’ve had to learn how to balance time quickly.
“When we don’t have jobs or something like that, after schools, I get an hour, two hours to myself, but then, I got to post ads. I got to, look at finances, go over that, fix the trailer, work on the trailer and stuff like that,” Isaac Traves, co-founder of Maine Trash Kings, said.
“It can be stressful at times, but you just got to look at the bigger picture and know that all the work you’re putting in now is just going to pay off in the future,” Dakin said.
Traves said he wants to go to college for business in the future. The junior in high school said the business has given him a head start on finances.
“Sometimes there are instances where we have to spend money to make money, and it is scary at first. Some people think oh, I’m going to spend money, that means that I’m going to lose all of that. I’m not going to make that money back. No, it’s not really how it works. You have to spend money to make money, to be honest,” Traves said.
Traves and Dakin’s work hasn’t gone unnoticed. Derek Ginn is a teacher at Searsport Middle School. Ginn said the boys came to him and asked if he could help them get the business started.
“It’s really great to see kids who, 16, 17, starting life not knowing exactly what they want to do, to see, hey, maybe I want to start a business. Let me see if I can fail. Let me see if I can succeed. Let’s see what’s out there,” Ginn said. “These guys did that all on their own. I’m not saying, you guys should go start this business. You guys should go start this business. No, they came to me and are like, hey, how do I do this? And that’s incredible to see for kids their age.”
Ginn said the boys also help him with his students. They serve as mentors to the younger students in the school. Ginn said that’s how he got to know Traves and Dakin.
The young business owners said they are giving the business everything they’ve got. So far, they say they love the work.
“I like working and I actually quit my job to do this full-time now, so I mean, just putting all my effort into this and seeing it grow is just, I love it,” Dakin said.
Maine Trash Kings serves Searsport and surrounding areas.
They give quotes via their Facebook page or by calling 207-323-6984 for junk removal.
Copyright 2026 WABI. All rights reserved.
Massachusetts
Trauma foam developed by Massachusetts company used to stop internal bleeding in first patient
A Waltham, Massachusetts, company began to develop a trauma foam to stop internal bleeding; years later, it saved an Alabama man’s life.
Ronald Farms remembers his car flipping upside down and then a white light in what can only be described as a near-death experience.
“There was this light that was so bright. It was literally a light from heaven. It was white, so bright, but it wasn’t blinding,” Farms said.
But when the 34-year-old regained consciousness, he was on his way to the University of Alabama at Birmingham Hospital (UAB) and suffering from severe abdominal bleeding.
“They told me I had a laceration to my kidney, a laceration to my liver. My spleen was completely ruptured. They had to remove that. Part of my colon was taken out,” Farms said.
When he got to the hospital, Farms says the trauma surgeon, Dr. Preston Hewgley, told his family that he had 20 minutes to live.
Within minutes, Hewgley decided to use a tool that had never before been administered in a patient, a futuristic foam to stop internal bleeding.
“There was a very intense moment of injecting the foam into Ronald’s abdomen that was palpable,” Hewgley told WBZ-TV.
UAB is the site of an FDA-approved clinical trial for ResQFoam, developed by Waltham biotechnology company Arsenal Medical. It is administered by cutting a small incision below the patient’s belly button and inserting what looks like a calking gun into the abdomen, then shooting foam, which expands inside the body cavity.
“It wraps around injured tissues and injured organs and puts pressure on them, which temporarily slows or stops hemorrhage,” said Dr. David King, a trauma surgeon at Massachusetts General Hospital.
ResQFoam is the brainchild of King, who knows how deadly internal bleeding can be. He is a Colonel in the Army Reserve and has performed surgeries in combat.
“Intra-abdominal hemorrhage remains a leading preventable cause of death on the battlefield,” King said, “From the combat surgeon standpoint, it remains a very exciting horizon.”
The successful administration of the foam in Farms is a giant step forward for Arsenal Medical, but President and CEO Upma Sharma is cautiously optimistic with a clinical trial ongoing.
“We have a first safety cohort that we need to get through to demonstrate that the foam isn’t doing anything totally unexpected,” Sharma said.
Ronald Farms credits the foam with saving his life and he believes there is a higher reason why he is now sharing its story.
“I would highly, highly endorse it because it saved my life,” Farms said.
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