No matter what holiday people celebrate this time of year is usually celebrated. The days are getting super short and the harvest is in. For us Americans, Thanksgiving is in the rearview mirror and Christmas/Hanukkah/Kwanza are rapidly approaching. It is a time for reflection and a time to be generous. My Good News Roundup is meant to spread some holiday cheer and be generous!
Speaking of being generous...
Don’t forget to donate to Take the House in 2026! GoodNewsRoundup has selected the 15 most critical races to flip so you can donate to them! I’m probably going to change the focus of or cancel my fundraising effort soon. More details later in the Roundup.
We at the Good News Roundup choose hope instead of fear, good news instead of doomscrolling, and love instead of hate. We’re not naïve — we know that the forces of evil are strong and currently have power in the halls of Washington, D.C. However, we also know that the forces for good are strong too!
Here goes my December Good News Roundup…
😡 We’re Not Gonna Take It Anymore! 😡
Protests against ICE continue.
#ETTD
x
Since inauguration:
—Shares in the company that operates Truth Social: ⬇️ 75%
— Meme coin named for Trump: ⬇️ 86%.
— Meme coin named for Melania: ⬇️ 99%.
“When do I give up on this and move on?” asked one investor, whose chat name is SimpleMindHatter.
www.wsj.com/finance/stoc...
[image or embed]
— Bill Grueskin (@bgrueskin.bsky.social) November 29, 2025 at 6:38 PM
IDK who Sabrina Carpenter is but kudos to her for shutting down the regime using her music!
x
JUST IN: Pop star Sabrina Carpenter has fired back at the Trump administration after the official White House account used her song over footage of federal agents chasing down immigrants.
"this video is evil and disgusting. Do not ever involve me or my music to benefit your inhumane agenda."
[image or embed]
— MeidasTouch (@meidastouch.com) December 2, 2025 at 12:12 PM
💪 Not Afraid To Take a Stand 💪
Kudos to these Indiana State Senators. They are under a lot of threats and pressure and they are standing firm against the regime on redistricting.
Costco Sues Trump Regime to Get Tariff Refunds
Costco Wholesale has filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration, asking the Court of International Trade to consider all tariffs collected under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act unlawful.
The company said in a Nov. 28 filing that it is seeking a “full refund” of all IEEPA duties paid as a result of President Donald Trump's executive order which imposed what he called "reciprocal" tariffs.
“Because IEEPA does not clearly authorize the President to set tariffs...the Challenged Tariff Orders cannot stand and the defendants are not authorized to implement and collect them,” Costco's lawyer writes in the lawsuit.
The legality of Trump's sweeping tariff agenda is currently under review by the Supreme Court. In early November oral arguments, justices appeared skeptical about the government's case to let them continue.
⚖ Trump Fought the Law and the Law WON! ⚖
x
NEW: A federal judge has once again blocked the Trump admin from enforcing a budget law provision "defunding" Planned Parenthood—this time in response to suit from 22 states and Washington DC. HOWEVER judge pauses injunction for 7 days to allow HHS to appeal
storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...
[image or embed]
— Susan Rinkunas (@susanrinkunas.com) December 2, 2025 at 5:42 PM
🐈🐕Pootie/Woozle Video Break 🐈🐕
Who will win the eternal holiday battle between cats and Christmas trees? Let’s find out!
❎The Times They Are a Changing ❎
If you’ve made it this far, don’t forget to donate to the Take the House in 2026 fundraising page!
Aftyn Behn didn’t win, but Matt Van Epps +9 is pathetic in a district Trump won by 22 points last year.
Reminder what gerrymandering does (TN-07 is the district with “Nashville” over it). It was next to impossible to win this district and a 13-point overperformance with midterm level turnout in line with other elections this year is great.
We *did* flip the mayor race in Roswell, GA. This purple city is a northern suburb of Atlanta.
x
JUST IN: Democrats have flipped the mayor's office in Roswell, Georgia, in tonight's runoff.
GOP Mayor Kurt Wilson conceded earlier tonight to Mary Robichaux, the Dem challenging him.
(This is a city in the Atlanta suburbs, the 9th most populous city in Georgia.)
— Taniel (@taniel.bsky.social) December 2, 2025 at 9:30 PM
EYES ON THE PRIZE
x
Before tonight, the average Dem overperformance in special elections was 13 points.
Aftyn Behn matched that figure almost exactly.
If anything remotely like this holds next year, GOP hopes of holding the House will be very slim.
Track all these races with our special election Big Board →→→
[image or embed]
— The Downballot (@the-downballot.com) December 2, 2025 at 10:08 PM
x
A recap of tonight's special election in TN-07 (plus a WAY-TOO-EARLY model of the 2026 midterms).
A swing of 13 points would put Dems over 250 seats in the U.S. House. A more reasonable scenario—say, D+6—still gives them the House, and maybe the Senate.
www.gelliottmorris.com/p/what-the-s...
[image or embed]
— G Elliott Morris (@gelliottmorris.com) December 2, 2025 at 10:56 PM
None of the articles shared below constitute an endorsement by bilboteach or the GNR. We respect the primary process and will allow it to play out.
The GOP Flipped the RGV: Can a Moderate Tejano Singer Flip It Back?
Bobby Pulido is a star recruit for Democrats in the Rio Grande Valley in Texas.
Wearing jeans and cowboy boots, Bobby Pulido insisted he was feeling a little rusty at a skeet shooting competition this month in the border city of Weslaco, Texas. But when the clay pigeon thrower hurled the targets into the air, he steeled his nerves, pointed his shotgun and blasted six out of six.
“It’s precision and calculation,” Mr. Pulido, a Tejano singer and Latin Grammy Award winner, said, explaining how he anticipates where the target is headed before pulling the trigger.
A household name in the Rio Grande Valley and beyond with a career in show business spanning three decades, Mr. Pulido, 52, knows that he will need that level of precision to translate his celebrity into a political career. He is trying to take back Texas’ 15th congressional district from a Republican who flipped it in 2022 after 118 years of Democratic control.
…
Then there is Mr. Pulido, a father of four and a generational Texas Latino with two Latin Grammy Awards and a Grammy Award nomination for Best Mexican Music Album under his wide leather belt. He’s counting on his image as a rugged cowboy-hat-wearing Spanish-language performer with rural sensibilities to secure that Hispanic vote deep in the heart of Texas.
“This is not a costume,” he said. “This my life.”
He could be knocking on an open door, as the economic anxieties that pushed Hispanics toward Mr. Trump linger and the president’s aggressive immigration crackdown pushes them away from him. A poll released on Monday by the Pew Research Center found that 70 percent of Latino adults nationally disapprove of the way the president is handling his job, 65 percent disapproved of his administration’s approach to immigration, and 61 percent said Mr. Trump’s economic policies have made economic conditions worse.
San Diego Area May Lose Its Only GOP Congressman
The more favorable odds have drawn a wide field of challengers, including Issa’s former opponent, Ammar Campa-Najjar, who lost to Issa in a previous version of the district in 2020, San Diego City Council Member Marni von Wilpert, and several contenders from the Coachella Valley.
The passage of the redistricting measure triggered a statewide game of musical chairs, setting in motion the chairs as well as the players.
The current 48th District covers conservative East County San Diego communities. The new district moves west and north, losing much of that backcountry and adding the North County San Diego cities of Escondido, San Marcos and Vista. It also includes ultra-liberal Palm Springs in Riverside County, where Democratic voters outnumber Republicans by more than 4 to 1.
Those new lines absorb part of the current 41st District in Riverside County, represented by longstanding Republican Rep. Ken Calvert. His current district will move entirely to Los Angeles and Orange County, so Calvert plans to run in the new 40th District in Riverside and Orange County against fellow Republican Rep. Young Kim.
🌍We are the World🌎
Romania going all in on recycling.
Novel way of using CO2. Doesn’t remove it from the atmosphere as far as I can tell though.
x
I work in supercritical fluid extraction, but this week another groundbreaking use of supercritical CO2 has emerged: China has connected the world’s first commercial supercritical CO2 power generator to the grid!
🧪 #chemsky #sustainability
www.scmp.com/news/china/s...
[image or embed]
— Jose A. Mendiola (@ja-mendiola.bsky.social) November 27, 2025 at 9:09 AM
Fossil fuels are increasingly uncompetitive when compared to renewables.
Seriously, they are uncompetitive.
Amazing what can happen when nations agree to save the planet.
Cool find!
🎶Song of the Day🎶
Mariah Carey has defrosted after a year of slumber and is ready to belt this song out again.
🧪Don’t Stop Believing (in Science) 🧪
We’ve engineered more efficient bacteria to eat plastic!
Renewable energy is what is keeping up with ever increasing energy demand.
x
Key electricity generation points for Q3 2025: The increase in renewable generation in China exceeded that of the rest of the work combined. The drop in Fossil Fuel use in China and India exceeded the increase in Fossil Fuel use for the rest of the world! 🧪🔌💡☀️💨💧🔋
[image or embed]
— Joseph D. Ortiz (@earthsciinfo.bsky.social) November 29, 2025 at 9:01 PM
This is an amazing use of AI. Instead of using it to create generative slop, let’s use it to learn how animals communicate. Long way from that still though.
x
Mind-blowingly cool use of AI
“Altogether, these findings are leading us to an extraordinary conclusion: Whales may possess a communication system more intricate than our own, one that possibly predates human language by tens of millions of years.”
www.nytimes.com/2025/11/23/o...
[image or embed]
— Apoorva Mandavilli (@apoorvanyt.bsky.social) November 30, 2025 at 3:58 PM
Chinese electric vehicles are increasingly competitive. Even the long haul trucks.
Extremophile Amoeba Shatters Records for Heat Tolerance
A single-celled organism squirming about in the searing waters of California's Lassen Volcanic National Park has just set a record for heat tolerance.
The newly named Incendiamoeba cascadensis – meaning "fire amoeba from the Cascades", as described in a preprint on bioRxiv – grows and divides at temperatures up to 63 degrees Celsius (145 Fahrenheit), the highest known temperature for a eukaryotic organism.
Moreover, it doesn't start growing until temperatures reach at least 42 degrees Celsius. This makes it an obligate thermophile – a creature that requires conditions far hotter than most eukaryotic organisms can endure.
"Our findings," writes a team led by biologists H. Beryl Rappaport and Angela Oliverio of Syracuse University in New York, "challenge the current paradigm of temperature constraints on eukaryotic cells and reshape our understanding of where and how eukaryotic life can persist."
This is the way.
x
Agro-photovoltaic (solar panels over agricultural fields) still feels more solarpunk than real world, but they are (slowly) becoming more common, and with that, the thought about how to move towards integration with sustainable agriculture. 🧪
Link: www.cetjournal.it/index.php/ce...
[image or embed]
— Dr. Or M. Bialik |📚|🔬|🌊|⚒️ (@obialik.bsky.social) December 1, 2025 at 1:48 AM
Any possible means of fighting drug resistant bacteria must be fully explored.
😷I Will Survive (Good Medical News)😷
x
Breakthrough in kidney modeling: Stem cell-derived tissues replicate disease phenotypes, paving way for novel therapies & future kidney engineering. PMID:41214197, Nat Rev Nephrol 2025, @NatRevNeph https://doi.org/10.1038/s41581-025-01018-0 #Medsky #Pharmsky #RNA #ASHG #ESHG 🧪
[image or embed]
— Shicheng Guo (@shihcheng.bsky.social) November 29, 2025 at 8:10 PM
Speaking Multiple Languages Slows Brain Aging
People are living longer than ever around the world. Longer lives bring new opportunities, but they also introduce challenges, especially the risk of age-related decline.
Alongside physical changes such as reduced strength or slower movement, many older adults struggle with memory, attention and everyday tasks.
Researchers have spent years trying to understand why some people stay mentally sharp while others deteriorate more quickly. One idea attracting growing interest is multilingualism, the ability to speak more than one language.
When someone knows two or more languages, all those languages remain active in the brain. Each time a multilingual person wants to speak, the brain must select the right language while keeping others from interfering. This constant mental exercise acts a bit like daily "brain training".
Choosing one language, suppressing the others and switching between them strengthens brain networks involved in attention and cognitive control. Over a lifetime, researchers believe this steady mental workout may help protect the brain as it ages.
Studies comparing bilinguals and monolinguals have suggested that people who use more than one language might maintain better cognitive skills in later life. However, results across studies have been inconsistent. Some reported clear advantages for bilinguals, while others found little or no difference.
A new, large-scale study now offers stronger evidence and an important insight: speaking one extra language appears helpful, but speaking several seems even better.
x
Our bone marrow consists of specialized tissue made up of bone cells, blood vessels, nerves and other cell types. Now, researchers @biomedizin.unibas.ch have succeeded for the first time in recreating this cellular complexity using only human cells. This could reduce the need for animal experiments.
[image or embed]
— University of Basel (@unibas.ch) November 18, 2025 at 11:15 AM
Common Drug Could Be Able to Fight a Deadly Brain Cancer
Previous studies have shown that glioblastoma tumors are often high in ADO, hijacking it to produce a chemical called hypotaurine, which helps the cancer cells spread, survive for longer, and tolerate stress.
But no ADO inhibitors were known prior to this study.
Hydralazine effectively mutes ADO, the team found: RGS proteins aren't attacked, blood vessels aren't squeezed, and blood pressure drops. In experiments with human glioblastoma cells, hydralazine halted tumor growth by blocking ADO.
It's very early days – the effects of hydralzine still need to be tested in people with glioblastoma in clinical trials – but these are promising findings that could unlock a way to control the spread of these notoriously hard-to-treat brain tumors.
The newly uncovered mechanism also explains why hydralazine is an effective treatment for preeclampsia, a high blood pressure condition in pregnant women. That means the drug can be better engineered and personalized, to reduce side effects and improve results.
"Understanding how hydralazine works at the molecular level offers a path toward safer, more selective treatments for pregnancy-related hypertension – potentially improving outcomes for patients who are at greatest risk," says chemist Megan Matthews, from the University of Pennsylvania.
The discoveries here mean better drugs for both high blood pressure and brain cancer can now be developed, carefully balancing the need to hit particular pathways in cells while minimizing harm to healthy parts of the body.
x
While gene therapy can offer personalized cures, developing them is prohibitively expensive. Now, scientists report on an approach they hope could overcome those unfavorable economics: a single gene therapy. cen.acs.org/biological-c... #chemsky 🧪
[image or embed]
— C&EN (Chemical & Engineering News) (@cenmag.bsky.social) November 29, 2025 at 11:16 AM
Key Molecule Behind Exercise Effects Pinpointed
We know exercise is good for us, but scientists are still figuring out why, at the most fundamental and molecular level. A new small but long-term study may have yielded a crucial answer, identifying the metabolite betaine as a key driver of the benefits of exercise.
Betaine, a small molecule found in foods like sugar beets and spinach, has previously been linked to improved health, but it hasn't been connected to exercise before.
In this study, a team led by researchers from the Xuanwu Hospital Capital Medical University in China found that long-term exercise boosts levels of betaine in the body, via the kidneys.
What's more, betaine can mimic some of the beneficial effects of exercise, especially the slowing of biological aging (aka geroprotection). It may be that this molecule could help us live healthier lives for longer.
"This study gives us a fresh way to turn how our body works into something we can target with chemicals," says biophysicist Liu Guang-Hui, from the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
"It opens the door to geroprotective treatments that can tweak how multiple organs work together."
Simple Vitamin Treatments May Slow Parkinson’s Disease Progression
Researchers have suspected for some time that the link between our gut and brain plays a role in the onset of Parkinson's disease.
A recent study identified gut microbes likely to be involved and linked them with decreased riboflavin ( vitamin B2) and biotin (vitamin B7), suggesting an unexpectedly simple treatment that may help: B vitamins.
"Supplementation therapy targeting riboflavin and biotin holds promise as a potential therapeutic avenue for alleviating Parkinson's symptoms and slowing disease progression," said medical researcher Hiroshi Nishiwaki from Nagoya University in Japan, when the paper was published in May 2024.
Previous research found people with Parkinson's disease also experience changes in their microbiome long before other signs appear.
Analyzing fecal samples from 94 patients with Parkinson's disease and 73 relatively healthy controls in Japan, Nishiwaki and colleagues compared their results with data from China, Taiwan, Germany, and the US.
While different groups of bacteria were involved in the different countries examined, they all influenced pathways that synthesize B vitamins in the body.
The team found that the changes in gut bacteria communities were associated with a decrease in riboflavin and biotin in people with Parkinson's disease.
The researchers then showed the lack of B vitamins was linked to a decrease in short-chain fatty acids (SCFAs) and polyamines: molecules that help create a healthy mucus layer in the intestines.
"Deficiencies in polyamines and SCFAs could lead to thinning of the intestinal mucus layer, increasing intestinal permeability, both of which have been observed in Parkinson's disease," Nishiwaki explained.
x
Transdermal insulin delivery breakthrough! A new polyzwitterion easily passes skin barrier, transporting large molecules effectively. Science redefined at 500 Da. PMID:41261125, Nature 2025, @Nature https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-025-09729-x #Medsky #Pharmsky #RNA #ASHG #ESHG 🧪
[image or embed]
— Shicheng Guo (@shihcheng.bsky.social) November 30, 2025 at 4:10 AM
7th HIV Patient Found to Be in Long-Term Remission
A German man remains in remission from HIV an incredible six years after he received a stem cell transplant to treat an aggressive form of leukemia.
The seventh known HIV patient to achieve long-term remission, the patient known as Berlin 2 (B2), received donor stem cells containing only one copy of a mutated gene known to confer resistance to HIV, unlike the two copies present in donor cells given to other patients.
The single-copy cells were thought to provide a short-lived but less durable resistance, raising questions over the precise mechanisms responsible for clearing the immunodeficiency virus from the man's system.
Related: New HIV Prevention Drug Shows 100% Efficacy in Clinical Trial
But the breakthrough, described in a paper led by immunologist Christian Gaebler of Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin in Germany, offers a tantalising new path towards understanding other ways of potentially curing HIV.
Speaking of HIV, good news in mice! But it was a human antibody first.
Antibody Found That Defeats 98% of HIV Types
In experiments with mice that had been infected with HIV, the 04_A06 antibody was seen to neutralize most HIV infections.
In total, the researchers ran experiments with almost 340 variants of HIV, including those that were resistant to other antibodies.
"HIV has a high genetic diversity, the viruses are all quite different," said Klein. "That's what makes HIV so difficult to treat."
But the 04_A06 antibody neutralized 98% of the HIV variants they tested.
The researchers said the 04_A06 antibody may be able to help people who are already infected with HIV — because it blocks the virus' access to cells.
"It attaches itself to the envelope protein of the virus, so the virus can no longer infect the target cell," said Klein. In addition, viruses blocked by 04_A06 were better recognized and actively eliminated by the body's immune system.
The researchers hope that 04_A06 could also prevent HIV infections.
"The antibody intercepts viruses before they can infect cells and multiply in the body," said Klein.
So, the newly discovered antibody could act as a passive immunization. An active immunization would be a vaccine that enables the body to produce antibodies itself. But there is no HIV vaccine as yet.
x
For the past quarter-century, the gold standard malaria treatment has been artemisinin combination therapies (ACTs). Yet there are issues of treatment nonadherence and malaria parasite drug resistance. cen.acs.org/pharmaceutic... #chemsky 🧪
[image or embed]
— C&EN (Chemical & Engineering News) (@cenmag.bsky.social) December 1, 2025 at 1:51 PM
Common Acne Medication Reduces Schizophrenia Risk
An antibiotic commonly prescribed for acne management has been linked to a reduced chance of developing schizophrenia.
In a new study led by researchers at the University of Edinburgh, adolescents using mental health services who took doxycycline were less likely to be diagnosed with schizophrenia in adulthood, compared to individuals who took other antibiotic types.
While the tentative findings cannot prove that doxycycline prevents schizophrenia, the researchers argue that the drug's effects on immune responses, inflammation, and programmed cell death may help prevent neurological changes responsible for the condition.
"The observational data used in this study cannot provide definitive evidence of a causal relationship between doxycycline treatment and reduced schizophrenia risk, meaning that further research will be necessary," the authors conclude.
"However, these findings raise the tentative but exciting possibility that doxycycline treatment may reduce schizophrenia risk in adolescent psychiatric patients and point to important new therapeutic opportunities for future mental illness prevention research."
😆Wednesday Wheezes 😆
Thank you to Denise Oliver Velez for posting humorous cartoons every day in the APR.
👍 Hey Hey What Can I Do? 👍
You might see a theme with this first bundle of action steps… 😏
-
- If you want to help teachers that desperately need funds (especially at the beginning of the year!), DonorsChoose is the site to hook you up! Another one is Adopt a Classroom!
- Support the Inoculation Project! This is a Daily Kos effort to fund STEM and literacy projects in classrooms!
- Volunteer in a classroom! It can be something as structured and formal as Citizen Schools or as informal as inquiring at a local school district. Be prepared for a background check though!
- Build a Little Free Library! I use these all the time and you never know what you’ll read next. Bonus points for distributing books banned by MAGA!
- 50501 is the group that sparked the protests against the Trump regime. The next huge day for protests is October 18. Be there or be square!
- Calling your representatives matters. 5calls.org makes the process much simpler and more efficient for you! Make it a goal to call their offices once a week or so!
- Support the Hope Springs from Field group (follow snowbored) or Postcards to Voters (follow Progressive Muse) in order to better reach voters!
- Donate to Win the Majority 2026 or Take the House 2026!
Fundraisers for Gnuville, USA:
This Week’s Totals in Thousands of Dollars (Last Week):
GoodNewsRoundup:
bilboteach:
- Win the Majority 2026 — 4.0 (4.0)
Total Week ending 11/29: 31.7 (30.5)
Thanks, Everyone! We’re just chugging along!
💰💵💲😍💰💵💲😎
(Updates on Sundays.)
Anyways, very few are donating to my fundraiser. This isn’t a complaint or begging to change that but merely an observation. I think I’m going to ask GoodNewsRoundup to change hers to a “26 in 26” style fundraiser and add some of the races from mine. What I will do with my fundraiser I’m not sure yet — I have to coordinate with Madame Mayor first!
Suggestions are welcome!
About the Author
I have a complicated relationship with the holidays. It’s mainly due to the fact that I rarely give out presents for a couple of reasons. First, I’m cheap. I don’t splurge on things even for myself! Second, I’m a perfectionist. If I cannot divine what the perfect gift is I won’t attempt to do it. I’m not the Grinch or Scrooge by any means but I’m also not exactly enamored with this time of year either.
With that, my December Good News Roundup is open! Feel free to contribute more in the comments and especially help make next month’s edition better!
