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Happy happy fun fun. It’s 9-11, boys and girls. Plague year edition. As long-time readers know (glad you’re both still with me!), I often do something… commemorative about September 11th on its anniversary. In this case, I am pleased in some sense that the twin beams of light (“Tribute in Light”) launched from the site of the original twin towers of the World Trade Center will be going forward, despite concerns over safety of workers as a result of COVID-19. I mean… concern for the safety of workers at the WTC? Why start now? And while the “official” ceremony will...

Hard to believe that the Loquacious Pup, who wasn’t even two years old when this here blog got started a week after 9-11, is now starting her senior year of college. But there you go. Her college, for reasons of its own, has opted for a “hybrid” of some on-line classes and some in-person (though all students have the option of all on-line). Because she has a couple of “hands-on” classes, she has opted to return to campus (or near campus, anyway, as for various reasons, she and two friends are renting an apartment near by… an unfurnished apartment– more...

And so we come to the weekend between the scheduled Democratic and Republican National conventions, which, this year, because of the COVID-45/Donald Trump plague, are largely “virtual” affairs made for television and computer live-streaming. For his part, Joe Biden made a decision (that I consider to be a catastrophic mistake) of not traveling to Wisconsin, the original “live site” of the convention. Joe, what part of “if Hillary did it, I shouldn’t” did you miss? Trump, like the shark he that he is, perceived some blood in the water and made sure to get himself to Wisconsin. Meanwhile, top Democrats...

As we roll through a summer like no other in an election year like no other when the uniquely awful attributes of the uniquely awful American system make the least-experienced, least appropriate by temperament and intellect and just plain worst President (by far) in American history still potentially viable for reelection (and God knows the American media which created him in the first place is still desperate to prop him up to create their “horse race narrative”) some dismal science is starting to emerge, such as the likelihood that Democratic candidates actually disproportionately benefit from voting by mail. This simple...

As I write this on TD Dad’s (of blessed memory) 83rd birthday, I note that exactly two months ago, Mrs. TD and I landed in Madrid for what we hoped would be a week’s visit with the Loquacious Pup, then studying abroad there. She had also planned study in Paris later in the spring (would be close to being done with it and then visiting Italy right about now, actually). What a difference a plague year makes! Instead of a week’s visit, we were frantically woken up (as if we could sleep!) by several friends in the middle of the...

I could also call this “Beware the Ides of March.” As I sit here in New York at the moment, the third Covid-19 related death among over 700 cases in the state. Barely 72 hours ago, Familia Talking Dog returned from Spain, where coronavirus cases shot up in the four day period we visited, and now include 288 deaths and over 7,000 confirmed positive cases now. The Loquacious Pup was doing a semester abroad there (and in Paris– that ain’t happening), and so, instead… To be honest, we were scheduled to return today, and then we changed it to yesterday,...

February 29th only comes once every four years, so I thought I would take this opportunity to sneak a post in on this “extra” day. Right now, the world is convulsing through a COVID-19 viral outbreak that has not yet been termed a “pandemic,” but today, marked the first death within the borders of the U.S. Naturally, the President did what he always does and lied, first suggesting to one of his Nuremberg rallies that the whole thing was a hoax dreamed up by Democrats to discredit him (which he walked back… eventually), and then misidentifying the victim as a...

The novel corona virus originally centered in Wuhan, China now exceeds 71,000 cases world wide and over 1,700 deaths. Supposedly there are about 15 cases in the USA. The ordinary seasonal flu has infected over 250,000 people, with an estimated 14,000 deaths for the 2019 to 2020 flu season. I was wondering about some other things going on. In the most recent full year for which data is available (2018), world AIDS deaths were around 770,000. Meanwhile, in the ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo, since the outbreak began in August 2018, there have been 3432 total cases...

And so we come to a day or two of “Question Time” or something during the third ever “impeachment trial,” in this case of “President” Donald John Trump, when the issue of “calling witnesses” may have spun beyond Senate Majority Leader Mitch “Dick Turtle” McConnell’s control, at least for the moment. Although, I tend to believe (1) there won’t be any witnesses called and (2) the impeachment “trial” will be promptly terminated by a majority vote entirely along party lines, because (3) we aren’t remotely a “democratic” country (if we ever were). So I thought this would be a pretty...

It seems fitting that my first post of the new decade will be GTMO related. For those who still care (which I hope is you), today marks 18 years since the opening of the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, still home to forty men (some of whom were captured as boys). All Muslim. All foreign nationals. As usual, there will be a protest across the street from the White House. God willing, I will be there, as I have for the past several years. Andy will be there; hopefully, the Stately DogMobile will do the job along the various...