16 July—Yesterday, Fifth District Congresswoman Jahana Hayes was the only member of Connecticut’s pure Democrat House delegation to vote in favor of an essentially symbolic and ultimately failed amendment to cut off additional aid to Israel. Given Jahana’s past—and, she insists, continuing—support of Israel, her vote was rather surprising.

Jahana voted for what she admitted was a “gotcha amendment” even though she agreed with other Democrats and Democrat pols in general who use it as an excuse to vote against legislation that the amendment was “poorly written,” “overly broad,” and pushed by dastardly Republican leadership to divide the Democrats. (Republican pols use the same stale excuses for voting against Democrat-sponsored legislation when it’s expedient.)

So even though, thanks in no small part to the unsuitability of both of the Republicans who want to unseat her, Jahana is certain to be elected to her fifth term in November, her silly vote on that silly amendment will cost her some votes.

So what?

In other news, then, the Monitor’s White House correspondent reports that Donald Trump is claiming—without any evidence, as usual—that Canada’s Prime Minister Mark “the Fuckin’ Firebug” Carney has personally set the 800 or so wildfires in Ontario, Alberta, Manitoba, and British Columbia and intimidated Aeolus, the god of winds, into blowing all the smoke and associated atmospheric pollution down here. (Yes, we too were surprised—astonished, even—that Trump knew about Aeolus.)

Why would Carney, a man of intelligence and stability, want to do a thing like that? Well, even though atmospheric warfare is strictly illegal under international law, along with germ and chemical warfare, of course, laws international and otherwise have never stopped Donald Trump from doing whatever he damn well pleases. So Trump reckons Carney as a national leader must be equally dismissive of law and decency and is therefore combining all three illegal warfares as a brilliant strategy to preempt the United States from annexing Canada as the 51st state.

And—get this—Trump’s infallible intelligence network has assured him that Canada is instead going to annex the United States and make it the 11th province, joining Ontario, Quebec, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Manitoba, British Columbia, Prince Edward Island, Saskatchewan, Alberta, and Newfoundland.

Trump has enough trouble with Spanish and is too old to learn French. And he isn’t alone in considering O Canada an even lousier national anthem than The Star Spangled Banner. And he’s never gonna be second fiddle to any pipsqueak Canuck. So he and his testosteronial warlord have begun to mobilize all of America’s armed and paramilitary forces, including ICE goons, to do whatever it takes—and then some—to confiscate and commandeer every damn fan in the country and point all of them north so as to blow the anti-MAGA smoke back to Canada.

And yet people doubt that Donald Trump is all there . . .

15 July—It’s not just editorial—i.e., political—cartoons that offer cynically profound commentary based on a cartoonist’s observation and experience. And wit, of course. Comic strips do it too. Take yesterday’s Hagar the Horrible strip, for instance. In the first panel, the black-hooded tax collector tells Hagar, “The king has abolished taxes!” In the other panel, the tax collector elaborates,”They’ve been replaced with a ‘Do What’s Good For You’ DONATION!” And Hagar enthuses, “I’m stealing that line!”

Politicians all over the world have in fact stolen that idea, if not that very line. Right here at home, for example, Connecticut’s Democrat trifecta calls the mandated tax you can’t opt out of that funds government policies like renewable energy incentives and low-income assistance a Public Benefits Charge. Call it what they will, the notorious Public Benefits Charge is nothing but an onerous tax.

Another Connecticut tax deceptively called something else is the infamous Passport to the Parks fee that’s added—applied automatically, like it or not—to all non-commercial vehicle registrations and related transactions. It allegedly gives all vehicles with Connecticut non-commercial license plates (i.e., markers) free access to state parks and forests. Make that “would give” because most motor vehicle owners who are forced pay the tax on a tax never ever go to state parks or forests. And a mandatory fee is a tax no matter what it’s called.

Moving away from deceptively mischaracterized taxation, we come to Classic Peanuts. In yesterday’s offering, originally published in 1979, in the first panel, Linus asks Lucy, “Did you hear that Charlie Brown is in the hospital?” Lucy in the second panel asks, “He is?” Linus in the third panel: “What’s the first thing you think of when you hear that a friend has gone to the hospital?” And Lucy, unapologetically and typically honest in the fourth panel, answers, “I’m glad it wasn’t me!”

Does Lucy speak for you too?

Back to editorial cartoons, then, one by Dave Granlund features a despondent postman lamenting in four panels: “We’ve lost business to FedEx . . . and lost business to UPS . . . lost business with letters by FAX . . . plus lost business to letters by e-mail. In the fifth panel the postman perks up: “This calls for a plan to win back customers!” And in the sixth panel he rejoices: “We’ll hike the cost of postage again!!”

Of course. What else would you expect from the government?

14 July—On this day in 1789, as the second part of a two-stage operation, a mob of between 600 and 1,000 hungry and bloodthirsty Parisian insurrectionists stormed the Bastille, a mediaeval fortress, at the time an armory and little-used prison with, however, a well-deserved reputation for housing opponents of the notoriously absolutist and oppressive Bourbon monarchy.

Earlier that morning the rebellious mob had raided the Hôtel des Invalides, a 32-acre military complex, and relieved it of more than 30,000 muskets as well as a few small cannons. And, doubtless, other goodies. But the Invalides commandant, anticipating the incursion, had moved 250 barrels of gunpowder to the Bastille. Evidently it hadn’t occurred to him that the revolting mass was in the mood for a fight and had nothing better to do than march the two-and-a-half miles to the Bastille for the gunpowder, as well as more arms.

So the mob double-timed it from the Hôtel des Invalides to the Bastille and after a four-hour battle easily (if only by force of numbers) overwhelmed the old tourist attraction’s garrison of 82 French army veterans (Invalides) and 32 Swiss mercenaries (Salis-Samade Regiment) and brutally lynched—stabbed, shot, decapitated—the prison’s governor, Bernard-René Jourdan de Launay, who had surrendered the fortress in exchange for a guarantee of safety. Did Bernard-René really think the mob would honor the MOU? Not that he had a choice.

As an afterthought, the mob—or Second Amendment-worthy civilian militia, depending on whom you ask—freed the Bastille’s seven political prisoners, who turned out to be four forgers, two mentally ill men, and one aristocrat incarcerated at the request of his family.

While the storming of the Bastille was undeniably a symbolic victory for representative government, such as it may have been, it actually engendered a notorious decade of political and social turmoil, economic hardship, and bloody violence. Think Reign of Terror. And it led to Napoleon’s dictatorship.

And nobody sang La Marseillaise on the way to the Bastille. Because it hadn’t been written. That wouldn’t come until 1792 in the war against Austria.

One-hundred-forty-four years later, 14 July 1933, the Hitler administration, having systematically and insidiously undermined and ultimately destroyed the country’s political and democratic integrity, officially outlawed all political parties except the Nazi party, thus formally establishing Germany as a one-party state.

Don’t think any or all of it can’t happen in America . . .

13 July—It appears that 84-year-old Senator Mitch McConnell is really still alive, even though he hasn’t spoken to anyone but a few close comrades. Instead, utilizing a classic kidnapper’s stratagem to prove a kidnappee is alive, Mitch’s press release includes a photo of him smiling and holding a Washington Post newspaper that—if not Photoshopped, of course—confirms it was snapped yesterday. And Mrs. McConnell, also smiling, is holding on to Mitch.

Mitch explains why he was hospitalized a month ago and is now in an unnamed rehabilitation facility, and assures us that it wasn’t a heart attack or a stroke, tumors, or hemorrhages. He apologizes for his silence: “You all know how folks of my generation often hesitate to share the vulnerability that comes with growing older. Even in the public eye, I feel that same instinct—I can’t help it.” And he reminds us that his childhood polio has left him with mobility challenges that “haven’t exactly gotten easier to manage with age.”

We’re with Mitch all the way about hesitating to share the vulnerability that comes with growing older and go a step further in asserting that all life challenges haven’t exactly gotten easier to manage with age.

For better or worse, since he’s no longer a Trumpublican, it looks like Mitch McConnell won’t be voting in the Senate for at least a little while. But whomever Trumpublican South Carolina Governor Henry McMaster picks to replace the late Senator Lindsey Graham is likely to vote with Trump all the way. Pity is putting it mildly.

So Senator Graham’s cardiac arrest was triggered by an aortic dissection—rupture—due to arteriosclerotic cardiovascular disease. Evidently he was aware that arteriosclerosis affected other members of his family. And that’s all we know.

The good news is that a few hours before Senator Graham died, Donald Trump told him, “I’ll see you, like, soon.” As Hamlet put it, “Tis a consummation devoutly to be wished . . .”

12 July—South Carolina Trumpublican convert Senator Lindsey Graham died last night, probably from cardiac arrest, having turned 71 on Thursday. Trump will miss him.

I can’t remember anything about the first time I traveled on a train pulled by a steam locomotive, as it was in 1943, during World War II, and I wasn’t much over a year old when my mother, older brother, and I went to Texas with my father, who was an Army medical officer on an indirect route to Europe.

The last time I traveled on a train pulled by a steam locomotive was in 1962, and I remember it well. It was my first time in the UK, when I, as is my wont, made it to King’s Cross railway station in London just in the nick of time (because it was very early in the morning, only 10 o’clock) to catch the Flying Scotsman to Waverley Station in Edinburgh, actually named after the series of Walter Scott’s novels.

Back in the day, the Flying Scotsman wasn’t only the express rail service between London and Edinburgh, but also the steam locomotive that pulled what the Brits call coaches. It was (and still is) what’s known as a Pacific-type locomotive, 4-6-2 in Whyte notation, with four leading wheels, six driving wheels, and two trailing wheels. Nothing to sneeze at, to be sure.

A 4-6-2 Pacific isn’t bad for the Brits on their tight little island, but it’s positively dwarfed by Union Pacific’s 4-8-8-4 behemoth known unsurprisingly as the Big Boy. There were 25 Big Boys built between 1941 and 1944 to haul 100-car, mile-long (plus) freight trains up fairly steep grades unassisted. Eight Big Boys are still around, of which one has been restored and runs for excursions and as a museum.

Big Boy’s unique 4-8-8-4 configuration was dictated by the massive power that necessitated not only the front set of eight driving wheels to be articulated in order to negotiate curves engineered for shorter wheelbases, but a four-wheel leading truck for stability entering curves and a four-wheel trailing truck to support a huge firebox. (Like the beloved 4-6-4- Hudson.) The tender also was specialized, with a seven-axle articulated wheelbase and other advanced features.

While Big Boy—Union Pacific 4014—spends most of his time west of the Mississippi, he did come east on this year’s coast-to-coast tour. But, given the limitations and condition of Connecticut’s rail infrastructure, he didn’t venture here.

Here are pictures of the Flying Scotsman and Big Boy. Do they need captions?

11 July—Unsolicited good news miraculously turned up in my email yesterday, along with the usual political stuff, phishing lures, dating porn, and other spam. It was from The Gospel Mag, a digital-only publication that provides daily devotionals, scriptural verses, and other goodies necessary for or at least relevant to propagation and maintenance of the Christian faith. Amen.

If you didn’t get the pun, “gospel,” from Old English “godspel,” means “good news.” And The Gospel Mag must not be confused with The Gospel Magazine, a bi-monthly real printed periodical based in the United Kingdom since 1766, available online only in archival PDFs.

In all events, this is the first revelation, so to speak, I was privileged to receive from The Gospel Mag. It’s evidently a new translation of the popular verse 31:24 from the Old Testament Book of Psalms, “זְקוּ וְיַאֲמֵץ לְבַבְכֶם כָּל־הַמְיַחֲלִים לַיהוָה,” which the King James Version claims means “Be of good courage, and he shall strengthen your heart, all ye that hope in the LORD.”

The effect of modern biblical exegesis on the artistic science of translation is positively astonishing.

Moving on, then, today is Bowdler’s Day, remembering—if not celebrating—the birth in 1754 of Thomas Bowdler, the English physician who, with the help of his equally censorious, puritanical, misguided sister, deleted words and passages from Shakespeare’s plays they considered improper for women and children and inspired the U.S. Federal Communication Commission to ban perfectly innocent content from radio and television.

As it happens, the Bowdlers did quite well with The Family Shakspeare. So Tom similarly expurgated Gibbon’s licentious Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire but died before he could finish, so his nephew finished the travesty and also biographied Uncle Tom.

On this day in 1804, Aaron Burr shot Alexander Hamilton in the illegal Weehawken duel. Hamilton got off the first shot but missed—intentionally, it’s believed. But Burr’s ball pierced Hamilton’s liver and lodged in his spine. And Hamilton died the next day. Burr is revered in Litchfield because he was the first student at his brother-in law Tapping Reeve’s little South Street law school.

And Captive Nations Week begins today. It’s an official observance ever since Ike signed it into law in 1959, demonstrating solidarity with nations under the control of governments deemed by the United States as “authoritarian.” Sadly, it brings to mind the Greek aphorism “γνῶθι σεαυτόν,” “know thyself.”

With Donald Trump allowed to run roughshod over the Constitution, who are we to judge?

10 July—Earlier this week the USPS’s infallible scanner in Springfield printed the wrong destination code on an envelope not addressed to me or my extortionate PO box. So, after giving the wayward envelope to the appreciative clerk on duty, being curious (i.e., nosy), I googled the addressee.

And this is what came up on the Litchfield municipal website for the addressee’s property tax and on three real estate websites for the address:

According to the Town of Litchfield, the real property in question has a net and gross assessment of $567,230. The gross assessment represents the statutory 70 percent of the property’s strict (presumably appraised) valuation; the net assessment reflects local exemptions, deductions, and credits, as for veterans and poor old folks. Evidently the addressee-property owner is neither a veteran nor old and poor. And the tax, due 1 July but billed dilatorily and in all events not delinquent until 4 August, which is irrelevant, is $11,628.

The street address comes up on the three biggest real estate websites. As off market, of course. And this is what they say:

Zillow.com, the biggest of the real estate websites by visitor traffic, cautiously lists only the “tax assessed value,” which of course is $567,230, rather than even a Zestimate®, which Zillow says is its “estimate of a home’s market value, incorporating public records, MLS data and user-submitted home details into Zillow’s proprietary home valuation model.” But Zillow warns that a Zestimate “is not an appraisal and can’t be used in place of an appraisal.” Fair enough, but “shouldn’t be used in place of an appraisal” would be more to the point because people are people. And since the property is off market, there are no user-subitted details.

Next, Realtor.com, which is actually owned by Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp but licenses the Realtor trademark from the National Association of REALTORS® and is right behind Zillow.com in visitor traffic, lists the property’s “estimated value,” “based on tax assessment records, recent sales prices of comparable properties, and other factors.” And that estimated value is $693,000. You wonder what the comps and other obviously deep dark secret factors are.

Last, Redfin.com, smallest of the big three real estate websites visitorwise, estimates the property at $1,015,109, adding that it’s “up $675K since last sold,” “up $91K since June,” and that “this home’s estimate is 114.7% higher than the average sale price ($473K) of 5 comparable homes.” You wonder about the Redfin algorithm’s choice of comps, too, as well as its adjustment algorithms. The seven-figure price certainly makes sense. But up $91K just since last month?

And if you’re wondering, the property in question was indeed last sold for $340,000. In 1995 . . .

9 July—Not that it matters, but a month after his cardiac arrest, heart attack, stroke, or other unspecified medical emergency has retiring Kentucky U.S. Senator Mitch McConnell really spoken with three selected Republicans—his former aide Scott Jennings, his successor as Senate Majority Leader John Thune, and dependable Trumpublican Whip John Barrasso—the three of whom and only the three of whom, as far as we know—claim he has?

If Mitch is in fact able to communicate (or do anything at all) during his alleged convalescence, why hasn’t he been allowed to communicate with, say, his fellow Kentucky Republican senator Rand Paul, who gleans updates on his colleague’s condition “through the grapevine,” as Dr. Paul puts it.

(Brings to mind Iran’s Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei who hasn’t been seen in public since he got the job in February. Is he alive?)

And Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear has been trying to speak with Mitch or at least find out how the old guy is doing and as the CEO of his state has every right to be kept informed. You might even say it’s the governor’s responsibility to be kept informed. On second thought, though, Beshear is a Democrat, so he must obviously be kept out of the minuscule privileged GOP—but not Trumpublican—loop and doesn’t have a right to anything in an otherwise reliably Republican state.

It’s not that Gov. Beshear could appoint a replacement should Mitch be unable (for whatever reason) to serve out the last few months of his undistinguished and often dis graceful term, mind you. Because in 2024 Kentucky’s veto-proof Republican-majority legislature relieved him of a governor’s traditional power to appoint a successor, making it only the fourth state to exclusively require a special election for that purpose.

You wonder why they’d have done or even seen a need for a nasty move like that. Could it possibly have had anything to do with Mitch’s triple bypass in 2003 and, more to the point, the unfortunate public “neurological events”—probably TIAs despite the Capitol physician’s public diagnosis of “occasional lightheadedness” caused by dehydration, blah blah, blah—in 2023, one mini-stroke in D.C., the other back home in Kentucky?

And let’s not forget Kentucky’s extremely popular Democrat governor in his second term.

Nor should we forget that in 2016 Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell blocked—on irrational and unreasonable but politically expedient grounds—the merest consideration of Merrick Garland’s nomination by Barack Obama to fill the Supreme Court seat made available by Antonin Scalia’s unexpected death. Not that the GOP majority would have confirmed Garland, to be sure, but it was a possibility.

Shame on Mitch McConnell for abusing his considerable power and the public trust. And his fairly recent break with Trump—only after he decided to retire, of course—doesn’t absolve him . . .

8 July—First, in 1972, when I arrived in Litchfield, the town’s population was 7,450. In 54 years it’s grown some 12 percent to about 8,300, with commensurate growth in the number of real estate parcels, taxable personal property, and residents’ motor vehicles registered (as required by law) in Connecticut.

In 1972, Litchfield’s tax collector had a side-handle adding machine and a manual typewriter and during the tax season Isabel Rylander, who had served eight terms as a state rep, inter alia, worked with a part-time assistant to get the tax bills out in plenty of time. And the bills always but always arrived in June, well before taxes were due on 1 July (plus the month’s grace period, of course).

In 2026, Litchfield’s tax collector has computers, digital data bases, the internet, contracted printing and mailing services, a full-time assistant, and two part-time assistants during the tax season. And this year the tax bills weren’t even mailed until 1 July—into the month’s grace period.

Now to Nixon. It’s Col. John Nixon of Pennsylvania, Richard Nixon’s son (really), and not to be confused with Brig. Gen. John Nixon of Massachusetts. And 250 years ago today, in Philadelphia’s State House Yard—now known as Independence Hall—Col. Nixon delivered the very first public reading of the Declaration of Independence. And of course it was received very enthusiastically.

And now to a scummy liar calling scummy liars scummy liars. As if you don’t know. In his declaration of nullification in Ankara early today—the laughable ceasefire agreement, the useless MOU with Iran—Donald Trump bitched that “it’s just a waste of time dealing with them, they’re liars.” And he went on to describe the mullahs as “scum” and “sick people.”

Of course, Trump is absolutely right. (Isn’t he always? Just ask him.) But doesn’t “liar,” “scum,” and “sick” bring someone else to mind?

So in addition to Trump, Graham Platner certainly fills the liar, scum, sick bill. Platner has excreted slimy negative vibes from the moment he announced his intention to unseat Maine U.S. Senator Susan Collins last year. And the Platner vibes have been getting slimier and negativer by the hour. Yet the Dems and Bernie Sanders stuck with him until the latest rape accusation. Why? Are they so desperate? Or do they reckon Senator Collins isn’t really all that bad?

On the other hand, isn’t even a weirdo like Graham Platner innocent until proven guilty?

7 July—He who veers from an intended disquisition is scooped. The Monitor’s art department created this editorial—i.e., political—montage on Sunday for posting yesterday. (We don’t do cartoons.) But Mount Trumpmore came up. So the post was rescheduled for this morning.

But—wouldn’t you know it!?—this morning’s Margolis & Cox editorial—i.e., political—cartoon pictured colonially dressed Donald Trump on a horse, shouting “The commies are coming! The commies are coming!”

Ah well.

To belabor the point, then, Margolis & Cox brilliantly exploit the incongruity of Trump on a horse. Can you imagine Trump on a horse? Pity the poor horse, for starters.

On the other hand, isn’t the verisimilitude of Trump in a golf cart on the Capitol lawn pretty good, too? And pity the poor golf cart . . .

6 July—So Donald Trump spent America’s non-250^th big birthday bash weekend doing what he does best. Continuously. Without surcease. All the time. He misrepresented, misstated, exaggerated, just plain lied; criticized, insulted, vilified, just plain bitched; boasted, bragged, flaunted, just plain grandstanded; congratulated himself, indulged himself, served himself, just plain gratified himself. In public.

And he put his formerly and conveniently bone-spurred foot in his fat mouth when he proclaimed, “Communism is a mortal threat to American liberty . . . the greatest threat to our country, including World War I, World War II, Pearl Harbor or even 9/11.” Boy, did he get that wrong.

Because without hesitation or doubt, the real mortal threat to American liberty, “the greatest threat to our country, including World War I, World War II, Pearl Harbor or even 9/11,” is Donald J. Trump.

Public masturbation is a trait not uncommon among narcissists and megalomaniacs. It’s a product and concomitant of exhibitionism, of course, and reflects sociopathic problems with impulse control and an overweening sense of entitlement.

It’s common practice for dictators to plaster images of and monuments to themselves throughout their dictatorships as means not only of self-gratification but also of fostering quasi-religious devotion among both their enthusiastic followers and oppressed masses. Think of Caligula, Nero, Joseph Stalin, Adolf Hitler, Kim Jong Un, and of course Donald Trump.

If you didn’t know, Trump has them all beat with his noisome image defacing public places and official federal items like passports and national park passes, on which latter his disgraceful mug replaces images of nature. And of course Trump and his evil spawn have monetized his image and everything else even tangentially connected with him, too numerous to detail here.

And now we learn that Donald Trump has decided to put himself on Mount Rushmore alongside George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt, and Abraham Lincoln. And he’s assuring everybody that it won’t cost the taxpayers one red cent because his oligarch flunkies will foot the whole billion-dollar bill. But his administration flunkies are nevertheless fiddling with ways to sneak several to many billions of bucks for the grandest monument to himself.

But, you’re thinking, Trump’s repellent puss can’t be carved on Mount Rushmore for geological as well as legal reasons. The National Park Service, for instance, has noted that the remaining granite is too unstable to carve and any dynamiting or drilling might even destroy the existing worthy presidential faces.

In that case, all Trump has to do is fire and hire until he gets what he wants. The Supreme Court told him he can do it, after all.

And in 1994 Congress passed an act banning any further carvings of Mount Rushmore. But if the increasingly uncooperative Trumpublican majorities don’t heed their master’s order to rescind it because it was obviously passed without any consideration of Trump, he’ll just tell them where to go an issue an executive order to give him his way.

In all events, here’s a sketch of what is henceforth to be known as Mount Trumpmore that was filched from the West Wing: