Triple-A says the highest recorded price for regular unleaded fuel in Missouri was $4.683 on June 16, 2022. The record for diesel was set just nine days later at $5.375.
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We either are still in Indianapolis or on the way home after witnessing two races—one of which we hope to have more about later (and we don’t mean tomorrow). We took this picture last year of the starting field—only six cars, if you want to call them that.
This year was the second annual Wiener 500. All six of the Oscar Mayer Wienermobile raced for two laps, each with a two-person crew (both college students who have spent a year touring the country promoting Oscar-Mayer products. It was so much fun they decided to do it again Saturday, weather permitting (we are writing this on Wednesday night before heading to the Circle City Friday morning). We’ll have a full report. Last we knew, two young women from the MU Journalism school had been part of the traveling show. If one of them drives one of these machines to victory, she will be the first woman to win a race in the 117-year history of the Speedway.
Last year, the 500 broadcast crew had fun with their straight-faced coverage:
Inaugural Oscar Mayer Wienie 500 🌭 Full Race | INDYCAR on FOX
Unofficially, the last 2.5 mile lap was turned in 3:17.5, about 65.2 mph.
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Another example of the political amateur hour in Washington crossed our desk a few days ago when Interior Secretary Doug Burgum told the House Natural Resources Committee advocates for solar energy are wrong because, “”All of these projects …in Nevada have one thing in common. When the sun goes down, they produce zero electricity….The whole machine doesn’t work when the sun goes down. And there’s examples from around the world of this happening.” He suggested committee members have secret briefings about how solar energy doesn’t work.
California Congressman Jared Huffman couldn’t resist a response, asserting there is an “amazing new technology that apparently the secretary is unaware of, it’s a battery.” And solar system batteries hold the day’s electricity for use at night. Burgum seems to have been in the dark about that. Ignorance such as this in this administration stopped being a surprise a long time ago.
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I’m an immensely popular guy. Or maybe a lot of people are interested in my welfare. My phone is ringing from sunup to sundown from people wanting to make sure my Medicare program is good enough. Even when my caller identity says they’re call from some town in Missouri (and other places nationwide) it turns out that they’re not calling from those places at all.
And many voices sound as if they’re coming from places without Medicare.
A dozen calls a day probably is below average. I answer the calls because I don’t want to fill up the answering machine with non-messages. The thing beeps and drives me crazy.
One day our caller ID told us we were calling ourselves. But we recognize our own voices and the voice calling us was neither of us.
It’s time we re-examined the Attorney General’s no-call list to see if we can have a law (maybe it has to be federal) that says any call originating from someplace other than where the caller ID says it’s coming from is a crime. It has been many years since we heard of the Attorney General racking up a big fine against a robocall company.
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Here’s something that is really, really serious in our country’s politics. There are conspiracy theorists who claim that President Trump faked his assassination attempts. While there is no Christmas card exchange between his mailbox and ours, we can’t see how that assertion is true. If it is true, it means that Donald Trump planned for the death of one or more onlookers—Corey Comperatore, who did get fatally shot, and two other people on the platform who were wounded in Pennsylvania. There are those floating the idea that he somehow convinced some guy from California to give up the rest of his life as a free citizen to go to Washington and do something at the correspondents’ dinner to justify tearing down part of the White House and building a ballroom that is more secure than the Washington hotel ballroom where the dinner was scheduled this year.
All of that is rubbish. Perhaps the discussion we should be having is about what Trump does and/or says that has encouraged three unbalanced people to try to get him in their gunsights.
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Here’s a way to end Mr. Trump’s war with Iran. We buy all of its enriched uranium and make an exclusive contract with Iran to be our exclusive supplier, with American management involved. Payments for the uranium would come from the funds this country has confiscated from Iran not only to pay for the uranium but to constitute reparations for our bombings. Turn management of the Strait of Hormuz to the United Nations which could charge reasonable fees that would finance programs in the world’s poorest countries.
Maybe we could make Iran our 51st state. Or the 52nd. Or the 52rd. Or 53rd. We almost need a scorecard to keep track of the possibilities.
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