Category Archives: Places

Notes from a Quiet Hill (Annexing Columbia Edition)

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—-the latest version of a series of ponderings that began with “Notes from a Battered Royal” that we used to write in the Missourinet newsroom that became “Notes from the Front Lines,” and then “Notes from a Quiet Street.”  The changes denote changes of the writer’s primary location.

Why shouldn’t Jefferson City annex Columbia?  Or why shouldn’t Missouri unilaterally declare Iowa part of our state?

They’re our version of Canada. They’re north.

If the standard for annexation is coldness, maybe Iowa would be the better choice.  And once we have Iowa, nothing can stop us from annexing Minnesota so we can have something REALLY cold in winter, but a nice place to go to in the steaming and humid days of summer.

The Greatest, or at least the silliest, Geopolitician of our time wants Canada to become our 51st state. If he read a geography book, he no doubt would be stunned to know that Canada is not one big geographic blob but has ten provinces and three territories.*** That might please him because we could go from fifty states to 60, and add two territories to our worldwide collection.

Think of the electoral votes involved.

Here’s a map so you will know more than your President does about Canada.

We would like to be in the same room when he suggests or demands that King Charles allow the United States to annex a country that is 41 times larger than the United Kingdom, of which it is a part, seven times larger than our present largest state—Alaska, and 15 times larger than our second-largest state, Texas.

But if he’s thinking of a one-state addition, he might try currying the favor of those in Quebec who have long advocated independence from Canada.

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King Charles did not attend the inauguration in January and there are no plans for a state visit by the new/old President to the UK so there appears to be little immediate possibility that Mr. Trump will have a chance to try to bully the King about Canada. He DOES know, doesn’t he, that he can’t primary a king?

The Great Geopolitician did meet with Prince William, the heir to the throne, at the reopening of Notre Dame. Cathedral a few months ago. The report from the GP illustrates the depth of their discussion: “He’s a good-looking guy. He looked really, very handsome last night. Some people look better in person? He looked great. He looked really nice, and I told him that.”

We wonder what William told his dad about what an uplifting talk he had with he presumed leader of the free world. We wonder how much they laughed.

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Canada appears not to know what is good for it. Doug Ford, who is the premier of Ontario—the most populous province of the GG’s proposed annexation, has a counteroffer.  He suggests Canada should buy Alaska and Minnesota. As far as the USA taking over Canada: “Under my watch, that will never, ever happen.”

Canada’s Green Party leader Elizabth May, has another offer. Cascadia. She suggests British Columbia join with Oregon and Washington to form an independent nation.  She had suggested California join Canada, too, If not a sister independent nation bit as 11th province. She thinks it’s a great idea for another reason—the United States would be rid of three states that vote for Democrats.

And it would be rid of territory with annual potentials for major wildfires (more on that later).

Before Prime Minister Justin Trudeau quit, he put it more bluntly: “There isn’t a snowball’s chance in hell that Canada would become part of the United States.” And Canadians know a lot more about snowballs than the Baron of Mar-a-Lago knows. Trudeau’s successor has been equally uncooperative.

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Speaking of Texas, here’s something the GG might consider in re-shaping the world.  Split Texas into five states.  That would mean ten more Senators, most of which are likely to be Republicans under present circumstances.  And it would mean a lot more electoral college votes.  Congress approved a joint resolution allowing the split in 1845:

New States of convenient size not exceeding four in number, in addition to said State of Texas and having sufficient population, may, hereafter by the consent of said State, be formed out of the territory thereof, which shall be entitled to admission under the provisions of the Federal Constitution.

Opponents say that resolution has been rendered moot by later legislation. But from time to time in Texas, there is talk.

Wonder if he’s thought about how that might help fight the thundering hordes storming his wall.

Here’s another bonus: Five new states, each with its own state university that can be threatened with loss of funds if they reject DEI.  How do you suppose the SEC and the Big 12 would split them up.

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We also wonder what the GG’s reaction would be if his good friend Vlad were to decide Russia got a raw deal when it sold Alaska to the United States and demanded a renegotiation at the least and a return of the area at the worst.

Why not sell it back to the Russians?  The money received could be used to buy Greenland. What use is it anyway? It’s not connected to any of the other states. Only a few people want to live there year-around. And why send all of those American workers up there to drill, baby, drill when there is still a lot of undrilled national parks and historic sites in the lower 49 to keep the oil companies busy for decades. And the Great State of Canada has a lot of drillable area.

Let the Russians have the Elk and the Permafrost.

How about drilling, baby drilling at Mar-a-Lago?  Probably not worth it. There already are eighteen dry holes there.

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And finally, this addendum to our earlier meditation on the geopolitician’s plan to export people;

It’s either them or the homeless crowd,.  One or the other group should be forced to stay here and rake California’s forests. You recall that the nation’s leading forest expert, or so he claims to be,  theorized four years ago that California wildfires were caused by all of the dead leaves that had fallen from the soon-to-be scorched trees. The President could even get a gold-painted ceremonial rake to take the first stroke. Probably, somebody would have to show him how to do it. Raking leaves when you live on the 56th through 58th floor of your own New York skyscraper is not a talent you have much opportunity to develop.

And if neither the homeless nor the deportees want to do it, he has an entirely new talent pool made up of former federal employees, a veritable 21st century Civilian Conservation Corps—-watched over by all the Generals and Admirals he has fired who might still be good for something.

***Wonder how many provinces and territories he could name.  How about you? I confess, I had forgotten some until I looked at the map. But I could be excused because I have no interest in annexing all of those provinces.

Should he read this entry (which is doubtful given reports that his attention span is so short that he would have quit reading it after “why not”) and for our own edification, here is the list: Ontario, Quebec, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Manitoba, British Columbia, Prince Edward Island, Saskatchewan, Alberta, and Newfoundland and Labrador (considered one).  Territories?  Yukon, Nunavut, Northwest Territories.

 

The King of the World

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The big black limousine pulls to the curb and out steps a man in a pin-stripe suit, his shiny dark hair slicked back, a bulge on the left side of his coat indicating there’s something behind the handkerchief poking up from the pocket.

He looks around, warily, the toothpick shifting to the other side of his mouth, as he swaggers inside.

His cold, piercing eyes underline his words:

“Nice little university you got here.  Be unfortunate if something happened to it.”  (The implication is clear that it better toe the organization line or something, perhaps several hundred million dollars worth of business, will disappear.)

Or:

“Nice little museum you got here.  We’d like you to change it for us.” (There is a “or else’’ understood in his request.”)

“Nice little law firm you got here.  You crossed the boss one too many times. We’re gonna shut you down.” (No reason for the boss to be subtle about it.)

With some strokes of his pen that produce an unreadable signature, the boss assumes powers to extort tribute from numerous targets, the congress, the law, and the courts be damned.

One of his biggest a few days ago asserts the power to cut off funding for the Smithsonian Institution if it continues exhibits that “degrade shared American values, divide Americans based on race, or promote programs or ideologies inconsistent with Federal law and policy.”

And who decides what those programs are?  Who decides what policies degrade shared American values—values apparently established by one man?

Does this mean closing the Museum of the American Indian? The African-American Museum?  The Holocaust Museum?  And the East Wing of the National Gallery of Art with all of its meaningless modernist stuff?

Maryland Governor Wes Moore, the third African American elected to a governorship in
our country calls the effort “disrespectful” and told an interviewer this weekend, “Loving your country does not mean dismantling those who have helped to make this country so powerful and make America so unique in world history in the first place.” Moore is the third black governor in American history, the first in Maryland.

Trump’s says, “Museums in our nation’s capital should be places where individuals go to learn instead of being “subjected to ideological indoctrination or divisive narratives that distort our shared history”

That’s Boss Trump’s job.

He also wants to influence what we can read. He has ordered the Institution of Museum and Library Services to be eliminated. That organization provides support for libraries and museums in Missouri and the other 49 states. Can’t have “divisive” things in our libraries that serve diverse audiences.

He has set up the Federal Communications Commission to become a censor of news and entertainment programs.  One of the first targets is Disney and its ABC News unit and their diversity and inclusion practices.  Chairman Brendan Carr says he wants to make sure ABC “ends any and all discriminatory initiatives in substance, not just name,” and that he wants to make sure ABC has “complied at all times with applicable FCC regulations.”  And what about FOX and OAN, One America Network, that is known for its fawning over all things Trump while FOX has had the temerity from time to time to challenge him?  Don’t look for Trump’s FCC to censor OAN, but FOX is no longer above suspicion.

ABC has become just another target in his war on the diversity of voices available to Americans. And he has shut down the Voice of America, greatest international representation of American values, especially in countries under dictatorial governments.

We should be very frightened of his belief he can censor or shut down news organizations that don’t buy his lies.

He has taken over the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts so that the only acts it can host are those that fit his definition of “American values.”

He wants to rewrite our history, especially eliminating references to times that non-whites have achieved breakthroughs in a white male-dominated society.

His rabid dog-like attacks on DEI has intimidated NASA into dropping its commitment to flying  the first person of color and the first woman on the moon, had led the Defense Department to eliminate postings about Jackie Robinson’s service during WWII, Navajo Code Talkers, the Tuskegee Airmen, and Pima Indian Ira Hayes, who helped raise the flag at Iwo Jima.

The fact-checking website SNOPES got an email from Pentagon Press Secretary John Ullyot proclaiming, As Secretary Hegseth has said, DEI is dead at the Defense Department. Discriminatory Equity Ideology is a form of Woke cultural Marxism that has no place in our military. It Divides the force, Erodes unit cohesion and Interferes with the service’s core warfighting mission. The code-talkers website was later restored to the Pentagon website, as were the stories of Major General Charles Calvin Rogers, 1970 black Medal of Honor recipient and Ira Hayes, who was at Iwo Jima.

And don’t forget the silliness of the removal from the internet of the Enola Gay, the first plane to drop an atomic bomb on Japan===because the word “gay” was used in the plane’s name.

And now he thinks he can order European countries to follow this blatantly discriminatory cleansing of our history. He has sent a letter to some large European companies that supply services to our government threatening them unless they adopt his DEI strategy, says The Financial Times.

Like Jack Dawson standing against the railing on the bow of the Titanic and shouting, “I’m King of the World!” the Don, not content with being the Despot of the United States, is dedicated to running the world.

Give me a major segment of your economy to pay off what I consider loans, he has told Ukraine, and I will make peace—a demand and a boast that must include a willing third partner who is proclaimed as a good friend but who has no interest in a peace.

“Pay economic blackmail,” says the Don, not realizing countries don’t pay tariffs but his own citizens will, “and I will let you do business in this country,” while the other countries are beginning to grow closer together and are beginning to plan for themselves instead of bowing to his demands.

He wants Canada and he wants Greenland, the feelings of the people living there notwithstanding in his quest for domination.

However, the people of Greenland should be breathing easier now that “Little Me” Vance has told them the Don will not use the military, his national muscle, to take over their island. He has urged them to embrace “self determination,” apparently failing to understand the Greenlanders long ago determined for themselves that they want to be aligned with Denmark and they don’t want to be under the Don’s “protection,” when all he really cares about are the country’s mineral deposits. “We think we’re going to be able to cut a deal, Donald-Trump style, to ensure the security of this territory,” said Vance to people who think Denmark has done a pretty good job of protecting them from—-China? And Russia, which is far more interested in restoring the Soviet Union and absorbing all of Europe eventually with little apparent interests in little Greenland?

So there he is, the Don standing on the prow of our Ship of State proclaiming himself King of the World.

We know what happened to Jack Dawson and the ship that was once thought to be unsinkable.

Kind of like our Ship of State.

Others in the world can see the rip in the side of the hull caused by Executive Order icebergs.  Others in the world are seeing our great Ship of State going down by the bow.

Some Republicans are starting to wonder if there are lifeboats enough for them.

There aren’t.

And the water is growing colder.

All They Did—-

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It will take a while, maybe several years, before some high school students living in an unincorporated area of 140 people of central Missouri fully appreciate what they have done.

They have won the State High School 2A basketball championship. But it’s more than just a trophy for the town of Eugene.

The exhilaration that comes from championships is a temporary thing. It might linger for several hours or for a few days before life takes over.

But legacies are eternal. And they have created a legacy.

All these students did was to give their little community where the number of students in the Cole R-V School District outnumbers the population of the community by more than four to one, the first state championship in community history—in any category.

The best at something in the entire state of Missouri, population 6.2-million.

It was not exactly a “Hoosiers” moment because they did not beat the dominant big-city team for the title, but to Eugene, Missouri, it IS a “Hoosiers” moment because it is the first time the school has won a state title in anything.

For the rest of their lives they will bound together by this historic event, For the rest of their lives they will be remembered as members of the first team in school history that—-

The chance to be a state champion comes rarely. Even if there are more trophies in the future, theirs will be the historic one, the one that says for the first time, Eugene was the best of its kind in the whole state.

They shall grow old, but they will always be young when others look at their trophy decades from now. They’ll be the ones every team to come wants to be like.

All they did was to give a120-year old community —that has never thought itself big enough to incorporate as a real town —the chance to proclaim itself the best of its kind in Missouri.

And these children shall become legends.

 

The State of Trump Address

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This is going to be a long one—as are all of the ones we publish after a major Trump serving of word salad.

We watched most of President Trump’s speech to a joint session of Congress Tuesday night. I confess that the longer it went on being Trump instead of being a President, the more I thought of finding something better to watch. I finally gave up after the one-hour mark and found an old cowboy movie on another channel, coming back at the end of it just in time for the Democratic Party response.

A few initial impressions:

He is still campaigning.

He is still lying.

I am sure he had some solid ideas. I am sure he had some less-solid ideas that are open to respectful discussion and compromise. I am sure he floated some ideas just to test political waters.  But his preoccupation with the 2020 and 2024 election, Democrats, and the immediate past-President buried them under his typical bloviating.

Never have a I heard a President spend so much time taunting the minority party. Until recent years, never had I seen members of Congress disrespecting the speaking President as I did last night. But in recent years, both sides of the aisle should have been spanked and sent to bed without dinner for their infantile behavior during the State of the Union speeches.

The place is starting to sound like the British Parliament during question time—except its manners are far worse.

If Trump had set forth his domestic and international agenda without attaching lies and insults to his statements, he would have saved us at least 45 minutes of our lives.

This was not a State of the Union speech.  It was a State of Trump speech.  And he’s pretty satisfied with himself.

I kept waiting for him to suggest something Congress should do.  But he carried on as if Congress doesn’t matter. Come to think of it, it doesn’t, as long as he can use his Magic Marker to make marks on a page that look like a badly-defibrillating heart monitor.

As is our habit, we’re going to turn to Daniel Dale of CNN for a comprehensive straight-out fact check.

But first, let’s look at some other reactions, at least some of which indicate how difficult it is to figure out how to assess what we watched the other night.

Satirist Andy Borowitz, who also writes pretty serious stuff, said in his Borowitz Report the next morning: “In what is being called a historic performance, on Tuesday night Donald J. Trump set a new world record for delivering the longest speech that did not include a single fact. Congressional Republicans were awestruck by their leader’s ability, at the age of 78, to give such a sustained fact-free oration. (House Speaker Mike Johnson said,) ‘To stand up there for 99 minutes and not accidentally slip up even once by saying something true? He’s still got it.’ Republicans contrasted Trump’s address favorably with the Democratic response of Sen. Elissa Slotkin, who spoke only briefly but whose remarks were riddled with facts.”

The New York Times Editor John Guida offered a more balanced approach the next day by asking some columnists and other writers for their assessments.

—Binya Applebaum: The speech was a “medley of fabrications, provocations, and insults.” Michelle Goldberg described Trump as “an autocratic thug gloating about stripping America for parts.”

Josh Barro noted Trump’s line about reducing immigration only required a new President instead of new laws, as advocated by Preisdent Biden was “an effective line on his strongest issue.”

Frank Bruni agreed that Trump was “on solid ground and in his comfort zone “when he talks about cracking down on illegal immigration” although he uttered lies about the issue.

Michael Schmitz: “Trump’s recitation of improbable-sounding expenses he claimed to have cut was funny.”

Farah Stockman praised the President for deputizing a child with cancer as a member of the Secret Service and telling the mother of a dead daughter that a wildlife area had been named in her honor.

Michelle Cottle thought the recognition of the chid was “a heartwarming plug for the President’s Make America Healthy Again agenda—and a clever way to gloos over the problematic views of his health and human services chief.”

Katherine Mangu-Ward said she has longed for a President who would dedicate “a significant portion…to cuts in the federal government.” But she was dismayed that the cuts he mentioned are small “and unlikely to withstand scrutiny from the courts or (as isn the case of his promises to stop Social Security Payments to 129-year olds fictional.”

Daniel McCarthy thought Democrats “set themselves up for the worst moment of the night with their jeering and heckling.”

Bruni grew tired of Trump proclaiming things were “like nothing that has ever been seen before,” and called such comments “juvenile, narcissistic and “exhausting—like his speech.”

Republicans in the chamber appeared to love every statement, every denigration of Democrats, every false claim. Democrats did themselves no favors with juvenile reactions when they should have been composing constitutionally-loyal opposition positions.

Was there an adult in the room?

Now, here’s Daniel Dale and his CNN fact-checking staff:

President Donald Trump made numerous false and misleading claims…The falsehoods spanned a variety of topics, including the economy, climate, immigration and more.

In his speech, just under one hour and 40 minutes, Trump also made a number of false claims about his predecessor, Joe Biden. Here is a fact check of some of Trump’s statements:

DOGE savings: Trump claimed that the Department of Government Efficiency, the initiative led by Elon Musk, has “found hundreds of billions of dollars” in fraud.

This figure, which is uncorroborated, needs context.

As of the day of Trump’s address to Congress, DOGE claimed on its website that its work has saved an estimated $105 billion for taxpayers.

But it hasn’t provided evidence to corroborate a figure that high.

DOGE listed about 2,300 contracts it claimed to have canceled across the federal government for a total claimed savings of about $8.9 billion. It also listed nearly 3,500 grants it claimed to have canceled for a total claimed savings of about $10.3 billion, but it provided no links or documentation for those cuts. And it listed about $660 million in savings from canceled government leases.

DOGE’s public tally has been marred with errors, and it has been repeatedly changed in recent weeks to remove some contracts identified as flawed by CNN and other media outlets — including a previous claim that it had saved $8 billion by canceling a contract that was actually worth a maximum of $8 million. Its website’s so-called wall of receipts has included contracts that were canceled during previous presidential administrations.Enter your email to sign up for CNN’s “What Matters” Newsletter.

 

Bottom of Form

Musk and other Trump allies have claimed DOGE’s work is aimed at targeting waste, fraud and abuse. But DOGE has not released evidence that the contracts it has canceled were fraudulent. And at least some of the cuts have been reversed amid criticism.

From CNN’s Casey Tolan

DOGE and transgender mice: Trump falsely claimed that the Department of Government Efficiency identified government spending of “$8 million for making mice transgender.”

Between the 2021 and 2022 fiscal years, the National Institutes of Health awarded a total of $477,121 to three  projects that involved administering feminizing hormone therapy to monkeys to understand how it may affect their immune system and make them more susceptible to HIV. Feminizing hormone therapy is a gender-affirming treatment used to block the effects of the male hormone testosterone and promote feminine characteristics among transgender women.

Transgender women are nearly 50 times more likely to be infected with HIV than other adults, according to one study from 2013 across 15 countries, including the US. It’s not clear where the $8 million figure came from.

From CNN’s Deidre McPhillips

Trump on the economy

Trump’s tariffs: Trump, promoting his tariffs on imported foreign products, claimed that “we will take in trillions and trillions of dollars,” and he added that “I did it with China.” This is misleading at best. Tariffs are paid by US importers, not foreign exporters, and study after study, including  one from the federal government’s bipartisan US International Trade Commission, found that Americans bore almost the entire cost of Trump’s first-term tariffs on Chinese products. It’s easy to find specific examples of companies that passed along the cost of the tariffs to US consumers.

From CNN’s Daniel Dale and Tami Luhby

Small-business optimism: Trump said that “small-business optimism saw its single-largest one-month gain ever recorded — a 41-point jump.”

This claim needs context. If Trump was referring to the commonly cited NFIB Small Business Optimism Index (his spokespeople didn’t respond to a previous CNN request to clarify), his claim about a 41-point increase appears to be a reference to one component of the index — the percentage of small-business owners expecting the economy to improve — rather than the index as a whole. That measure did soar a  net 41 percentage points from pre-election October to post-election November.

And Trump didn’t mention that the total index then declined in January to a level that is still high but lower than it was under Trump in  September, 2020 and Octoger 2020 – less than five years ago.

From CNN’s Daniel Dale

Egg prices: Trump on Tuesday made the misleading claim that former President Joe Biden “let the price of eggs get out of control.”

The avian flu has caused egg prices to rise because the United States Department of Agriculture requires the culling of entire flocks to stop the spread if the virus is detected. It’s a practice that occurred during the Biden administration, but also one that is continuing under Trump as the virus continues to infect flocks nationwide.

When Biden took office, the average price of a carton of a dozen grade A eggs across US cities was $1.47, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics data. By January 2023, as avian flu spread to flocks nationwide, a dozen eggs rose to $4.82 on average, a 228% increase. By the time Biden left office in January, a carton of eggs cost $4.95 on average, a 2.7% increase from a year prior. Due to short supply,  egg prices are projected to increase by 41.1%  this year, according to the USDA’s food outlook as of February 25.

From CNN’s Piper Hudspeth Blackburn, Elisabeth Buchwald and Vanessa Yurkevich

Trump on efforts to fight climate change

Trump and “the Green New Scam”: Trump claimed that he terminated the “Green New Scam.”

This claim is inaccurate in various ways. Biden didn’t pass the original “Green New Deal,” a nonbinding resolution   introduced by progressive congressional Democrats in 2019 that was never turned into law. Trump hasn’t yet terminated the major environmental law Biden did pass, which is what Trump might be referring to as “the Green New Scam.” Trump has previously claimed the policy cost $9 trillion.

Biden signed a law in 2022 known as the Inflation Reduction Act, or IRA,  containging $430 billion in climate and clean energy spending and tax credits.Independent estimates later raised the cost of that law to over $1 trillion by 2032, but the IRA actually saved the government $240 billion because of its increased tax enforcement and prescription drug savings, according to the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget. And importantly, the IRA’s tax credits spurred companies to build new factories and solar and wind farms in the US, creating jobs with it.

Trump and congressional Republicans haven’t killed the law, although they are aiming to take parts of it out later this year. Trump has effectively killed other climate policies Biden imposed through executive order, but it will take an act of Congress to reverse the former president’s signature climate bill.

From CNN’s Ella Nilsen

Paris climate agreement: Trump touted withdrawing a second time from the Paris climate agreement, claiming in his speech to Congress that the landmark climate deal was costing the US “trillions of dollars that other countries were not paying.”

This claim is inaccurate. Biden pledged to pay $11.4 billion per year toward international climate financing upon taking office. However, the US contribution to a global finance goal ended up being far lower because Congress appropriated far less money than Biden’s goal. Biden’s State Department  announced it had allocated $5.8 billion to international climate finance by 2022. US climate finance contributions have never reached trillions of dollars.

The US wasn’t the only laggard on its climate finance commitments; other nations have struggled to meet a collective $100 billion climate financing goal meant to help countries vulnerable to sea level rise and droughts.  China, the UK and the EU have all contributed. That goal  was tripled to $300 billion annually by 2035 at the most recent United Nations Climate Conference.

From CNN’s Ella Nilsen

Trump on border crossings and migrants

Illegal border crossings: Trump claimed that, since taking office again, he has already achieved the lowest number of illegal border crossings “ever recorded.” That’s false.

He could have accurately said the number of Border Patrol apprehensions at the southern border in February – the first full month of his second term – is the lowest in many decades, at least if it’s true that the number was 8,326, as he claimed on social media in early March. But  official  federal statistics show there were fewer Border Patrol encounters with migrants at the southwest border in various months of the early 1960s, as well as in various months of previous decades.

From CNN’s Daniel Dale and Devan Cole

Migrants coming from mental institutions: Trump repeated his familiar claim Tuesday night about how other countries have supposedly released people from their “mental institutions and insane asylums” into the US as migrants. There is no evidence for the president’s claim, which Trump’s own presidential campaign was unable to corroborate. (The campaign was unable to provide any evidence even for his narrower claim that South American countries in particular were emptying their mental health facilities to somehow dump patients upon the US.)

From CNN’s Daniel Dale and Haley Britzky

Trump on former President Joe Biden

Weaponizing the Justice Department: Trump claimed that Biden used his office to “viciously” prosecute him. That’s false.

Trump’s two federal indictments were brought by a special counsel, Jack Smith. Smith was appointed in November 2022 by Attorney General Merrick Garland, a Biden appointee, but that is not proof that Biden was involved in the prosecution effort, much less that Biden personally ordered the indictments. Garland had said that he would resign if Biden ever asked him to act against Trump but that he was sure that would never happen. For Trump’s part, he has never provided any evidence that Biden was personally involved in the federal prosecutions.

The two cases were dropped by Smith after Trump was reelected.

From CNN’s Daniel Dale and Devan Cole

Inflation under Biden: Trump falsely claimed in his address to Congress that under the Biden administration America suffered the “worst inflation in 48 years, but perhaps even in the history of our country, they’re not sure.”

Trump could fairly say that the year-over-year US inflation rate hit a 40-year high in June 2022, when it was 9.1%, but that’s not “48 years” — and this 9.1% rate was not close to the all-time record of 23.7% set in 1920.. The rate in the last full month of the Biden administration, December 2024, was  2.9%. It was 3% in January, 2025, , a month partly under Biden and partly under Trump.

Trump did qualify the claim with the word “perhaps” and “they’re not sure,” but there is no basis for the claim regardless, and those numbers are certain: The Consumer Price Index data goes back to 1913.

Inflation’s rapid ascent which began in early 2021, was the result of a confluence of factors, including effects from the Covid-19 pandemic such as snarled supply chains and geopolitical fallout (specifically Russia’s invasion of Ukraine) that triggered food and energy price shocks. Heightened consumer demand boosted in part by fiscal stimulus from both the  Trump and Biden administrations also led to higher prices, as did the post-pandemic imbalance in the labor market.

From CNN’s Daniel Dale and Alicia Wallace

Undocumented immigrants: Trump falsely claimed Tuesday that 21 million undocumented immigrants came into the US during Biden’s tenure.

Through December 2024, the last full month of Biden’s presidency, the country had  recorded  under 11 million nationwide “encounters” with migrants during that administration, including millions who were rapidly expelled from the country; even adding in so-called gotaways who evaded detection, estimated by House Republicans as being roughly 2.2 million, there’s no way the total is “21 million.”

From CNN’s Daniel Dale and Devan Cole

Agricultural purchases by China: Trump repeated a false claim that he got China to purchase $50 billion worth of agricultural goods during his first administration and that the Biden administration “didn’t enforce it.” That is misleading.

China agreed to increase agricultural purchases by $12.5 billion in 2020 and $19.5 billion in 2021, as part of a trade pact signed with the US in January 2020. That did occur in 2020 but not in 2021, when US agricultural exports to China increased by $6.4 billion compared with 2020, according to US Department of Agriculture data.

Nevertheless, the pact never specified that China would have to continue to keep up such purchase levels beyond 2021.

Rather, it said, “The Parties project that the trajectory of increases in the amounts of manufactured goods, agricultural goods, energy products, and services purchased and imported into China from the United States will continue in calendar years 2022 through 2025.”

Even still, 2022 surpassed 2021 levels of $33 billion, according to USDA data. However, by 2023, US agricultural exports to China declined by $9 billion.

From CNN’s Elisabeth Buchwald

Trump’s other claims

Autism rates: In his address to Congress on Tuesday, Trump spoke of the recent rise in autism prevalence in the US, saying that “not long ago, and you can’t even believe these numbers, one in 10,000 children had autism, one in 10,000, and now it’s one in 36.”

Some of the earliest studies on autism diagnosis from the 1960s and 1970s estimated reported autism prevalence to be in the range of 2 to 4 cases for every 10,000 children, but that was many decades ago. While the diagnosis rate has increased steadily in recent years, it was already 1 in 150 children in 2000, 25 years ago, according to data from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It was indeed 1 in 36 children by age 8 in 2020.

Experts say significant improvement in identifying and diagnosing autism is a key driver behind the rise in reported rates.

From CNN’s Deidre McPhillips and Daniel Dale

Military recruitment: Trump claimed Tuesday that the US military is having “among the best recruiting results ever in the history of our services” and that the US Army had its “single-best recruiting month in 15 years” in January, adding that “just a few months ago” the US “couldn’t recruit anywhere.”

This needs context. According to  the Defense Department, military recruitment was already up over 10% in fiscal year 2024 compared with the year prior, and the delayed entry program for the active-duty military was up 10% in fiscal year 2025. The delayed entry program is a way for recruits to join the military but not ship out until a later date.

And looking specifically at the Army’s recruitment, former Army Secretary Christine Wormuth, who served until January 20, told FOX News that the uptick started before Trump was elected — and that the Army in fact started seeing increased numbers in February 2024.

From CNN’s Haley Britzky

Social Security benefits: In an extended claim, Trump said 4.7 million people who are at least 100 years old are still listed in the Social Security Administration’s database and that “money is being paid to many of them.” However, this claim needs context.

The vast majority of these people do not have dates of death listed in Social Security’s database. But that doesn’t mean they are actually receiving monthly benefits.

Public data from the Social Security Administration  shows that about 89,000 people age 99 or over were receiving Social Security benefits in December 2024, not even close to the millions Trump invoked.

The acting commissioner of the Social Security Administration, Leland Dudek, who was elevated to that post by the current Trump administration, tried to set the record straight in a February statement.

“The reported data are people in our records with a Social Security number who do not have a date of death associated with their record. These individuals are not necessarily receiving benefits,” Dudek said.

From CNN’s Tami Luhby and Daniel Dale

Aid to Ukraine: Trump repeated a regular false claim that the US has spent $350 billion, “like taking candy from a baby,” to support Ukraine’s defense while Europe has collectively provided just $100 billion in aid. That is not close to correct.

According to the Kiel Institute for the World Economy, a German think tank that closely tracks wartime aid to Ukraine, Europe – the European Union plus individual European countries – had collectively committed far more total wartime military, financial and humanitarian aid to Ukraine through December 2024 (about $263 billion at current exchange rates) than the US committed (about $126 billion). Europe had also allocated more military, financial and humanitarian aid (about $140 billion) than the US allocated (about $121 billion).

The US did have a slim lead in one particular category, military aid allocated, providing about $68 billion compared with about $66 billion from Europe. But even that was nowhere close to the giant gulf Trump described.

It’s possible to arrive at different totals using different counting methodologies, but there is no apparent basis for Trump’s “$350 billion” figure. The US government inspector general overseeing the Ukraine response says on its website that the US had appropriated nearly $183 billion for the Ukraine response through December 2024, including about $83 billion actually disbursed – and that includes funding spent in the US or sent to  countries other than Ukraine.

From CNN’s Daniel Dale and Alicia Wallace

Panama Canal deaths: Trump delivered a slightly vaguer than usual version of his repeated false claim that 38,000 Americans died during the building of the Panama Canal. That figure is not even close to true, experts on the canal’s construction say.

Experts on the canal say it’s not even close to true that 38,000 Americans died during construction.

While the century-old records are imprecise, they show about 5,600 people died during the canal’s American construction phase between 1903 and 1914 – and “of those, the vast majority were Afro-Caribbeans,” such as workers from Barbados and Jamica, said  Julie Greene, , a history professor at the University of Maryland and author of the book “The Canal Builders: Making America’s Empire at the Panama Canal.”

The late historian David McCullough, author of another book on the building of the canal, found that “the number of white Americans who died was about 350.”Thousands of additional orkers, perhaps around 22,000, died during the French construction phase that preceded the American phase. But Trump strongly suggested he was talking about American deaths, as he has explicitly said on previous occasions.

From CNN’s Daniel Dale

Great? 

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We have a place at the end of these entries for people to respond to them. I hope the Trumpers will do that today—

And explain how last week’s disgusting performance in the meeting with Ukraine’s President in any way makes America Great.

To whom?

Well, Russia thinks America is great.  Donald Trump thinks browbeating and bullying the president of a country fighting off takeover from a cruel, controlling, all-powerful despotic leader of a gigantically larger country makes our America great, at least in his own self-dominated mind.

HERE’S how American can be great—–but Trump’s own cruel, controlling, all-powerful self-image won’t let him do it:

Persuade his good friend Vlad to stop the invasion of Ukraine. Withdraw.  Offer Russia security protections against invasion from Ukraine.

He won’t do it. He can’t do it. He’s already speaking from Vlad’s pocket when he accuses Ukraine of starting the war.

Imagine if Roosevelt in 1939 had accused Poland of invading Germany; England of launching a blitzkrieg against Germany in 1940, Hawaii of bombing Tokyo in ’41.  Imagine if Truman accused South Korea of starting a war in 1950 by invading North Korea.  Or if George H. W. Bush had charged Kuwait with invading Iraq in 1990.

Just think how much greater we would be now if those presidents hadn’t made the mistakes Trump refuses to make today.

The greatness of America on the world stage is gone and it is becoming smaller in the international rear-view mirror.  It’s even growing smaller in our own rear-view mirror with every day of crude butchery of our own government, with every day that the faceless bureaucrats who try to make our government work for US are threatened with the loss of their jobs by people who have little appreciation for laboring on behalf of other people.

So tell me, Trumpers, in the dialogue box at the end of this entry, just how Trump is making our country great by doing the things to his own people that he is doing.  Look ahead, and tell me how our lives will be better a year from now.

Don’t send me an email.  My name is on every one of these entries. I expect those with differing opinions to have enough courage to stand behind their words with their names.

Make me think how great my country is today.  Make me proud of my president.  Make me sufficiently grateful.

Eyes on the Prize; Blind to Freedom 

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Making a deal with the Devil puts the Devil in charge.  Chickens making agreements with foxes soon realize the fox in the hen house always is hungry.

Freedom is not a business proposition. Those who try to make it so are less concerned with freedom than with ownership and exploitation. Acceptance of a business proposition by a battle-scarred country will an an acceptance of less independence by the people of that country and acceptance of less independence can only bring about a loss of freedom.

Ukraine is not a hotel, a country club, a casino, a university that can be run into bankruptcy while the person behind it walks away unscathed.  It is not a commodity such as coins, tennis shoes, and Bibles never read.  Freedom cannot be bought, sold, or traded.  There are no international bankruptcy laws that protect the freedoms lost by a people who become victims of a loser business man with an extensive record of deals gone sour.

And when a United States President asserts that an innocent nation minding its own business caused its own invasion by a ruthless despot is unforgiveable.

The freedom of Ukraine must be protected. It is too precious to be considered something that can be  bought or traded for. Once freedom has been achieved, it is worth fighting for even against overwhelming odds. Ukraine does not deserve someone who would force a devastated country to sell a major part of its economy in return for a peace without security or reparations.

And it is even more repugnant than that.

Anyone who would proclaim that Ukraine started the war with Russia and is willing to deal away Ukraine’s freedom as a business investment is an international disgrace, especially when representing a country that has been the shining example of freedom to the rest of the world.

It is betrayal of what this country stands for.

Trump wants the Nobel Peace Prize. He envies Barack Obama for winning it. He thinks he can demand it for himself by forcing another nation to give up a large chunk of its independence to end an accused war criminal’s invasion.

To hear his incoherent and lying babbling about the victimization of Russia-–even his former media apologists at FOX News struggle to tolerate it—must raise questions about his mental state and the damage he is doing both internally and externally to   our country.

Yes, he won the election. But every day he demonstrates his disrespect for the history of the nation he leads and every day he sees himself less as a defender of freedom and more as a shady wheeler-dealer who cares only about power and possession.

Donald Trump is proving every day that he belongs in a padded room, not the oval office.

Contrary to the song, Freedom’s just another word for EVERYTHING left to lose. Too bad we have a President who doesn’t care who loses it whether it is the people of another country or people of his own.

The Gulf

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It’s the Gulf of Mexico. Period.

And calling it the Gulf of America is as silly as some people got after the September 2001 terrorist attacks when France opposed our invasion of Iraq by deciding to call French fries, Freedom Fries.

The pettiness and immaturity of a 78-year old man with a superiority complex was played out a few days ago when he threw a tantrum and banished an Associated Press reporter from an Oval Office press conference dominated not by the old man but by his  hatchet man. The reporters was not banned because he asked an impertinent question of either of the stars of the event.

He was barred from the event because the Associated Press won’t call the Gulf of Mexico the presidentially-designated Gulf of America.

To begin with, Trump’s executive order on the Gulf shows his usual ignorance of and respect for maritime/economic law and the authority of individuals as well as countries to keep calling it the Gulf of Mexico.

But never trouble Donald Trump with facts or with respecting any system, nations, and cultures that long-ago legally or at least culturally designated names of places.

Renaming Denali, for example, is disrespectful of the Koyukon Athabascan people who have lived in that area for centuries and have called it Denali. Not until 1896 was it called Mt. McKinley, and not by any official action or decision by an international naming agency but by a gold miner who started calling it McKinley to support a presidential candidate. President Wilson signed a bill in 1917 making McKinley the official name.

But the state of Alaska asked in 1975 that the United States Board on Geographical Place Names make the official name to the traditional Denali. Ohio Congressman Ralph Regula blocked it because McKinley’s hometown of Canton was in his district and he didn’t seem to care what generations of natives had called the mountain long before he came along. Canton is a long ways from Alaska and surely Regula (who died a few years ago) could have found something closer to home with which to make a headline.

The Board of Geographical Place Names?

The King of Renaming Puffery apparently does not know, or does not care about, the existence of such a body that was created in 1897 and assumed its present status by federal law in 1947. The board, part of the Department of the Interior, tries to allocate place names based on local custom “as well as principles, policies, and procedures governing the use of domestic names, foreign names, Antarctic names, and undersea feature names,” as one source puts it. More than fifty other nations have similar national bodies.

Such organizations are necessary to avoid confusion about what is what and where that what is.

Then there is the United Nations Economic and Social Council  and its nine-member Group of Experts on Geographical Names that has been reviews things every five years, beginning in 1960. Having a commonly-used name of a place is important in domestic and international trade.

But we are learning that this President has no regard for federal agencies or international programs, especially when he decides to show his power by ignoring them with executive orders. And woe be unto anyone who does not worship his impulses.

Here’s the deal about the Gulf of Whatever—

The United States does not OWN the Gulf of Mexico.  The United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea grants countries control of waters about twelve nautical miles from the country’s shores. That’s the closest this country has to owning a gulf, a sea, or an ocean.

There also is an “Exclusive Economic Zone” that covers 200 miles of offshore water. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration says the zone allows this country to “explore, exploit, conserve and manage natural resources” in that area. That zone overlaps similar zones for Mexico and Cuba. But they don’t count in inner Trumpworld.

So the Great Geopolitician is asserting authority over Mexico and Cuba with his MAGA-pleasing proclamation, something outside his and his country’s authority. The solution to his situation should be easy for him: Make Mexico our 52nd state and Cuba our 53rd.

Canada already is in line to become number 51. And that brings us to another issue for our President and our takeover of Canada.

What’s with this St. Lawrence Seaway thing?

It allows oceangoing ships to travel from the Atlantic Ocean as far inland as Duluth, Minnesota.  It’s named for the St. Lawrence River that links Lake Ontario to the Atlantic. We expect an executive order soon renaming the thoroughfare the Duluth Seaway.

And while we’re at it, why is it the Missouri River when there are so many other states involved?  We can’t call it the Missouri-Kansas-Nebraska-Iowa-North Dakota-South Dakota, Montana River.  Let’s simplify it and just call it The Trump River and make it a symbol of his success at bringing the county together.

And then—

The administration’s new Interior Secretary, Doug Burgum says the department is considering redrawing boundaries of our national parks and historic sites so there’s more room to drill, baby, drill—even though we understand the major petroleum companies are less enthusiastic about the increased supply that will lower the pump prices of gas and oil.  But as long as we’re tinkering with those parks and historic sites—-

Let’s add the scowling Presidential visage to Mount Rushmore although rock experts have told the National Park Service the remaining rock is unstable.

It might be the perfect place for a Trump sculpture after all

(Actually, increased drilling should be welcomed by consumers who will pay less for the fuel it takes to buy their more-expensive groceries.)

And while we’re talking about the Gulf of Mexico, why don’t we annex the Caribbean?

Now back to the AP reporter. Trump’s action constitutes a punishment for a news agency that reports the news in a way he does not like.  That’s been illegal since John Peter Zenger was accused of libel by the Royal Governor of New York because Zenger’s New York Journal published an editorial critical of Governor William Cosby.

Cosby issued a proclamation condemning Zenger’s newspaper for “divers scandalous, virulent, false, and seditious reflections,” a crude eloquence we won’t find on (Un)Truth Social. It doesn’t even have an exclamation point, a misspelling, and a capitalized word.

Zenger’s lawyer, Andrew Hamilton—the father of Alexander—argued that truth is an absolute defense against libel. It took a jury only ten minutes to find Zenger not guilty, a judgment that established press freedom in this country.

Trump’s hissy fit because the AP recognizes the internationally-established name for the Gulf of Mexico, while not a libel, is an exercise of press freedom. The press is not obligated to print the party line or the individual declaration of anyone, including Presidents with a totalitarian attitude.

–or as the AP put it, “As a global news agency that disseminates news around the world, the AP must ensure that place names and geography are easily recognizable to all audience.”  The AP does agree to change the mountain to Mt. McKinley in its style book.

The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, a First Amendment advocacy group, commented, “President Trump has the authority to change how the U. S. government refers to the Gulf. But he cannot punish a new organization for using another term.”

Well, he did.  And he’s moving to punish news organizations who dare question his bloviating about any issue that pops into his head.

Someday, perhaps, we’ll get into a discussion of “America,” another word about which Trump is, shall we say, extremely uneducated.

Hearing a Speech Never Given 

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A few minutes before President Kennedy was to arrive at the Dallas Trade Mart on November 22, 1963, he was murdered.

Some of his planned remarks are useful for us to consider today. The text of the speech is available from numerous sources.

But what if he had lived to deliver it?

Well, we now have an idea of how it would have sounded.

A few days ago, I listened to  John Kennedy deliver that speech, in which he said, among other things::

“Ignorance and misinformation can handicap the progress of a city or a company, but they can, if allowed to prevail in foreign policy, handicap this country’s security. In a world of complex and continuing problems, in a world full of frustrations and irritations, America’s leadership must be guided by the lights of learning and reason or else those who confuse rhetoric with reality and the plausible with the possible will gain the popular ascendancy with their seemingly swift and simple solutions to every world problem.

“There will always be dissident voices heard in the land, expressing opposition without alternatives, finding fault but never favor, perceiving gloom on every side and seeking influence without responsibility. Those voices are inevitable…

“We cannot expect that everyone, to use the phrase of a decade ago, will ‘talk sense to the American people.’ But we can hope that fewer people will listen to nonsense. And the notion that this Nation is headed for defeat through deficit, or that strength is but a matter of slogans, is nothing but just plain nonsense.”

As he neared the end of his speech he would have cited how American leadership through strength had blunted the Soviet Union’s expansionism.  He would have said:

“. There is no longer any doubt about the strength and skill of American science, American industry, American education, and the American free enterprise system.”

He would have warned, “In today’s world, freedom can be lost without a shot being fired, by ballots as well as bullets. The success of our leadership is dependent upon respect for our mission in the world as well as our missiles – on a clearer recognition of the virtues of freedom as well as the evils of tyranny.”

He would have concluded, “Our adversaries have not abandoned their ambitions, our dangers have not diminished, our vigilance cannot be relaxed. But now we have the military, the scientific, and the economic strength to do whatever must be done for the preservation and promotion of freedom…

“We in this country, in this generation, are – by destiny rather than choice – the watchmen on the walls of world freedom. We ask, therefore, that we may be worthy of our power and responsibility, that we may exercise our strength with wisdom and restraint, and that we may achieve in our time and for all time the ancient vision of “peace on earth, good will toward men.” That must always be our goal, and the righteousness of our cause must always underlie our strength. For as was written long ago: ‘except the Lord keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain.’

Artificial Intelligence can be monstrously good and monstrously evil, which is why it is so frightening to many of those who have seen past promises of peaceful and proper use of technology turned inside out by those who have exploited them.  So it can be with AI, which is alternatively exciting and frightening.

But AI also has given us John Kennedy’s voice giving the speech he never lived to give.  You can read how it was done and then hear the speech here;

JFK video: hear Kennedy’s ‘lost’ Dallas speech in his own voice

The technology is remarkable—-and it is just beginning its ascendency.  And while listening to how technology has woven words into speech, it is more important to focus on the words never spoken—

“We in this country, in this generation, are – by destiny rather than choice – the watchmen on the walls of world freedom. We ask, therefore, that we may be worthy of our power and responsibility, that we may exercise our strength with wisdom and restraint,”

AI has given us that speech. Will human intelligence let us appreciate it in these angry times?

 

We Get A New Governor Today

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Mike Kehoe will be sworn in at noon today as our 56th Governor although it will be the 58th administration.  Two governors, Phil Donnelly and Christopher Bnd served two separate terms.

Kehoe succeeds Mike Parson, who now goes back to his farm in Polk County where he was working six years ago, when he was lt. Governor, when a Highway Patrolman showed up to tell hm he needed to get back to Jefferson City because Governor Eric Greitens was resigning.

I’ve referred to Govenor Mike Parson and Lieutenant Govenor Mike Kehoe as Mike 1 and Mike 2—and the Govenor’s Mansion for the last six years as the Parson-age.

Incidentally, a recurring political joke for many years asks voters if they would buy a used car from the candidate.  A lot of people did when he was a Ford dealer in Jefferson City.  He’s the second car dealer to be sworn in as Governor. Governor Arthur M. Hyde, who served 1921-1925 was a Buick dealer in Princeton and Trenton.

We’ve gone back over our notes on past gatherings to recall some special and sometimes not-so-special moments.

Each inauguration has some special touches. Sometimes the wheels fall off as was the case in 2013 when the usually reliable church bells tolling noon, the traditional time for the oath-taking, had a mind of their own and when the judge swearing in the governor mispronounced his name.

We listened back to The Missourinet’s recording of those events to put together this chronology showing how things fell apart at the critical moment.

11:59:56—band finishes playing “God Bless America.”

12:00:20—12:01:20—The bell at St. Peter Catholic Church tolls eight times.

Long pause.  Finally, Senate President Pro Tem Tom Dempsey, the MC, approaches the podium, and just as he draws a breath to introduce the judge to swear in the Governor—

12:02:23—a ninth bell (crowd and podium guests laugh loudly) Dempsey throws up his hands and retreats to his seat.

12:02:33—tenth bell

12:02:42—eleventh bell.  Then silence. There is no 12th bell for the noon swearing-in.  Voices on the platform (including Nixon’s apparently) are heard confirming, however, that there had been the 12th bell. Nope. Just eleven).

12:04:18—Convinced there are no more bells, Dempsey introduces St. Louis Circuit Judge Rex Burlison to swear in Nixon.

12:04:52—And Judge Burlison begins the oath by mispronouncing the Governor’s name:, “I, Jeremy Wilson Nixon…”  Nixon repeats, “I, Jeremiah Wilson Nixon…”

12:05:25—oath completed.   Church bells ring joyously throughout the city. Helicopter flyover.

Nixon’s first inauguration in 2009 was the second time in three inaugurals when the governor was sworn in early. Master of Ceremonies Charlie Shields, the Senate president pro tem, noted about 11:45 that the event was running early and the band would play some music to fill time. However after one number he announced the swearing in of the new governor would proceed. Shields said the National Guard, which operates the schedule for the inaugurations, told him through his earpiece to go ahead with the oath-giving and taking.  The swearing-in of Governor Nixon began at 11:52 and the church bells rang early.

The 2005 inauguration is remembered by some for the relatively warm weather and for the governor’s attire.

Governor Blunt refused to be sworn in while wearing the traditional tuxedo, which he referred to in an interview with The Missourinet as a “monkey suit.”  That night he did wear a tux, although the traditional attire for the inaugural ball is white tie and tails.  It was a frustrating few days for one of the Jefferson City tuxedo shops with which Blunt did business.  The owner tried…and tried…but failed to convince Blunt to be traditional in his attire.

Blunt used two Bibles.  In his inaugural address he noted that one was the Bible he used each day.  The second one would be given to his son upon his birth, which was scheduled for March.  He said it reminded him “that what we do today, tomorrow and across the next four years will help define the future opportunities of every Missouri Child.

2005 was the second time in recent memory that the new first lady danced in the inaugural ball a few weeks before the birth of the first couple’s first child.  Matt and Melanie Blunt had their first child, Branch, in March.  In 1981, Christopher and Carolyn Bond’s son, Sam, was born two weeks after the inauguration.

Bob Holden’s inauguration in 2001 was a scrambled affair that saw the first early swearing-in, in many years. Supreme Court judge Ronnie White, the master of ceremonies, called for the swearing-in of Attorney General Jay Nixon right after the invocation.  The schedule called for the inaugurations of the lesser officials to take place AFTER remarks from former Senator Thomas Eagleton and after the introduction of platform guests.  After Eagleton spoke and the guests were introduced, the other inaugurations took place.

The event, which had started at 11;15 instead of the usual 11:30 saw the inauguration of lower-ranking statewide officials by 11:45.  Rather than wait 15 minutes for the traditional noon-time inauguration of the governor, the ceremonies went right on ahead.  Just as the church bell across the street rang once to signal it was 11:45, Governor Holden was sworn in.  Radio and television stations planning to join the ceremonies just in time for the noon inauguration of the governor found themselves switching to the Capitol after Holden was well into his address, or not switching at all.  The church bells did not strike 12 because it would have interrupted the speech.  In his press conference after the event, Holden explained that he decided to go ahead with the swearing-in because it was 27 degrees and people were getting cold.

The early swearing-in caught the flight of four F-15s from the St. Louis national guard unit unprepared.  The jets, which usually formed up west of Jefferson City and flew over the Capitol west to east were far from being ready when word went out that the swearing-in was taking place and the 19-gun salute was being fired.  The jets wound up flying over the Capitol, more or less on a north to south route with two jets together and two others straggling behind, well out of formation.

The parties ended at 11;30 that night with fireworks over the Missouri River.  The explosions caught many Jefferson Citians unawares and awakened several.  Dozens of 9-1-1 calls were made.  One woman said she thought somebody was trying to break into her basement and called police.

The first Carnahan inauguration, in 1993, first brought the festival atmosphere which existed in and around the Capitol for the rest of the day after the ceremonies. Carnahan was sworn in using an old family Bible used by his great grandfather, a circuit-riding Methodist minister.  At one time there was a hole in the back cover.  Family tradition held that the hole was worn by the saddle horn of his great grandfather’s saddle.  A new cover was put on the Bible in later years that replaced that worn one. He did not wear a top hat–which is kind of an on-again-off-again tradition for these events.  Some people wear them; some don’t.  In 1989, when he was sworn in for his second term as treasurer, Carnahan wore a beaver topper with a long and distinguished history.  But he told us before the inauguration in ’93 that he reviewed the tapes of that event and saw he was about the only person who wore the traditional hat for the ceremony.  Others who had them either left them indoors or carried them. So he decided in 1993 to leave the hat off.  It belonged to his father, former Congressman A.S. J. Carnahan, who served in Congress for 14 years and was the first United States Ambassador to the African country of Sierra Leone, appointed by President Kennedy.

But his father was not the first owner of that distinguished hat.  It originally belonged to Congressman John B. Sullivan of St. Louis, whose wife Leonore became the elder Carnahan’s  successor in Congress and served with great distinction for many years.

Some might find a bit of irony in the telling of that story, we suppose.  Anyway, the hat stayed in the box in 1993.

But—

In 1997, Carnahan wore the beaver top hat—a little bit. He only wore it for the trip from the Mansion to the Capitol.  The ceremony was held in the rotunda because of the cold weather.

—As long as we’re speaking of top hats, here’s a little top hat history for you.  In 1969, when John Danforth was sworn in as Attorney General, he was the only one of the state officers who did not wear one.

Thomas Eagleton wore one that day although he refused to wear such a thing in earlier ceremonies.  He had complained that all during his military service his hats had been either too large or too small and he had refused to wear any hats since.

In 1961, when Harry Truman attended John Dalton’s inauguration, he refused to wear a top hat in the parade.  He wore his customary felt hat instead.

One highlight of the 1989 inauguration was the opening of the huge bronze doors on the south front of the Capitol.  The doors had been closed for many years.  They had been opened only for very special occasions for about 40 years.  The state had paid $122,000 to repair and restore the doors.  The hinges and frames were rebuilt and the finish to the doors was restored.  The doors weigh 7,200 pounds, stand more than 18 feet tall and are 12-feet wide. It takes seven minutes to get the things open.  The doors are divided into four panels.  the second and third panels–the center panels–fold inward toward the Capitol and lock against the first and fourth panels, which also fold inward to provide a panoramic view up the 30-foot wide grand stairway to the third, or legislative, floor of the building.   At the time the doors were installed, they were called the largest bronze doors cast since the days of Ancient Rome.

The bronze doors have been restored to their original appearance and the mechanisms have been repaired just in time for this inauguration.

The 1985 and 1989 inaugurations of John Ashcroft included prayers from his father, an Assembly of God minister.   Ashcroft, following his faith, did not dance at his inaugural balls. Each time he played the state song, “The Missouri Waltz,” on a piano in the rotunda.

In 1985, new Governor John Ashcroft made some headlines on his inauguration day when he did not dance at the traditional ball because of his Pentacostal background that discourages drinking, smoking, gambling, and dancing. Instead, he played a piano, accompanied by famous New Orleans trumpet player al Hirt, and the St. Louis Cardinals most famous harmonica player, Stan Musial. He did a similar thing for his 1989 inaugural.

In 1985, Former Governor Hearnes did not attend the ceremonies, saying he had not been invited far enough in advance.  Supreme Court Judge Warren Welliver refused to attend, showing his disappointment that an associate justice of the court was swearing in Governor Bond instead of the Chief Justice.  The Associate Justice that day was Albert Rendlen, former Republican Party chairman (Welliver was a Democrat), who later became a Chief Justice.  While he held that office, he swore in John Ashcroft for his first term.  Ashcroft was sworn in for his second term by Judge Edward Robertson, his former aide that he had shortly before appointed to the supreme court.  Robertson, who became the Chief Justice and is now in private practice, did not not swear in Governor Carnahan.  In fact, most members of the Supreme Court were absent from involvement in the 1993 ceremonies.  All of them were Ashcroft appointees.

It is not mandatory that the Chief Justice swear in the Governor.  Circuit Judge Sam Blair swore in his brother, James T. Blair, in 1957.  In 1881, Governor Thomas Crittenden was sworn in by the outgoing Lieutenant Governor, Henry Brockmeyer, because members of the Supreme Court didn’t show up for the ceremony until Crittenden was giving his inaugural address.                                                  —–

In 1981, an empty chair was placed on the inaugural platform next to Kenneth Rothman, who became Lieutenant Governor that day.  Rothman had it placed there as a memorial to his father, who had died the year before.

In 1977, when Joseph Teasdale was sworn in on a bitterly cold day, Senator Thomas Eagleton was sitting on the platform next to Senator Danforth.  He was so wrapped up in a shawl that Sally Danforth had given him when she went inside to get warm that a University of Missouri reporting program reporter mis-identified him as Senator Danforth’s wife.  The wind chill factor that day was 25 to 40-below, so you know why he was wrapped up so tightly.    The ceremony started in two-below-zero temperatures, (the high for the day was plus 3),  Nine inches of snow had fallen overnight, causing the cancellation of the inaugural parade.  Despite abysmal conditions—the pianist suffered frostbite on all of  her fingers–Teasdale decided to have the ceremony outside because of the large number of people who had come to Jefferson City–especially from his home town of Kansas City–to see him sworn in.   Many, if not the majority, of them stayed inside the Capitol, however, while the new governor earned for himself the nickname “Freezedale” from uncharitable critics, especially those who endured his event outdoors.Incoming Lt. Governor Ken Rothman reported later that Teasdale leaned over to him and said, “This must be my first mistake.” Senator Thomas Eagleton remarked later, “My feet damn near fell off.”

In his ten-minute speech, Teasdale said it was God’s will that he be elected governor, prompting State Treasurer Jim Spainhower—who would unsuccessfully challenge Teasdale in the 1980 primary—to tell a friend, “Don’t trust politicians with messianic complexes.” Spainhower was a minister of the Christian Church/Disciples of Christ.

The President Pro Tem of the Senate usually is the presiding officer, master of ceremonies, of the event—except in 1965 when the Speaker of the House presided.  That was the first inauguration of Warren Hearnes, who had run against the so-called “establishment” that ran the Democratic Party, and had defeated Lieutenant Governor Hillary Bush.  Former Senate leader Albert Spradling, Jr., recalled for the State Historical Society that Hearnes tried to gain control of the Senate but conservative senators stopped him by electing John W. Joynt of St.  Louis as the Pro-Tem.  Hearnes recalled in a similar interview that he had tried to get one of his campaign supporters, Senator Earl Blackwell of Hillsboro, elected President Pro Tem although Blackwell had been in the Senate only two years at the time.  The veteran senators also rejected Hearnes’ efforts to compromise by having Blackwell named Chairman of the Judiciary Committee. The resentment caused by Hearnes’ tactics—before he was even Governor—so antagonized Joynt that  he refused to preside over Hearnes’ inauguration a few days later, leaving the job to Speaker of the House Thomas Graham.

Timing of the events leading to the noon inauguration was a problem, too, in 1965, during the first Hearnes inauguration.  Speaker Tom Graham, about whom we referred earlier, recalled in an oral history interview for the State Historical Society that all of the scheduled events leading to the governor’s inauguration had been finished ten minutes early.  He said, “I introduced everybody in sight.  I introduced Governor Dalton and his wife. I introduced my wife. I introduced the members of the House. I introduced the members of the Senate, and then I introduced the taxpayers.”  That killed enough time for the swearing-in of Hearnes to take place at high noon.

Thomas Eagleton figures in a couple of other odd moments on inauguration day.  On the way to the first Hearnes inaugural in 1965, Eagleton—who was to become Lieutenant Governor that day—was seen hitchhiking, dressed in formal attire.  The car being used to chauffer him around had run out of gas a number of blocks from the Jefferson City First Baptist Church, where an inaugural worship service was held in 1965.  Another was held there in 1969.  The Hearnes family was Baptist and Betty often sang in the church choir.

The year Eagleton was sworn in as Attorney General, 1961, the man administering the oath forgot it.  Former Judge Sam Blair, who had administered the oath to his brother Jim when Jim became governor in 1957, said he had sworn-in thousands of persons before, and the oath is really simple as can be.  But he said he suffered a complete mental block, which lasted about four seconds but seemed far longer and left Judge Sam a little shaken.

The 1961 inauguration as unusual in another respect.  The Lieutenant Governor was not sworn in with the other statewide officials.  Hillary Bush was inaugurated more than two hours later in the State Senate because the Lieutenant Governor is the President of the Senate.  He told the senators he respected the Senate tradition of “orderly and courteous procedure and the most searching examination into each and every law affecting our citizens.”  He promised to support “full and open debate,” saying “Good laws are not enacted after bearing only one side of a question. Minority views are just as important as the views of the majority. Sound debate often results in a decision acceptable to both sides and thus redounds to the benefit of the state”

However, several of Bush’s friends from Kansas City missed the event.  The passenger elevators were jammed by the large crowd, so a janitor agreed to let them use a freight elevator.  Fifteen to twenty people crowded in—and the elevator stopped about five feet from the third floor.   Several minutes of door-pounding and prying open the doors finally caught the attention of someone in the hallway who got on top of the elevator car and lowered a chair to the interior.  After about five people used the chair to get out, the car rose to the third floor and stopped normally.  But it was too late for those inside to witness the event.

The scariest inauguration might have been in 1913, when Elliott Major was sworn in.   The Capitol had burned in 1911 and a temporary Capitol was erected just east of the present building.  It was made of stucco, lath and wire.  One account says “it was jammed to suffocation and the structure groaned and creaked under the weight of the crowd.”  The building was still there when Frederick Gardner was to be inaugurated but officials were afraid to use it.  The situation led to the first outdoor inauguration four years later when the new Capitol remained unfinished enough for an indoor ceremony and nobody wanted to go back into the temporary building.

Things were a little straight-laced, compared to today, in 1913.  The inauguration committee issued an edict barring “ragging” at the ball, the playing of ragtime music.  modern dances such as the “bunny hop” or the “bear cat,” or the “turkey trot,” and  “all other of the 57 varieties of the terpsichorean art where swaying of the shoulders and other unnecessary movements” are made.

There were fears in 1881 that the inauguration of John S. Marmaduke might have to be delayed because he developed a severe nose bleed in St. Louis a few days earlier.   The New York Times reported (Jan 11, 1885) that three doctors worked to solve the problem by trying to keep him “perfectly quiet and free from all excitement.”  The newspaper reported the Marmaduke was at a St. Louis hotel “up in his room nursing his well proportioned nose, which has both nostrils solidly plugged up.”

Marmaduke was a bachelor and described in the article as “quite a ladies’ man.”  A few days earlier he had a date with the Widow Bernoudy and was her escort as she called upon several mutual friends.  During the outing he complained of a pain in the back of his head but she thought he just wanted sympathy.  After the calls, the pain in his head grew much worse and he was seized with intense bleeding. She called two doctors who took him to the hotel and spent the day and night before they finally stopped the bleeding.   He did recover in time to attend his inauguration.  However he died in pneumonia  in 1887 before the end of his term.

Governor Thomas Fletcher, chosen in the first election since the start of the Civil War,  took office about three months before the final collapse of the Confederacy calling for magnanimity and “forgetful of past differences, seek only to promote the general good of the people of whole commonwealth.”

He said in part: “Henceforth Missouri shall be an asylum for all nationalities and races and peoples; the repository of wealth, and a theater for the development of the labor and enterprise of the hand and spirit of Industry; and the home of free thought, free speech and a free press, where the prejudices of caste and class have no legal embodiment or political encouragement…Let it be announced that in the new era which has come, ours is to be the first of States, with the largest freedom and the widest charities…Where a free people…guards the right of permitting the position and privileges of every man to be such as his virtues, talents, education, patriotism, enterprise, industry, courage or achievements may confer upon him.”

In 1857, Trusten Polk was being inaugurated when it was discovered there did not seem to be a Bible anyplace in the Capitol.  The ceremony was delayed for several minutes while an intense search was done.  A Bible was finally located, several blocks away, at the state penitentiary.

One newspaper said afterwards that Jefferson City would be a tremendous field for missionaries, noting, “”We fear that the work of legislation can never go on properly in a place where copies of the Good Book are so scarce, and that it will be necessary for other reasons than the high price of board, to fetch the Legislature to St. Louis where, goodness knows, there are plenty of Bibles, whether we govern our lives by the precepts contained therein or not.”

Inaugurations have not always been spectacular events.  When Missouri’s first state Governor, Alexander McNair, delivered his first message to the legislature in 1821, he did the entire thing—the swearing-in and the speaking—so quickly that a number of lawmakers in a nearby St. Charles pub missed the whole thing.  St. Charles was the temporary state capital then.   McNair refused requests to give his speech again.

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I was among those asked to keep a daily journal during the pandemic so that people of the next great pandemic would know how we survived the anxious pre-inoculation months did it, the apprehensions we felt, the isolations we dealt with,  and the things we witnessed from a distance.

This is my lengthy entry for this day, four years ago. I offer it so we can recall the astonishing, abhorrent events and the reactions to them.

This recollection became more poignant when I read the reaction in 2021 of former President Jimmy Carter—-and the contempt for him by the man who will resume power in the White House in two weeks.

Although Donald Trump issued a statement of sympathy after Mr. Carter’s death, he cannot escape history recording that he once called Carter “the worst president” and when Joe Biden dropped out of the presidential race, Trump reacted in a way that surprised no one:

“Crooked Joe Biden is the worst president in the history of our country. He’s the most incompetent and he’s the most corrupt president in the history of our country. And it’s not even close. In fact, I said, today, the happiest person alive today is Jimmy Carter because his presidency looks brilliant. Brilliant by comparison.”

Historians, on the other hand, who are not as self-absorbed as Mr. Trump, a few years ago ranked the worst presidents as James Buchanan, Andrew Johnson, and Donald Trump.

President Biden has asked that flags be flown at half-staff for a month in honor of Mr. Carter, not an unusual way to recognize the death of a past President—-and Trump has again shown his usual self-absorption and lack of class by complaining that the flags will be at half staff during his inauguration.

Jimmy Carter, a man who lived his faith in word and deed, is being disrespected by a man who borrowed a Bible for a photo op at a church across the street from the White House, someone who worships the putter on Sundays and who will never build a house for Habitat for Humanity.

Remember January 6, 2021? A newspaper article yesterday carried the headline that memories of it  are \fading. If we love our country, love it more than we love ourselves, we cannot let those events “fade” as the  inspiration behind them prepares to move back to the scene of the event. So I have decided today to recall what I—and others—wrote and thought that awful day, four years ago today, even as it unfolded. (I am omitting the pictures from the original entry.)

Wednesday, January 6, 2021

I begin this entry at 1:50 p.m. while watching something happen in Washington that neither I nor my citizen ancestors going back to the days of Washington, Jefferson, and even earlier founders could have imagined—thousands of supporters of our president, egged on by him in an hour-long tirade near the White House—have laid siege to the United States Capitol, interrupting the debate on certifying results of the Electoral College. I am watching FOX, the network that has been uncomfortably friendly with our president for years, as some demonstrators are trying to break through the doors into the House of Representatives.

Reporters just said law enforcement officers are guarding the doors with guns drawn, and another of the reports said moments ago that he’s been getting text messages from ambassadors saying this country would be highly critical of other countries if anything such as this happened there.

What we are seeing is appalling.  One observer calls it “a breakdown of the constitutional process.”  It’s the most significant incursion inside our Capitol since the British attack in 1814.  There is no doubt our president stoked this outrage and has been doing it for months, years. This morning, he and his children and other supporters had a rally near the White House.  His son, Donald Junior—who hopes to become the next national chairman of the Republican Party—told the crowd that their presence should tell mainline Republicans their day is past. “It should be a message to all Republicans who have not been willing to actually fight, the people who did nothing to stop the steal. This gathering should send a message to them: This isn’t their Republican Party anymore. This is Donald Trump’s Republican Party. We’re going to try and give our Republicans the kind of pride and boldness that they need to take back our country.”  Then his father ranted for about 90 minutes, speaking to a crowd he had been begging for several days to show up in Washington today.  He urged the protestors to go to the capitol.

They did and about an hour after Congress started the process and started dealing with the first protest—of the Arizona results the House and Senate suddenly adjourned.  When I saw that happen (on C-SPAN) I switched to CNN and then to FOX because I suspected there was trouble developing.

FOX reporters are as stunned as anybody on the other (less Trumpish) networks by what is unfolding in front of them. Others got into the hallways and office areas.

Protestors get into the capitol and are shown on video walking through Statuary Hall.

One reporter on Pennsylvania Avenue just reported things are becoming increasingly violent in the streets. Senators and Representatives are locked in their offices. The Vice-President, who was presiding over the joint session, has been evacuated.  The President apparently is in the oval office where he earlier sent a Tweet criticizing the VP for lacking courage to overturn the election results today.  That was after VP Pence told members of Congress he would not try to singlehandedly throw out electoral votes. He had sent a letter to all members of Congress saying, “It is my considered judgment that my oath to support and defend the Constitution constrains me from claiming unilateral authority to determine which electoral votes should be counted and which should not.”

A few minutes ago he tweeted, “Please support our Capitol Police and Law Enforcement. They are truly on the side of our country. Stay Peaceful!”

One senator just tweeted a picture of protestors in the Senate Chamber.

The Mayor of Washington has instituted a 6 p.m. curfew.

So far, Josh Hawley has been silent—and he’s one of those who lit this fire several days ago when he announced he would challenge the election results. He was later joined by a dozen others, and the president who “rallied” his supporters in Georgia Monday and who encouraged demonstrators this morning to march on the Capitol.

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, interviewed on FOX “cannot be sadder or more disappointed. This is not the American Way. I’m with capitol police; I’ve heard on the radio shots have been fired.”   (we later learned a woman had been shot, apparently while with the crowd trying to break into the House chamber.) “This is Un-American, what’s going on.” He called on Trump to make a statement.  The president sent out a Tweet shortly after that, about 2:15: “I am asking everyone at the U. S. Capitol to remain peaceful. No Violence! Remember WE are the Party of Law & Order—respect the Law and our great men and women in Blue. Thank you!”

About the same time, Brett Baier on FOX reported Speaker Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer had asked that the National Guard be deployed to clear the protestors.

2:30—FOX shows protestors breaking windows and climbing into the building.

Fox at 2:50 showed a photograph of a demonstrator sitting in the chair in Nancy Pelosi’s office.

The New York Times reported later that night that he’s from Arkansas, Matthew Rosenberg, who left a quarter on the desk and took a personalized envelope from the office. And he could be in very bad trouble. His Congressman, Steve Womack, tweeted about him, “I’m sickened to learn that the…actions were perpetrated by a constituent. It’s an embarrassment to the people of the Third District and does not reflect our values. He must be held accountable and face the fullest extent of the law. This isn’t the American or Arkansas way.”  And Arkansas Senator Jim Hendren tweeted “Don’t know this guy, but he needs to go to jail.”

Another photo shows a demonstrator sitting in the Senate President’s chair.

Haven’t seen an I-D of this creep yet.

(all Photos in this post are from Getty Images unless otherwise noted)

2:52—Pelosi and Shumer call on president to go on the air and call on protestors to leave.

2:55—DOD mobilizes troops.  A barrier will be set up around the capitol, crowd to be cleared out. And a tight lockdown will be put in place.

2:20—FOX reports at least one person has been shot.

2:20—senate secured and demonstrators are being pushed out of the second and third floors of the rotunda.

3:05—President-elect Biden goes on the air.  He began, “At this hour, our democracy is under unprecedented assault, unlike anything we’ve seen in modern times. Let me be very clear: The scenes of chaos at the Capitol do not reflect the true America, do not represent who we are. I’m genuinely shocked and saddened that our nation, so long a beacon of hope and light for democracy, has come to such a dark moment. America’s about honor, decency, respect, tolerance. That’s who we are. That’s who we’ve always been.”

He demanded the president call on his supporters to end an “unprecedented assault” on democracy. “I call on President Trump to go on national television now to fulfill his oath and defend the Constitution and demand an end to this siege.”  He urged the protestors to end their occupation of the House and Senate and blamed today’s violence on Trumps refusal to accept defeat. “At their best, the words of a president can inspire. At their worst, they can incite…This is not dissent. It’s disorder. It’s chaos. It borders on sedition, and it must end now. I call on this mob to pull back and allow the work of democracy to go forward.” He finished, “President Trump, step up.”

A few minutes later the White House released a taped message from Trump encouraging people to go home—-but most of his 61-second message was a whine about the election:

“I know your pain, I know you’re hurt. We had an election that was stolen from us, it was a landslide election and everyone knows it, especially the other side.  But you have to go home now, we have to have peace. We have to have peace. We have to have law and order we have to respect our great people in law and order. We don’t want anybody hurt. It’s a very tough period of time. There’s never been a time like this where such a thing happened where they could take it away from all of us from me from you from our country. This was a fraudulent election. But we can’t play into the hands of these people. We have to have peace. So go home. We love you. You’re very special. You’ve seen what happens, you see the way others are treated that are so bad and so evil. I know how you feel. But go home and go home and peace.”

We love you. You’re very special. ??????  No condemnation, no criticism.  Whine and pat these domestic terrorists you have encouraged on the heads and tell them to go home.

3:40—FOX shows video of woman shot in the capitol. She’s reported critical at a hospital. This is the only reported shot fired and only reported person injured.

It’s dusk in Washington now and reporters and city officials are worried about what will happen tonight, despite the curfew.  The Mayor and metropolitan police have announced anybody on capitol grounds after 6 p.m. will be arrested.

4:15: Rep. Steve Scalise says he hopes to get the capitol open and continue the debates tonight. Some other members reportedly feel the same way but we haven’t heard from the Congressional leadership yet.

At some point in all of this, this afternoon, the networks proclaimed John Osoff had won the Georgia Senate election although the margin is so thin that a recount is likely. He’s 33 and will be the youngest member of the Senate although not the youngest person elected. That honor goes to Joseph Biden.

About 4:55 it was announced that police think the capitol is secure again.

About an hour ago, Hawley tweeted: Thank you to the brave law enforcement officials who have put their lives on the line. The violence must end, those who attacked police and broke the law must be prosecuted, and Congress must get back to work and finish its job.

He drew three quick responses:

Samuel George

Sir – you inflicted this by rejecting the vote of the people

Your name will always be associated with today. Cool legacy.

Alex Rozar

This was your doing.

Former President George W. Bush released a statement late this afternoon “A statement on the insurrection at the Capitol,” a pretty plainspoken comment.  It’s especially impactful because he has seldom spoken about things since leaving the White House—as past presidents traditionally have done.  But there’s no love lost between the Bush family and Trump.

“Laura and I are watching the scenes of mayhem unfolding at the seat of our Nation’s government in disbelief and dismay. It is a sickening and heartbreaking sight. This is how election results are disputed in a banana republic — not our democratic republic.

“I am appalled by the reckless behavior of some political leaders since the election and by the lack of respect shown today for our institutions, our traditions, and our law enforcement. The violent assault on the Capitol — and disruption of a Constitutionally-mandated meeting of Congress — was undertaken by people whose passions have been inflamed by falsehoods and false hopes.

“Insurrection could do grave damage to our Nation and reputation. In the United States of America, it is the fundamental responsibility of every patriotic citizen to support the rule of law. To those who are disappointed in the results of the election: Our country is more important than the politics of the moment. Let the officials elected by the people fulfill their duties and represent our voices in peace and safety.  “May God continue to bless the United States of America.” 

Former President Clinton: “Today we faced an unprecedented assault on our Capitol, our Constitution, and our country. The assault was fueled by more than four years of poison politics spreading deliberate misinformation, sowing distrust in our system, and pitting Americans against one another. The match was lit by Donald Trump and his most ardent enablers, including many in Congress, to overturn the results of an election he lost.”

Former President Obama: “History will rightly remember today’s violence at the Capitol, incited by a sitting president who has continued to baselessly lie about the outcome of a lawful election, as a moment of great dishonor and shame for our nation. But we’d be kidding ourselves if we treated it as a total surprise. Right now, Republican leaders have a choice made clear in the desecrated chambers of democracy. They can continue down this road and keep stoking the raging fires. Or they can choose reality and take the first steps toward extinguishing the flames. They can choose America.

“I’ve been heartened to see many members of the President’s party speak up forcefully today. Their voices add to the examples of Republican state and local election officials in states like Georgia who’ve refused to be intimidated and have discharged their duties honorably. We need more leaders like these — right now and in the days, weeks, and months ahead as President-Elect Biden works to restore a common purpose to our politics. It’s up to all of us as Americans, regardless of party, to support him in that goal.”

Jimmy Carter: “This is a national tragedy and is not who we are as a nation. Having observed elections in troubled democracies worldwide, I know that we the people can unite to walk back from this precipice to peacefully uphold the laws of our nation, and we must. We join our fellow citizens in praying for a peaceful resolution so our nation can heal and complete the transfer of power as we have for more than two centuries.”

Twitter has shut down our president’s access for 12 hours because of a message he put out this afternoon.  Facebook took down his “We love you” video and has banned him for 24 hours.

The Kansas City Star tomorrow morning:

“No one other than President Donald Trump himself is more responsible for Wednesday’s coup attempt at the U.S. Capitol than one Joshua David Hawley, the 41-year old junior senator from Missouri, who put out a fundraising appeal while the siege was underway.  

“This, Sen. Hawley, is what law-breaking and destruction look like. This is what mobs do. This is not a protest, but a riot. One woman was shot and has died, The Washington Post reported, while lawmakers were sheltering in place.

“No longer can it be asked, as George Will did recently of Hawley, “Has there ever been such a high ration of ambition to accomplishment?” Hawley’s actions in the last week had such impact that he deserves an impressive share of the blame for the blood that’s been shed.

“Hawley was first to say that he would oppose the certification of Joe Biden’s Electoral College win. That action, motivated by ambition, set off much that followed — the rush of his fellow presidential aspirant Texas Sen. Ted Cruz and other members of the Sedition Caucus to put a show of loyalty to the president above all else.

“After mayhem broke out, Hawley put out this uncharacteristically brief statement: “Thank you to the brave law enforcement officials who have put their lives on the line. The violence must end, those who attacked police and broke the law must be prosecuted, and Congress must get back to work and finish its job.” So modest, Senator, failing to note your key role in inspiring one of the most heartbreaking days in modern American history. We lost something precious on Wednesday, as condolence notes to our democracy from our friends around the world recognize.

“Among those Hawley got to emulate him was Kansas Sen. Roger Marshall, whose very first act as a member of the world’s greatest deliberative body was to sell out his country by attempting to overturn the outcome of a legitimate election.

“This revolt is the result, and if you didn’t know this is where we’ve been headed from the start, it’s because you didn’t want to know.”

“’The Frankenstein just tore down the doors to the palace,” U.S. Rep. Emanuel Cleaver, a Democrat from Missouri, told The Star. Which happened because, as he said, “One-third of the nation has bought into a bald-faced lie, and they are living in a fact-free America.’

“’I’m currently safe and sheltering in place while we wait to receive further instruction from Capitol Police,’ tweeted U.S. Rep. Sharice Davids, a Democrat from Kansas. ‘Today is a dark day for our country. It’s unacceptable that we have a President who has repeatedly condoned and even encouraged this despicable behavior. It must stop.’”

“We’ll say again what Davids is too polite to say: Trump did not manage this madness on his own. Far from it.

REPUBLICANS KNEW TRUMP’S FRAUD CLAIMS WERE BOGUS

“Just before the putsch began, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said sadly that we need to once again work from an agreed upon set of facts. Only now has he noticed that lying to the public on a daily basis poisons democracy.

“People have taken this too far,” House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy said on Fox News. Until he had to run for cover, McCarthy was fine with this sick stunt.

“U.S. Rep. Andy Barr, a Republican from Kentucky, said in a statement, ‘Today’s events at the U.S. Capitol are tragic, outrageous, and devastating. They are wholly inconsistent with the values of our constitutional Republic.’

“Yes, they are. But they are wholly consistent with Trump’s calls to overturn this election to address nonexistent fraud. And they are wholly predictable, given the willingness of most Republicans to repeat these baseless claims.

“When we wrote that Hawley’s actions were dangerous — and that those of Missouri Sen. Roy Blunt and others were too, in their pretending for far too long that the election wasn’t over — some readers found that absurd. ‘Oh my goodness, how will democracy and our country survive?’ one reader wrote in sarcasm. ‘How will Biden possibly govern? The Star editorial board’s hysteria over nothing is approaching CNN levels.’

“No doubt plenty of Americans will see even this free-for-all in the temple of democracy as defensible. And those of you who have excused all of the brazen lawlessness of this administration can take a little bit of credit for these events, too. They couldn’t have done it without you.

“Hawley, Marshall and other Republicans who upheld Trump’s con about widespread fraud knew all along that his claims were bogus. Now that they’ve seen exactly where those lies have landed us, decency demands that they try to prevent further violence by making clear that Joe Biden did not win by cheating. Please, gentlemen, surprise us.”

(Hawley gestures to the demonstrators this morning as he goes into the Capitol.)

About 9:30 tonight the Senate defeated the challenge to Arizona’s electoral votes 6-93 as several of the original protesting Senators withdrew their support of the challenge after today’s actions.

A TV station in San Diego (KUSI) says it has confirmed the identity of the woman who was shot to death inside the capitol.  It says she’s Ashli Babbit, a USAF 14-year veteran who did four tours overseas. The French news agency, AFP, said tonight that Babbit tweeted yesterday about those going to Washington for the rally, “Nothing will stop us….they can try and try and try but the storm is here and it is descending upon DC in less than 24 hours….dark to light!”,

I had said right after the election that one of my greatest concerns was how much damage Trump could do before he left.  I’ve written a couple of pretty harsh blog pieces (the most recent one was Monday) about him.  I can’t say I was surprised by what happened today—I was surprised by the scope of the events but not that there was mob violence based on his encouragement of it. Now, with two weeks to go before he departs the White House, there are some concerns being voice in tonight’s news coverage about this deranged man with his finger on the nuclear trigger remaining in his job for those 14 days.

Tonight (it’s 10:15 p.m.) there’s talk about whether steps need to be taken under the 25th Amendment to remove him.  And there are reports of several resignations from his staff and possible resignations from his cabinet or high-level staff.  There are also a lot of questions being asked about how the mob could have penetrated the Capitol security.

I don’t think I would want to be in the White House tonight.  Our president must be in a rage that borders on insanity, not only because Pence hasn’t done his bidding and Congress not only won’t do his bidding and because some of his closest associates are on the verge of bailing out, but because he has no access to s social media, no way to rant and rave at an unprecedented level.

This has been one of those days that will be a “What were you doing when….” question is asked. It’s a landmark day in national memory much as the Kennedy assassinations and the King murder and the Moon landing, and the Twin Towers attack (and in Jefferson City’s case, the 2019 tornado). This one is so special because even the Kennedy and King assassinations didn’t leave people this shaken about the future of our republic.

It’s now after midnight.  The TV nets are reporting the streets of Washington are quiet.  The day’s toll, according to various reports:  Four dead—one shot to death by a police officer and three who had medical emergencies.  Fourteen police injured , two hospitalized, one critical.

The joint session re-convened. Two or three protests were offered but none had a Senator’s name on it—the first House member with one protest said the Senators had withdrawn their names. The count stopped with Pennsylvania when several House members and Senators Hawley and Cruz filed a protest.  The Senate dispatched with the Hawley-Cruz part of it 7-92.  The House is voting down the protest on its side of things but it’s time to call it a terrible day and go to bed.

While all of this has been going on, the common folks were dealing with the coronavirus.  MODOH reports yesterday’s positivity rate was 21.5% and hospitalizations just under 2800. Nationally, yesterday was the deadliest day in the pandemic.

MODOH was my shorthand for the Missouri Department of Health.

—A week later, I added to the journal the text of Trump’s remarks so that those a hundred years from now (I hope we don’t have another pandemic for at least that long) will understand how Trump encouraged those events and how stunning it was to watch them.

And how our then-junior Senator fanned the flames.

Jimmy Carter is dead and today the House and Senate will make the electoral college vote official with the same ceremony Trump tried to stop four years ago.

And the flags will be at half staff. Read into that circumstance what you wish.