2017—The Senate confirms a new Ambassador to the Czech Republic: ex-Wisconsin GOP chair Steve King. In 1972, on orders from her husband, CREEP chair John Mitchell, King tore Martha Mitchell’s phone from the wall and restrained her as she was forcibly injected with tranquilizers to keep her from talking to the press.
2010—“Fox and Friends” reports that Los Angeles has bought $1 billion worth of jet packs for its Police and Fire Departments. They cribbed the story from the Weekly World News.
2003—Timothy Treadwell and girlfriend Amie Huguenard discover the hard way that the grizzly bears they’ve been associating with in Alaska are not vegetarians.
2002—George W.[MD] Bush tells N.H. Guardsmen that Saddam could inflict “massive and sudden horror” on the U.S. It’s not true.
2001—Robert Stevens, photo editor of the supermarket tabloid The Sun, dies of anthrax. The terrorist who infected him remains at large.
1988—In a Vice-Presidential debate, Lloyd Bbentsen informs Dan Quayle he’s “no Jack Kennedy.”
1986—Nicaraguans shoot down a U.S. plane illegally supplying Contras with arms bought with the proceeds of illegal U.S. arms sales to Iran.
1971—Prescient advisor Pat Buchanan tells statesman Richard Nixon, “If we tear the country in half, we can pick up the bigger half.” They do. It works.