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1999—The $328 million Climate Orbiter crashes on Mars because Lockheed forgot to use the metric system. 1998—The New York Fed bails out broke hedge fund LTCM, establishing a suicidal precedent. 1990—As Dan Quayle speaks at a $2,500-plate fundraiser in Portland, Ore., the Reverse Peristalsis Painters protest by vomiting red, white, and blue mashed potatoes. 1975—Already fired for spying on citizens, ex-CIA counterintelligence chief James Jesus Angleton testifies, “certain individual rights have to be sacrificed for the national security.” 1960—Alan Ginsberg, Peter Orlovsky, and LeRoi Jones meet in Manhattan with Fidel Castro. 1957—Nine Black students enter Little Rock High School, but are escorted out again by …

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2003—“A year from now,” Richard Perle says, “I’ll be very surprised if there is not some grand square in Baghdad that is named after President Bush.” 1987—Navy Reserve Capt. Timothy J. Dorsey shoots down a Navy plane during a training exercise. Its crew survives with injuries. Dorsey’s career is unscathed: daddy’s an Admiral. 1975—Disabled ’Nam vet Oliver Sipple deflects Sarah Jane Moore’s shot, saving President Gerald Ford. 1970—President Nixon requests more FBI spies for college campuses. 1959—Fire Commissioner Robert J. Quinn sounds the air-raid sirens to celebrate the White Sox’s pennant win. Many Chicagoans assume it’s war with the Russkies. 1950—Truman vetoes the McCarran Act, …

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2014—A spokesman for the Islamic State  calls U.S. Sec. of State John Kerry an “uncircumcised old geezer.” 2001—CIA chief George Tenet tells the V.P. his Iraq/al-Qaeda link appears to be fiction. Dick “Dick” Cheney continues to repeat it. 1989—The Chase Manhattan Bank accepts for deposit a check sent as a prank by Spy Magazine. Endorsed by “short-fingered vulgarian” Donald J. Trump, it’s for $0.13. 1983—Defending the diversity of his staff, Reagan’s Sec. of the Interior, James G. Watt boasts, “I have a Black, a woman, two Jews, and a cripple.” 1982—Edward Lee Howard, a CIA agent suspected of spying for the U.S.S.R., eludes FBI surveillance …

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2006—“The devil came here yesterday,” says Hugo Chavez at the UN, “and it smells of sulfur still today.” 2001—George W.[MD] Bush declares a War on a noun, viz., Terror, before a joint session of Congress, which somehow takes him seriously. 1968—A U.S. military spokesman in Saigon says Agent Orange has no harmful effects on human health. 1958—A deranged woman stabs Martin Luther King, Jr. while he’s autographing books in Harlem. 1945—Ex-Nazi, former SS member, and rocket scientist Werner von Braun begins working for the U.S. 1830—In Philadelphia, 38 free Blacks form the National Negro Convention to abolish slavery. 1797—The frigate Constitution is launched in Boston. …

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2014—Iraq War veteran Omar J. Gonzalez jumps the White House fence and runs into the East Room. 2001—George W.[MD] Bush tells CIA chief George Tenet to look for links between S. Hussein and al-Qaeda. Lacking credible evidence, he suggests Dick “Dick” Cheney as a source. 2001—The U.S. goes to war against Afghanistan—what could go wrong? 1991—Alpine tourists discover 5,300 year-old Ötzi the Iceman. 1980—After eight hours of fire, a missile silo in Arkansas explodes, hurling a nuclear weapon 600 feet. Somehow only one person is killed. 1964—The first gay rights demonstration is held at the Whitehall Army Induction Center in New York City. 1961—Betty and …

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2001—Five journalists receive letters laced with anthrax. Five people die, the perps remain unknown. 2001—Complying with a White House request, EPA head Christine Todd Whitman says it’s safe to breathe the air at “Ground Zero.” It isn’t. 1987—The N.Y. Times reports the FBI’s been spying on public library patrons. 1980—Cuban Arnoldo Tamayo becomes the first Black person in space, thanks to the Soviet Union. 1980—A dropped 30-pound socket wrench hits a Titan II missile fuel tank in Damascus, Ark. The tank springs a leak; the leaking fuel catches fire. 1975—The FBI catches “Tanya,” press baron Wm. Randolph Hearst’s bank-robbing granddaughter. 1970—RIP Jimi Hendrix. 1961—UN Secretary …

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