Mon, May 9

2017—D. Trump fires J. Comey. 1999—At the University of Chicago, two students competing in a scavenger hunt build a plutonium-producing reactor. They come in second. 1991—Bush aide John Sununu is told to quit using military planes to see his Boston dentist and ski in N.H. 1989—“What a waste it is to lose one’s mind,” says Veep Candidate Dan Quayle, addressing the Negro College Fund, “or not to have a mind is being very wasteful, how true that is.” 1980—The Summit Venture collapses Fla.’s Sunshine Skyway Bridge; a Greyhound on it plunges, killing 35. 1974—Congress finally begins to ponder impeaching Richard Nixon. 1971—Major General Carl C. …

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Sun, May 8

1979—Salvadoran police maintain order in a cathedral; 23 KIA, 70 WIA. 1970—With flags at half mast for Kent State kids shot by National Guardsmen, students protesting in NYC at Wall and Broad streets are attacked by 200 “hardhats” organized by AFL-CIO leader Peter Brennan. Nixon will make him Sec. of Labor. 1970—At the University of New Mexico, 11 people protesting the Vietnam War are bayoneted by National Guardsmen. 1967—Muhammed Ali is indicted for refusing to be inducted. 1964—Against Ike’s orders, Curtis LeMay sends a B-47 into Russian territory on a recon mission. It returns with extra holes thanks to a MiG-17. 1963—In Hue, Ngo Dinh …

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Strangely Predictable

The Union Leader* revealed on Sunday that its former publisher William Loeb sexually abused his daughter and his step-daughter. Ordinarily we try to avoid clichés, but this is a special occasion: yes, we are shocked, but no, we are not surprised. Readers under a certain age may not appreciate the magnitude of this revelation. In recent decades the statewide daily has been but a shadow of its former self. For more than thirty years, though, beginning in 1946, the Union Leader was New Hampshire’s Pravda and Bill Loeb was its Stalin. His vitriolic editorials ran on the front page, thundering against anyone who dared to …

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Virus? What Virus?

Well—we sure are glad that’s finally over. The Covid-19 pandemic, a once-in-a-century pain in the butt, has finally ended. Everyone is free to roam around, inhaling and exhaling at will. Within the next fortnight the acknowledged U.S. death toll is going to top one million, but never mind all that depressing stuff—it’s morning in America, again! At least, so it seems. New Hampshire closed its testing clinics in March, just as winter was beginning to let up. Portsmouth’s iconic brick sidewalks are clogged with tourists from all over hell and gone. Some of them fly here, spending hours in a metal tube, sharing the air, …

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