Volume 268 | No. 10

Mon, Jan 29

2002—Qassem Suleimani, Commander of the Quds Force—who had been considering a rapprochement between Iran and the U.S.—goes ballistic after George W.[MD] Bush’s “Axis of Evil” speech. Also: Bush asks Senate Majority Leader Daschle to limit investigations into 9/11. 1991—“Our forces in the Gulf will not stay there one day longer than is necessary,” says George Herbert [Hoover] Walker Bush. 1979—“I don’t like Mondays,” replies Brenda Spencer, 16, when asked why she shot eleven people, killing two, at a San Diego elementary school. 1976—The House, under Speaker Carl Albert [D–Okla.], votes to cover up the Pike Committee’s report on the crimes of U.S. intelligence agencies. 1925—The …

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Sunday, Jan 28

2008—In his last (yay!) State of the Union speech, George W.[MD] Bush promises his budget will keep the U.S. “on track for a surplus in 2012.” 2004—U.S. weapons inspector David Kay tells the Senate pre-war WMD intelligence was “almost all wrong.” 2003—In his State of the Union, George W.[MD] Bush lies about tubes, viruses, alliances, and uranium to justify his next war. 1998—Lawyer John Morton-Finney, son of a formerly-enslaved man, dies two years after retiring. He’s 108. 1986—Ronald Reagan’s State of the Union is rescheduled; his Challenger applause line turned into a tragedy. 1969—Unocal drillers using sub-standard pipe cause a 100,000-barrel oil spill off Santa …

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Don’t Be Reckless, Vote Fascist

To the Editor: If I were to write about Trump’s reckless personal life, tainted business history, draft-dodging, constant unchallenged lying, cheating donors, squishy liberal record and surrender to the establishment, it would be too much to publish. His past administration demonstrates a massive failure as a “conservative” Republican. If only five percent of Republicans who supported him in 2020 (before he engaged in questionable activities) refuse to vote for him in another general election, he can’t win. And from what I see, that is exactly what they’re saying they’ll do. We only need to look at the losses suffered at all levels since 2018 by …

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More Unsung American Heroes

by W.D. Ehrhart Back in 1970, after the Ohio National Guard murdered four college students at Kent State University, I set out to understand what had happened to me and my country in Vietnam.  In the process, I stumbled upon the history of my own country.  More than a half a century later, I’m still learning. I recently wrote an essay called “Unsung & Oversung Heroes” occasioned by a biography of Elizabeth Jennings titled America’s First Freedom Rider, in which I discussed significant Americans that history has largely forgotten or never recognized in the first place. And the very next book I happened to read, …

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Did Stock Buybacks Knock the Bolts Out of Boeing?

You’d think that Boeing would not compromise on safety, given that one small production error or software glitch could down a plane worth hundreds of millions of dollars while killing hundreds. But you’d be wrong. by Les Leopold On January 5th, a door plug blew out of the side of a Boeing 737 Max 9 plane flying for Alaska Airlines from Portland, Oregon, to Ontario, California. (A door plug is a section of the plane’s fuselage bolted in to take the place of an optional emergency exit. It is meant to be an integral part of the plane’s body.) Miraculously, during the twenty minutes it …

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