Debatable

Posted on October 17, 2026 by 34orion
An illustrated scene depicting Senator Susan Collins dressed regally, seated on a throne surrounded by bags labeled 'ROAD SALT', while addressing a crowd with a speech bubble saying, 'Let them eat rock salt.' The crowd appears frustrated, holding signs like 'GROCERY BILL' and 'MAINE'.

The news this week has not been the kind that allows for a good night’s sleep.

Elon Musk and the Great Pumpkin in the White House each denied responsibility for restrictions on the satellite services Ukraine relies on for its national defense. Each pointed at the other while Putin, one imagines, laughed like a Bond villain. All that was missing was the white cat.

Crude oil prices surged as two ships sank and others came under attack near the Strait of Hormuz. Meanwhile, the supposed Ukraine–Russia energy truce appeared to have all the substance of another one of Dementia Don’s hallucinations.

And in an episode that might impress his dictator friends, federal agents searched a sitting congresswoman’s home. California was given 48 hours to respond to a thumb drive supposedly containing the names of ineligible voters. Side note: A similar thumb drive provided to Pennsylvania contained 18,000 names; according to the review, not one was an illegal voter. All in service of a voter-fraud theory that has been disproved so many times it would be funny if it weren’t so pathetically sad.

I was desperate for a reason to laugh. Not because any of this is funny, but humor is my way of deflecting the sting of reality. Unexpectedly, I found it in this week’s political debates. Jon Stewart ought to have a field day on Monday. Meanwhile, some of my literary heroes—Mencken, Twain, Vonnegut, and P. J. O’Rourke—might have enjoyed themselves, too.

“It’s very important that you guys are able to hear from both of us tonight.”

On paper, that sounds like a nine-year-old complaining that his friends won’t stop talking.

The speaker was Dan Schwartz, the Democratic candidate for Maryland’s 1st Congressional District, debating Republican incumbent Andy Harris on October 13.

Harris had been asked about rising diesel prices and the Trump administration’s decision to ease sanctions on Russian diesel. He began explaining that the real culprit was Democratic environmental regulations.

The audience laughed. Not a polite chuckle, either. The sort of laughter that escapes when an explanation collides head-on with common sense.

Harris was not amused. Apparently, laughter required permission. He scolded the audience, invoked his First Amendment rights, and informed a woman that she was rude. Twice.

Schwartz, meanwhile, calmly reminded everyone that they needed to hear both candidates. Harris then assured the moderator that his own supporters weren’t interrupting anybody.

There was something wonderfully theatrical about a congressman invoking the First Amendment while lecturing his constituents for laughing at him.

To be fair, audiences should let candidates finish their answers. But the Constitution guarantees freedom of speech, not freedom from ridicule.

Across the country this past week, candidates for Congress, the Senate, and governorships gathered beneath unforgiving television lights to explain the inexplicable, defend the indefensible, and occasionally stumble into something genuinely funny.

Not necessarily jokes. Something better. Irony.

Consider Alaska.

During Thursday’s Senate debate, Republican incumbent Dan Sullivan noticed that his Democratic opponent, Mary Peltola, was consulting notes while answering questions. This apparently struck him as suspicious.

Sullivan asked whether the candidates had been given the questions in advance. The moderators assured him they had not. Peltola had a two-word explanation: “Just prepared.”

There is something deliciously American about a politician treating preparation as probable cause. In MAGA-world, apparently, you shoot first, gather the facts later, and regard the person who brought notes as a possible criminal mastermind.

Call me peculiar, but implying that your opponent cheated because she came prepared is a strange argument to make in what is, after all, a job interview.

In Maine, Democratic Senate candidate Troy Jackson had debated Republican incumbent Susan Collins over tariffs earlier this month.

Collins highlighted her success in getting Canadian road salt removed from the tariff list. Fair enough. Road salt matters in a Maine winter.

Jackson was unimpressed.

“We can’t eat road salt.”

True. It is useful on an icy road, less so between two slices of bread.

Then there was Massachusetts, where Senator Ed Markey debated Republican John Deaton, who emphasized his independence from party orthodoxy despite running on the Republican ticket.

Markey compared the arrangement to being a “carnivorous vegetarian.”

Somewhere, a MAGA political consultant is charging six figures to explain how that’s perfectly consistent.

Massachusetts, however, was hardly alone in its descent into political vaudeville. In Georgia, a gubernatorial debate managed to proceed without one of the gubernatorial candidates. In Arkansas, one candidate expressed relief at being physically situated between his opponents. And in New York, Governor Kathy Hochul discovered that her opponent had managed to secure the support of at least two Democrats. Democracy, it seems, was having a particularly entertaining week.

Georgia was the most literal. Republican Rick Jackson declined to attend the Atlanta Press Club debate, leaving Democrat Keisha Lance Bottoms beside an empty podium. It was the rare political contest in which one side was represented by office furniture, with no discernible loss of substance.

Then the moderator announced: “Mayor Bottoms, you may now ask a question to your opponent, represented by the empty podium.” She was allowed 30 seconds to ask it and another 30 to rebut the answer she imagined her absent opponent might have given.

I would have liked to hear the podium’s position on health care. Or education. As far as we know, it was the only participant that night to make no claims it couldn’t substantiate.

In Arkansas, Republican Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders and Libertarian Colt Shelby traded barbs about agriculture. Democrat Fred Love, stationed between them, offered a candid assessment: “I’m glad I’m between these two.” It was like being seated between feuding relatives at Thanksgiving, except nobody could pretend they needed to check on the turkey.

In New York, Republican Bruce Blakeman invoked New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani. Hochul replied: “Who Donald Trump actually thinks is a great mayor.” So much for guilt by association.

And in Illinois, Republican Darren Bailey discussed the prospect of the Chicago Bears moving to Indiana with Governor J. B. Pritzker. Bailey sounded quite certain the team was leaving. “It’s like you’re wishing for it,” Pritzker interjected. Rooting for a football team to leave your state is a curious strategy when you’re asking to govern it.

In all four states, the humor came from the same place: a politician’s grand story colliding with the inconvenient facts of the moment. Sometimes it was two endorsements. Sometimes an NFL franchise. And sometimes a lectern with a more disciplined communications strategy than the candidate who should have been standing behind it.

None of these remarks will reduce the national debt, lower grocery prices, end a war, improve the quality of congressional legislation, or help me sleep at night.

But a good laugh can expose a contradiction faster than a 40-page policy paper, three charts, and a panel of cable-news hosts shouting over one another.

I suspect Mencken, Twain, and Vonnegut would have enjoyed these exchanges. Nobody appreciated a puffed-up politician being deflated more than those three. They might have laughed all night. Then they’d have remembered that the people onstage are asking us to put them in charge.

We live in an age when politicians employ armies of consultants, pollsters, opposition researchers, and social-media specialists to construct the perfect message.

Yet the memorable moments come when the machinery breaks down and an actual human being says something unexpectedly simple.

Or when an audience begins laughing.

The most revealing political statements aren’t always the ones candidates rehearse for weeks. Sometimes they’re the ones that escape before anyone can stop them.

And sometimes the punchline comes from the audience.

Which brings us back to Maryland, where a congressman was offended that his constituents laughed at him, and his opponent politely asked them to listen.

Somewhere, Mencken is reaching for his notebook. Twain is lighting a cigar. And Vonnegut is shaking his head.

So it goes.

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MAGAnimity:

Posted on October 10, 2026 by 34orion

The Ninety-Dollar Bribe

Donald Trump tried to bribe me this week.

Not with a suitcase full of unmarked bills. That would have suggested a certain respect for the transaction. No, the president offered me ninety dollars. A one-time Medicare rebate, payable to some 20.8 million Americans, conveniently arriving less than a month before the midterm elections.

I was outraged, naturally. I have reached an age at which a man should be able to take offense at being purchased with his own money.

The money comes from the Medicare Improvement Fund, established by Congress to improve Medicare. The administration says that handing the money directly to beneficiaries is itself an improvement. (Tell that to the 2.6 million who lost health care under this admin.)  It is an argument with the elegance of a landlord insisting that repainting the lobby counts as fixing the elevator.

Some will object to my use of the word “bribe.” Mainly the ignorati, for whom a red hat has apparently become a substitute for critical thinking. Fair enough. Nobody has demanded a photograph of my Republican ballot in exchange for the payment. But even the ignorati ought to recognize that the timing is peculiar, and the president followed the announcement with an email to Medicare enrollees congratulating himself on his health-care achievements. It takes a practiced politician to put his name on a government benefit and then send the recipient the campaign literature.

The arithmetic is less charming. Ninety dollars multiplied by 20.8 million recipients comes to $1.872 billion. Nearly $1.9 billion in public money, extracted from a fund of a little over $2 billion. KFF says the payments will largely empty it. Should Medicare require those resources for actual improvements later, someone will have to find new money or abandon the improvements. The nation’s seniors get a check today; their children will get the invoice tomorrow.

And that is before the more immediate double whammy. The standard Medicare Part B premium is $202.90 a month, meaning my presidential benefactor has not even offered to buy half a month. KFF projects that annual premiums will rise by $79 in 2027. If that projection holds, the grand ninety-dollar gesture will leave eleven dollars after next year’s increase. Eleven dollars! Enough to purchase a heartfelt thank-you card, provided you do not insist on very fine stationery.

Yet none of this is what offended me most.

What offended me was the size of the bribe.

Ninety dollars? Really? I realize inflation has made everything more expensive, but it appears to have spared the price the White House places on an American citizen’s gratitude.

Consider what ninety dollars buys in the United States today. Four people going to the movies in New Jersey, where the average ticket is about $18.49, will spend nearly $74 merely getting through the door. That leaves sixteen dollars for popcorn and four drinks. Perhaps the children can share a straw and inhale the aroma of popcorn carried over from the next row.

Gasoline? At roughly $4.37 a gallon, filling a twenty-gallon tank consumes almost the entire presidential windfall. Drive an SUV with a twenty-five-gallon tank and the ninety dollars will not finish the job. You can either get home or celebrate your new prosperity by running the air conditioning. Choose wisely.

Then there is the electric bill. The average American household’s monthly bill is around $158. The ninety dollars won’t cover it. Meanwhile the data centers required to power our glorious AI future are helping drive demand higher, so machines can write increasingly convincing emails telling us to consume less electricity.

Ninety dollars will also buy a few bags of groceries, a mediocre dinner for two (if neither diner orders drinks and you split dessert) or a surprisingly short encounter with a plumber. The American dream is alive and well, though increasingly available only in trial-size packaging.

Normally I would not complain about free money. If somebody presses ninety dollars into my hand, I don’t lecture them on fiscal policy until after I have counted the money and put it in my pocket. But this isn’t free money. It is ours to begin with, and the president is offering to return a sliver of it as though he’d discovered a forgotten twenty in his tuxedo.

And what makes this ninety-dollar exercise in presidential generosity especially galling is how magnificently the people distributing it have been doing for themselves.

Forbes estimated Donald Trump’s personal fortune at $7 billion in September, about $2.7 billion more than when he won the 2024 election. His extended family’s combined wealth, including Jared Kushner, was estimated at roughly $10 billion in September 2025—nearly twice its pre-election level. Call that an increase of about $5 billion, give or take a yacht.

And Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick? Forbes estimated his family’s wealth at approximately $7.3 billion this September, more than double its level when he entered government. Using an early benchmark of roughly $3.5 billion, that is another $3.8 billion in estimated appreciation.

Now I know that valuations are not bank balances. Some of this wealth exists on paper; some is held in family trusts. And calling all of it illegal graft would require evidence a columnist cannot manufacture. But there are questions worth asking when fortunes swell alongside ventures in cryptocurrency and businesses whose prospects can be affected by the very government these men help run.

Add the roughly $5 billion increase in Trump’s family wealth to Lutnick’s roughly $3.8 billion. That gives us about $8.8 billion. Divide it among the 20.8 million people eligible for the Medicare payment, and each person gets approximately $423.

That is about 4.7 times the ninety-dollar presidential offering. And it would not require raiding the Medicare Improvement Fund. It would merely require our public servants, and the families around them, to part with the wealth that has accumulated while they served.

And no, before the Republican talking points arrive by overnight delivery, this isn’t socialism. It is merely suggesting that people who have profited so handsomely during their time in public service might consider financing their own generosity instead of sending the bill to the taxpayers.

I do not expect this to happen. The rich have always been eager to teach the poor the virtues of sacrifice, preferably by providing demonstrations the poor can perform themselves.

So I suppose I should be grateful. I have been offered ninety dollars, a presidential message, and a splendid demonstration of MAGAnimity. The public finances the generosity, the well-connected count their billions, and the rest of us are expected to applaud.

My vote is not for sale. But if you’re determined to insult me with an offer, at least make it enough to take the family to the movies.

And buy the popcorn.

Click here for a surprise coming attraction: https://bit.ly/4e1fRKu

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The Eighty-Year-Old President and AI

Posted on October 3, 2026 by 34orion

On Thursday night, I sat down to watch an interview with the eighty-year-old President.

It was a simple setting. Inside his official residence, the interviewer, dressed casually, sat in one chair, leaning slightly forward for the camera, while the President, also dressed casually, sat opposite him.

The interviewer was not awed by sitting in the presence of the great man. He asked pointed questions and demanded full answers when he felt the President did not respond fully or dipped too deeply into partisan politics. Remarkably, the President was not offended. He seemed to enjoy the back-and-forth and treated the reporter with respect and, occasionally, deference. He was articulate! He resisted the temptation to insult and demean. Moreover, he did not act his eighty years. He was vibrant and engaged. He spoke in full sentences and provided explanations and the reasons behind his vision for the country. Imagine that: an answer with a subject, a verb, and an actual point.

Moreover, the President seemed to want the interview to go on forever. He was enjoying himself. It seemed the only reason the interviewer ended the conversation was that he had run out of questions.

In the end, it was a tour de force by the President—one that left me impressed and, I admit, a little jealous.

Shocked? You shouldn’t be. Because if you have not figured it out by now, the President being interviewed was not Agent Orange…it was President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva—Lula of Brazil. Eight months older than Dementia Don, he is a force of nature who looks and acts thirty years younger than his nearly eighty-one years. Something he attributes to daily intense workouts, his sixty-year-old wife, Janja, and a sense of purpose. (Donny, please note: playing golf from a cart while surrounded by sycophants is not a workout; it is a moving cocktail party without the cocktails.)

Lula had a lot to say:

  • “Much money in few hands is poverty; little money in many hands is wealth.”
  • He said his commitment is to ensure that the bricklayer’s son gets a diploma and every Brazilian table has plentiful food—not to bankers who profit from misery.
  • He said money in the people’s hands is investment, not spending, and that those who have money should be taxed.

Let’s be honest. It is hard to argue with any of those statements. But it seems that tax-the-poor, feed-the-rich Donny and a good part of the Republican Party would say just the opposite—and then send out a fundraising email congratulating themselves for it.

He was especially strong on education.

  • “The country has no way out if we don’t invest in education.”
  • He said Brazil had 140 federal institutes when he took office in 2003, will end this year with 802, and that he wants to reach 1,000.
  • He said workers with university degrees rose from 4.8 million in 2003 to 25.5 million, and his goal is 60 to 70 million.
  • He said the housekeeper’s daughter will go to university to become a doctor, architect, or engineer, and that people who dislike him for it will keep disliking him.
  • On technology, he wants to train thousands of young people for the digital world and said Brazil will owe nothing to anyone in AI.

Wow. A president who brags about providing a good education so people can flourish, as opposed to one who brags about the monuments and buildings he is naming for himself. Talk about refreshing. One is talking about human capital; the other seems to have developed an edifice complex. Especially considering the talk in the United States about downplaying the need for a college education and arguing that the future of employment lies with plumbers and electricians.

Let’s be clear: college is not vocational school. It expands your knowledge base and provides you with critical-thinking skills that allow you to see the world with clear eyes and plot a map for the future.

And sure, AI is going to take a lot of jobs away from the workforce, but the only way to make sure there are future jobs is through education. And a college education that enriches bankers and sends students into permanent debt is not the way to do that. Perhaps, instead of fighting wars that you can’t win and that didn’t need to be fought to begin with, we should fund higher education instead. Less willy waving, more scholarships.

Let me put it another way. If we had funded college education instead of this endless war that has caused inflation and hardship for every American, over 1 million students could have received a college degree—something that would do more to ensure our future than the macho foreign policy of Pistola Pete and Private Bonespur. Apparently, textbooks are less photogenic than missiles.

And if you think that the Mad Tariffers’ policies have helped improve the United States’ standing in Brazil, Lula begs to differ. He said the tariffs cut trade with the U.S. by 9.7%—less money for the U.S. economy—which was more than made up for by increased trade with China by 20%, Indonesia and Germany by 15%, and Vietnam by 14%. In other words: you want to play, FAFO.

When asked about Trump specifically, he said he refused to be bullied just because the U.S. has the largest army in the world. He said Brazil demands to be respected, not demeaned, and if that means looking elsewhere for partners, fine. We love having the United States as a friend. As a bully, not so much. Turns out sovereign nations have caller ID. And nobody picks up a phone to be insulted.

So why am I nattering on about this?

First, it was refreshing to listen to a President of a republic talk more about the future of his country than about how wonderful he is and why he is the greatest thing since mankind first discovered toast.

Second, we in the United States often fall under the delusion that we are the only people in the world and that citizens of other countries will automatically accept what we have to say. As a country, we need to listen more and dictate less. Otherwise, we are going to lose friends and do irreparable damage to our economy and our standing in the world.

Exceptionalism means good listening skills and empathy far more than bullying.

And A.I.

Wow. Bet you didn’t think I was going there.

I listened to this entire interview live using my AirPods 5 in live translation mode, powered by Apple Intelligence. It is an exceptionally good use of AI, especially considering my many years of failed attempts to speak and understand Portuguese. Technology: 1. My language skills: still awaiting a recount.

It confirmed something I already knew: AI is an exceptionally useful tool. In fact, these days I couldn’t do what I do without it. Most of my day, every day, is spent running a couple of small internet start-ups. Without AI for prospecting, modeling, presentations, and creative work, I could not do what I do in the time I need it done—or without a staff that would outstrip my budget before lunch.

And when I write, it helps me—a notoriously bad proofreader—check for misspelled words, punctuation errors, and grammatical no-nos. There is irony in having AI clean up a paragraph warning about AI, but I have learned to live with it.

That said, AI, if allowed to proceed unchecked and unregulated, is a gigantic, potentially world-ending catastrophe. Don’t believe me? Sam Altman of OpenAI, Dario Amodei of Anthropic, Demis Hassabis of Google DeepMind, and Elon Musk have also backed the general call for slowing the race and adding regulation to the industry. When the people building the rocket start asking where the brakes are, perhaps we should pay attention.

I mean, they should know, right? O

But who doesn’t? Yeah, that guy. The one who uses AI to portray himself as Christ, the Pope, or a superhero. Apparently, artificial intelligence can generate almost anything except self-awareness.

Why? I mean, come on. What does Donald Trump love above all other things? Money. I heard a MAGA pundit arguing the other day that we should not regulate AI because it represents 3.1% of GDP. In other words, money—especially money in the hands of the moneyed elite—is far more important than the destruction of humanity. On the bright side, the quarterly numbers should look terrific right up until the apocalypse.

Sigh.

Here is a simple truth. No industry in the history of the world has volunteered to self-regulate. They would giddily poison people’s food, cause cancer, or destroy the environment in order to enrich themselves, regardless of the cost to the world. Corporate conscience tends to arrive shortly after the subpoena.

In other words, the Trump AI accord—a pinky promise committing their companies to stronger internal safety controls, independent audits, monitoring teams, and board-level oversight—is not worth the paper it was never printed on.

Don’t believe me? Trump said—this will blow your mind—“it was morally binding.” That’s right. He invoked morals as the governing law regulating AI. Apparently, we have reached the point where “trust us” from a man who has no moral compass is being marketed as an iron-clad regulatory framework.

God help us. This movie, as currently being directed, does not end well.

31 days.

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Shoot, Ready, Aim

Posted on September 30, 2026 by 34orion
Red baseball cap featuring the text 'Shoot, Ready, Aim' in white embroidery.

There are political mistakes, and then there is Senator Eric Schmitt of Missouri accusing a man of perjury because he apparently cannot tell the Atlanta Hawks from the Iowa Hawkeyes.

This would be funny if Schmitt were arguing with his brother-in-law over nachos at Buffalo Wild Wings.

He was not.

He was sitting on the Senate Judiciary Committee, questioning former Special Counsel Jack Smith under oath, armed with blown-up text messages, prosecutorial indignation and the unmistakable swagger of a man who believes he has just found the bloody glove.

(If the glove does not fit you must acquit.)

Schmitt asked Smith whether he had attended an Atlanta Hawks game on February 3, 2024.

Smith said no.

Schmitt pressed harder. He suggested Smith might want to think carefully because, according to Schmitt, he had text messages from Smith’s own team placing him at a Hawks game. The implication was considerably more serious than basketball. Schmitt appeared to be suggesting Smith had secretly been in Atlanta around the time Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis was prosecuting Donald Trump. He even raised the specter of perjury.

There was only one small problem.

Jack Smith wasn’t in Atlanta.

He was in Maryland.

At a women’s college basketball game being a good girl dad.

Watching Caitlin Clark and the Iowa Hawkeyes play the University of Maryland.

Hawks.

Hawkeyes.

Atlanta.

College Park.

Only about 650 miles, gender and an entire level of professional basketball separate them.

Senator Amy Klobuchar finally supplied the missing piece of detective work: perhaps, she suggested, somebody had confused the Hawkeyes with the Hawks.

And just like that, the Zapruder film became a basketball schedule.

But the revealing part wasn’t merely that Schmitt was wrong. Politicians are wrong every day. If error disqualified anyone from Congress, C-SPAN would be broadcasting an empty chamber.

What made the episode so perfectly MAGA was the method.

Most of us were taught ready, aim, fire.

Check the facts. Establish the target. Then pull the trigger.

The MAGA version too often operates as fire, ready, aim.

Launch the accusation first. Call somebody a liar, a criminal, a dirtbag or a traitor. Let cable television and social media do the distribution. Then, perhaps sometime before dessert, see whether the underlying facts actually support what you just said.

In Schmitt’s case, they didn’t.

The accusation came first. The certainty came second. Verification apparently never made it out of the locker room.

That is the MAGA playbook. Begin with the desired conclusion. Find a fragment that appears to support it. Strip away whatever context proves inconvenient. Add outrage. Add certainty. Add a few capital letters.

Schmitt didn’t cautiously ask whether Smith had been in Atlanta. He constructed a dramatic confrontation around the proposition. Perjury was invoked. Sinister connections were suggested. Smith had already been publicly called a “dirtbag” by Schmitt.

That word deserves a moment.

My definition of a dirtbag is not a career public servant who answers a question under oath and turns out to be telling the truth.

My definition is someone who, hunting for an “aha” moment, accuses a principled public servant of perjury without first bothering to establish the facts.

That seems a considerably better fit.

Then came the amplification.

Conservative commentator Benny Johnson declared that Schmitt had caught Smith committing perjury. Sean Hannity also celebrated the supposed revelation. The posts were subsequently deleted after the premise fell apart.

Fire.

Ready.

Aim.

That sequence has become one of the defining habits of the MAGA information ecosystem. Begin with the desired conclusion. Find a fragment that appears to support it. Strip away whatever context proves inconvenient. Add outrage. Add certainty. Add a few capital letters.

Then launch.

If the claim survives, wonderful.

If it doesn’t, quietly delete the post and move along to the next emergency.

Conspiracy theories no longer require particularly good conspiracies. They merely require a wisp of information—a text message, a photograph, a name, the word “Hawks”—plus enough ideological enthusiasm to spin the pieces together into conspiratorial cotton candy before anybody asks whether it is worth getting your hands sticky.

Here is the thing. If you have serious allegations, bring serious evidence. It is simple:

Ready.

Aim.

Then fire.

Don’t reverse the order because the accusation is more entertaining than the truth.

On this particular question, there isn’t much ideological fog to hide behind. Jack Smith said where he was. The evidence supported him. Schmitt’s accusation was wrong because he was so excited that he couldn’t contain himself.

Hmmm. There is medication for that. Its called “reading.”

We know who the dirt bags are now. We kinda already knew. The real question is how much longer are we going to put up with the MAGA playbook and when are we going to return to decorum, decency and the rule of law.

34 days.

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Kitten Karma

Posted on September 19, 2026 by 34orion

My wife and I have a mixed marriage.

But we were older when we got married. We weren’t planning to have children, so we didn’t think it would make a difference. Love, after all, is love.

You see, my wife is a cat person. And I am a dog guy.

You might well ask: How do we make it work? Well, it helps that we maintain two households. In New Jersey, where Rosie the Australian Cobberdog rules the roost, we are a dog family. And in Brazil, where, until recently, Romeow was emperor of the domain, we are cat people. I am not going to get into the difference between cat love and dog love. If you know, you know. And if you don’t know, it doesn’t matter. But love is love wherever it comes from.

Which is why the loss of Romeow in August was such a bitter blow. He was beloved, and his absence made our home feel hollow and empty. This was particularly tough on Elaine. Since I disappear from our home in Brazil for weeks at a time, the absence of a cat accentuated not only the home’s emptiness but also her mourning for our beloved Siamese king.

That is why we planned to strike back against the emptiness of our home when I returned to Brazil by adopting not one but two kittens. Two, not only because what is cuter than one kitten? Two. But also because, when Elaine is in the United States, they would have each other for company. Our first attempt at finding a cat through shelters failed. It seems pet adoption in Brazil has been taken over by Petinistas. (Think PETA, but with a Brazilian accent.) Despite the fact that we live in a comfortably sized home, surrounded by a decent amount of property and a twelve-foot-high wall, they required us to put netting over all balconies, walls, and windows so the cats would not leap to their deaths. No exceptions. Mandated house inspections.

Using the Brazilian equivalent of ‘fuck them and the horse they rode in on,’ Elaine put out the word to the BCAU (Brazilian Cat Adoption Underground), and we were quickly rewarded with two exceptional choices.

Jenny is a mostly cream-and-pale-gray tabby with soft orange patches and a white chest and belly. We were smitten. After a moderately expensive trip to Cobasi (PetSmart with a Brazilian accent), she joined our family and quickly became Daddy’s little girl, rolling over for a belly rub whenever I entered the room and using my keyboard as an observation post.

Our next choice was more difficult. Ursula, our contact in the BCAU, let us know about a litter of Siamese-adjacent kittens that were available on the outskirts of Rio. We could pick any of them. Therein lay the problem. All three were cute enough to make the cover of Kitten Quarterly magazine, so how do you make the decision? Elaine decided that we needed another female to ensure domestic tranquility, and the decision to adopt Sasha was made.

A room was prepared for her. More equipment was purchased, and we made the twenty-mile trip to pick her up. All the way back home, she complained bitterly about her separation from her siblings and mother. It was pitiful. It was heartbreaking. And we broke down. Within hours, Ursula appeared at our door with Sushi. (Name of the cat, not a dinner order.)

It has been a very long time since I have had kittens. Richard Nixon might have been president. I am a dog guy, remember. I had forgotten how absolutely adorable, blood-pressure-reducing, serotonin inducing, amusing, and delightful kittens can be. Much better for you than a vaporous martini and an easier way to reach that calm place than all the body-twisting in yoga.

I carried that sense of peace and joy with me as I traveled back to New Jersey. Well, as far as Miami. And if I am being completely honest, it was not just the kittens making me feel karmic. I had been out of the news cycle for the past three weeks. Nothing is more calming than not having to engage with whatever effluence the effluencer-in-chief is secreting that day.

What killed the kitten karma for me was the passenger boarding the plane just in front of me. He was a white man of a certain age, proudly wearing a red baseball cap with that phrase on it and a black T-shirt with an American flag topped by a rendition of Mount Rushmore, with the great deceiver’s visage included.

My first, and you might even say best, instinct was to grab him by the shoulders and shake him while yelling, ‘Are you fucking stupid?’

‘This guy promised you no more foreign wars, and then he starts a war with Venezuela that produced nothing, changed nothing, and one with Iran over an issue that had been settled. That has now made us strategically more vulnerable and costs us $2 billion a day in a war that can never be won?’

‘He promised you that he would make America more affordable again. Yet the consumer price index is up 5.5% since his inauguration. And are you enjoying paying 50% more for gasoline? And don’t say it. It is not a little price to pay for freedom, because freedom from nukes was never what this was about. Remember, he settled that problem months before.’

‘Speaking of wars, didn’t he promise to end the war in Ukraine before he even stepped back into the Oval Office? How is that going? And didn’t he say the same thing about Gaza? Are you sensing a pattern here? No? Let me help.’

‘Didn’t he say he would tariff the world so we would finally have fair trade, and that you wouldn’t pay for it because the tariffed countries would? Turns out, surprise, surprise, the tariffs were illegal, and now the U.S. government has to pay back $165 billion, which effectively means you paid for the tariffs twice: once through increased prices on goods you bought, and now when the Treasury has to pay back the money it illegally collected.’

‘And I probably should mention that we have turned the nicest neighbor a country has ever had, Canada, against us. The vindictive and ignorant tariffs the orange genius imposed have made Canada apply to the EU for associate membership. That means, in case you are wondering, less trade for the U.S., fewer jobs for American workers, and a trading bloc that can exert more power over us, all because the pouter-in-chief had his feelings hurt. He is literally the snowflake-in-chief.’

‘You probably don’t care that Trump and his family have increased their net worth by $6 billion since January 2025, but I do. I have the wild idea that a president should be working for the good of the people, not the bottom line of his net worth.’

‘Perhaps you think it is a good idea to have a Secretary of Defense who thinks competence comes with the color of your skin and gender, as opposed to merit and skill. I don’t. I want people manning the watchtower who know what they’re doing, as opposed to toeing a political agenda and ideology. Oh, and I want a person in charge of our defense who makes decisions based on facts, not gut instincts, and has the skill set to think before he acts.’

My mind was roaring.

I could have gone on. And perhaps I was on the verge of saying something, except being on the no-fly list is not conducive to a bicontinental marriage. But luckily, the line moved, and before I knew it, I was safely ensconced in seat 17D.

But I was steamed. Forty-eight days to the election. How am I going to be able to maintain equilibrium when roughly one in three citizens still approve of his performance in office?

Then it struck me. I opened my phone to pictures of Jenny, Sasha, and Sushi. Deep breath. In through the nose. Out through the mouth. Kitten karma.

I am not sure it will get me to Election Day, but it got me home.

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E Pluribus Unum

Posted on September 10, 2026 by 34orion

On Friday, September 14, 2001, President George W. Bush, dressed in a windbreaker and casual slacks, climbed onto the pile at Ground Zero. With a bullhorn in hand and his other hand on retired firefighter Bob Beckwith’s shoulder, he addressed the hundreds of volunteers who had been relentlessly sifting through rubble and debris for survivors. “I can hear you,” he said. “The rest of the world hears you. And the people who knocked these buildings down will hear all of us soon.”

We were angry. We were hurt. We were grieving.

He made us feel seen, heard, and understood. It didn’t heal the gaping wound. Not even close. But by acknowledging us, he was fulfilling one of the most fundamental roles of a head of state: healer-in-chief. He gave us a glimmer of hope that we would somehow make it through and that we would exact revenge on the bastards who had shattered our buildings and our world.

He didn’t blame his predecessor. He didn’t make it about himself. He didn’t turn the moment into an attack on Democrats. He was speaking to all of America, not to a single faction that likes to wear red hats and demean people because of whom they love, the god they worship, or how they identify.

After leaving the pile, he moved on to the Javits Center, where he met with family members of roughly 200 missing police officers and firefighters. He didn’t address them all at once. He didn’t invite the press. He met with them one-on-one and listened to their stories about their loved ones.

We didn’t hear what he said to those families. We never saw it. We didn’t have to. What he did spoke for itself. It helped us heal because we knew the person leading us was comforting those who needed it most.

Perhaps this is where I should point out that George W. Bush was never my guy. He was just a nepo-baby frat boy who had the great good fortune of birth. His flannel-shirt brand of supply-side economics—where a tax cut is a sacrament rather than a subtraction, and revenue forgone at the top supposedly trickles down through the strata like grace through a cathedral, arriving at last upon the head of the wage earner, who is assured that his own bill will come due in some other administration—was bullshit. And don’t even get me started on the two generational wars he launched.

But that day, he was our president, standing alongside us, and we were in it together.

For one terrible day, politics receded. He spoke to us as one country.

E pluribus unum.

Which raises the question: what would the current occupant of the bedazzled Oval Office do, given an equally horrifying set of circumstances?

We don’t need to look any further than his behavior on 9/11 for the answer.

On that day, he gave a phone interview to WWOR-TV. In it, he said he believed 25,000 to 35,000 people were dead, then quickly moved on to the news that his building at 40 Wall Street was now the tallest in lower Manhattan. It was a callous, self-serving interview. Don’t believe me? Listen for yourself: https://youtu.be/PcKlPhFIE7w

On subsequent occasions, he has claimed he sent construction workers to help with the recovery effort. The problem is that investigators have never been able to corroborate it. Richard Alles, an FDNY battalion chief who supervised operations there, said a crew of 100 Trump workers would have been operating under official supervision and “there would be a record of it.” He knew of no such crew. Others deeply involved in the construction and recovery operation likewise said they knew of no Trump-organized workforce.

Trump publicly pledged money to 9/11 relief, but investigators have found no record that he made a charitable donation in the aftermath of the attacks. Fifteen years later, while running for president, his foundation donated $100,000 to the 9/11 Museum. Yes—the Donald J. Trump Foundation, the same foundation that was later forced to dissolve in New York.

His most recent claim is that two firefighters carried him to safety when a building was in danger of collapsing. It was such an obvious lie that every major news outlet in the country was calling bullshit practically as it left his mouth.

And that isn’t even his most memorable lie about 9/11.

No. There is no credible evidence for his claim that he watched “thousands and thousands” of Muslims in Jersey City cheering on television as the World Trade Center collapsed.

None of these lies is particularly shocking, considering who we’re dealing with.

Trump lies as easily as the rest of us breathe. But the lies all serve the same purpose: to promote himself in some way, to make himself feel a little better about being the damaged person he is.

But that is not what really bothers me.

What makes my blood pressure soar, my pupils dilate, and spittle fly from my mouth when I speak is the stolen valor.

2,977 people died in the attacks that day, 2,753 of them at the World Trade Center.

403 first responders died trying to save them: 343 FDNY firefighters, 37 Port Authority police officers, and 23 NYPD officers.

Roughly 91,000 people gave up their time, their health, and pieces of their peace of mind to work at Ground Zero.

Since then:

  • More than 600 FDNY rescue and recovery workers have died of World Trade Center–related illnesses.
  • More than 12,000 FDNY members have been certified with at least one 9/11-related physical or mental condition; nearly 5,000 have had some form of cancer.
  • More than 9,000 people have died of 9/11-related causes.
  • The September 11 Victim Compensation Fund has recorded 5,892 responders, area residents, and workers who died of cancers attributed to the toxic air.
  • As of June 30, 2026, 145,275 responders and survivors were enrolled in the World Trade Center Health Program. An estimated 400,000 people were exposed to toxins in and around lower Manhattan.

All of these people sacrificed because of 9/11. They didn’t do it for money or fame. They did it because something deep in their souls told them they had to.

Donald Trump, who could have given more and done more than almost anyone else in the country, gave nothing. Then he spent the next twenty-five years helping himself to their courage. It’s the only kind he’s ever had.

We shouldn’t forget his cowardice and his puddle-deep character tomorrow. Or ever.

But tomorrow isn’t about him. Tomorrow we remember those who died that day, those who gave their lives searching for survivors and then for their fellow citizens’ remains, and all those who gave up something of themselves because of that day—and are still giving it up, twenty-five years on.

A moment of silence is not enough. Sixty seconds is free, and these people gave everything. Go out of your way to be kind tomorrow. Do something for someone who can’t pay you back. That’s what they did. There is no better tribute.

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What We Gave Away

Posted on September 9, 2026 by 34orion

Early on the morning of September 12, 2001, I went for a long run along the Greenway on New York’s Upper West Side.

This was not to clear my head after the events of the day before. Well, maybe a little. But its primary purpose was to continue my training for the Chicago Marathon, just three weeks away.

This was my first marathon, and despite the fact that I am built more like a weightlifter (thanks, Fran Farrell) than a runner, I was determined to do well. The year before, my father had been diagnosed with lymphoma, a disease that just a few years earlier might have been fatal, but medical research had created drugs that cured him. I was grateful. So grateful that I had joined Team in Training, a Leukemia and Lymphoma Society program that trained people to run marathons while they raised money from sponsors for the organization.

I had raised $15,000 to honor my dad, and I was determined to do well even though I had never told him I was running the marathon in his honor. He just thought I was going through some crazy midlife crisis. You may ask: Why didn’t I tell him? It was something he had taught me years before called tzedakah, the Jewish practice of giving anonymously so that neither the donor nor the recipient is obligated to the other.

I didn’t need anything further from him. Pop had given me enough. And keeping silent about why I was running the marathon—because of a lesson he had taught me as a child—was the best way I could think of honoring him.

It was a beautiful day. The sun was shining, and the Hudson glittered. If you had somehow slept through the previous day, you would have had no idea how profoundly the world had changed, except perhaps for the fact that there were fewer runners than usual.

But when you got to 57th Street, where the Greenway opens up to the south, you could see smoke rising from the pile. And when you hit Chelsea Piers at 23rd Street, you saw a line of ambulances parked bumper to bumper, stretching to where the path was blocked just below Canal Street. At the time, reality had not set in. We thought there might be a mass of survivors who had been miraculously saved, and the ambulances were a vivid symbol of our hope—and our denial of reality.

The hope those ambulances represented inspired me. I ran home, showered, and walked the few blocks over to the Red Cross offices at 66th and Amsterdam to donate a pint of blood for anyone who might have survived the attack. There I was greeted by a volunteer who told me that if I wanted to donate blood, I should go next door to Martin Luther King Jr. High School, where they were setting up a facility to handle mass donations. She also informed me that it would likely be hours before I could donate. So before joining the queue, I stopped at a magazine store (remember them?) and bought The New York Times, the Daily News, and the New York Post because, back then, our source of information and distraction didn’t have a ringtone.

At MLK, we were given a number and directed to the auditorium to wait until our number was called. I spent the next eight hours reading the ink off those papers. Tragedies teach us who our friends are, and what I remember most about the news that day was the support and solidarity the nations of the world offered us.

For example:

18 fellow NATO members—Belgium, Canada, Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Spain, Turkey and the United Kingdom—agreed that the attacks could constitute an attack on all of them under Article 5.

Russia, China, Japan, India, Pakistan, Israel and Iran were among the countries whose governments quickly condemned the attacks or expressed sympathy and support.

Canada also performed an extraordinary practical service on September 11 by taking diverted U.S.-bound aircraft and caring for tens of thousands of stranded passengers. (Later, they would send 146 relief workers to New York, and Canadian Mohawk and other ironworkers came south to help dismantle the wreckage.)

I haven’t forgotten what it felt like to know the world had our back—that they were with us because they knew we would stand with them. It felt good. It made me feel like we were not alone.

But it does make me wonder: If a terrorist incident of this magnitude happened today, would the world feel the same? I doubt it. The Screaming Meme, whose idea of diplomacy is telling other countries why they should kneel before us, has spent years treating goodwill like the credit card of a company that is about to declare bankruptcy—something to be emptied because it won’t be his problem for long. He has squandered a remarkable share of the goodwill our nation accumulated over 250 years. Diplomacy, after all, is not a protection racket with better stationery.

Think about it.

  • Do you think Iran would offer us any support whatsoever, other than perhaps sending a congratulatory fruit basket to the terrorists?
  • Would Denmark be able to find warm words of support after Agent Orange demanded Greenland as though it were the last property in a Monopoly game?
  • Is Italy likely to feel simpatico toward us after Agent Orange has told deliberate lies about its prime minister? Nothing says friendship quite like publicly inventing things about your friends.
  • What do you think Spain would say after Denteless Don threatened to cut off all trade with them? ‘Our thoughts and prayers are with the people who just threatened our economy’ doesn’t exactly roll off the tongue.
  • Don’t even get me started with Canada.

After all Agent Orange has said and done, can you imagine the world showing us the same generosity of spirit today that it did in 2001? You can only kick your friends in the shins only so many times before they don’t answer the phone.

But if you don’t believe me—or think I am cherry-picking the data, consider the following facts from Pew Research. Numbers, unlike politicians, have the annoying habit of remembering what happened:

  • In 2002, the United States was viewed favorably by a majority in 35 of the 42 countries surveyed—about 83% of the countries polled. America was especially well regarded in much of Europe, Africa, Japan, and the Philippines. Pew described the world as still having a significant “reserve of goodwill” toward the United States.
  • By 2026, Pew’s newest survey paints almost the reverse picture. Across 36 countries, the median favorable rating of the United States is just 37%, while 57% view it unfavorably. Pew says positive ratings are now at or near historic lows in countries including Canada, France, Germany, Italy, the Philippines, South Africa, South Korea, and the United Kingdom.

And here is the kicker: The U.S. is no longer the most popular country in the world. China is. That is not merely losing the room. That is setting fire to your house, after defunding the fire department, insulting the firefighters and wondering why your house burned to the ground.

On September 12, 2001, I sat in a high-school auditorium with hundreds of New Yorkers waiting to give blood that, as it turned out, almost no one would need. Outside, smoke rose from lower Manhattan. But I was comforted by the knowledge because around the world, friends—and even countries that were anything but friends—stood beside us.

That reservoir of goodwill was real, precious, and paid for over generations. We did not inherit it so one man could drain it to build generational wealth.

The tragedy is not simply that America is less loved today. It is that when the next terrible day comes, we may finally discover what all that orange swagger cost us: the empty space where our friends used to stand.

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Not America’s Mayor

Posted on September 7, 2026 by 34orion

On September 11, 2001, Rudy Giuliani was not America’s Mayor.

He was my mayor.

My city had just been attacked. Thousands of people were missing. Lower Manhattan was burning. Two buildings that had defined the New York skyline for most of my life were simply gone.

Nobody knew what was coming next.

And there was Rudy.

He was walking the streets. He was talking to reporters. He was answering questions when there really were no answers to give.

Most importantly, he seemed to understand what New Yorkers needed from our mayor that day.

He did not sugarcoat what had happened.

“The number of casualties will be more than any of us can bear ultimately.”

It was a brutal sentence. But it was an honest one.

And then he gave us something else.

“We’re going to rebuild…. The City of New York will be whole again.”

That mattered.

In those first terrible hours, when the entire world seemed to have tilted off its axis, Rudy Giuliani made us feel heard. He made us feel seen. He gave voice to our grief and, somehow, managed to reassure us that New York would survive.

He was our mayor.

America was watching, too.

Soon the rest of the country adopted him. The press called him “America’s Mayor.” He was universally praised, admired and, for a time, almost canonized. There was even talk of suspending New York’s term-limit rules so he could remain in office.

I understood it.

I felt it.

But twenty-five years later, I also understand something else.

The person we saw that day was an overproduced reality star. Not the real man.  

There were things about Rudy Giuliani we either did not know, did not understand or, in the fog of grief surrounding 9/11, simply were not prepared to examine.

And some of them should have mattered enormously.

Start with the decision to locate New York City’s Emergency Operations Center in 7 World Trade Center.

Think about that.

Eight years earlier, terrorists had detonated a bomb beneath the North Tower hoping to bring it down. Six people were killed and more than 1,000 injured.

The World Trade Center was not some theoretical target.

It had already been attacked.

Yet Giuliani’s administration placed the city’s emergency command center right there.

Apparently, once was not sufficient warning.

Worse, the city did not have a fully established backup command center ready to take over if the World Trade Center complex was attacked again.

As one 9/11 commissioner later asked:

“Why put it in one of the most likely places where people are going to come back and hit us again and where it could be knocked out and not help us save lives?”

Good question.

Then there were the radios.

The 1993 bombing had exposed serious problems with FDNY radio communications inside skyscrapers. In 1994, Giuliani’s first year as mayor, another report warned about those deficiencies.

Seven years passed.

Replacement radios did not reach firefighters until the spring of 2001. They were purchased through a noncompetitive procurement process, were inadequately tested in the configuration firefighters received and failed so badly that the FDNY withdrew them from service.

So on September 11, firefighters entered the World Trade Center carrying the old radios.

Communications failed.

Evacuation orders did not reach everyone.

Three hundred forty-three members of the FDNY died that day, leaving roughly 250 widows and more than 600 children without their fathers.

It would be unfair to claim that Giuliani personally caused those deaths. It is not unfair to ask why a problem his administration had known about for years remained unresolved when those firefighters needed reliable communications most.

But that was not a question many of us were asking on September 11.

I certainly wasn’t.

That day Rudy was my mayor.

And my mayor was standing in the street telling me that my city would survive.

Maybe that is why what came later feels so jarring.

Maya Angelou famously said, “When people show you who they are, believe them the first time.”

Perhaps Rudy had already shown us.

We just weren’t ready to see it.

Time has a way of clearing away the smoke.

And over the decades, another Rudy Giuliani emerged—or perhaps the same Rudy became easier to recognize.

There was Bernard Kerik, Giuliani’s longtime associate whom he enthusiastically recommended to become Secretary of Homeland Security before Kerik’s nomination collapsed amid ethics and financial scandals.

Apparently, vetting was optional.

There were the city security expenses associated with Giuliani’s travel while he was conducting an extramarital affair, expenses initially billed through obscure municipal agencies.

Nothing says romance quite like creative municipal accounting.

Then came Donald Trump.

As Trump’s lawyer, Giuliani helped conduct the pressure campaign seeking Ukrainian investigations of Joe and Hunter Biden that contributed to Trump’s first impeachment.

After the 2020 presidential election, he became one of the loudest promoters of the false claim that widespread fraud had stolen the election from Trump.

Two Georgia election workers, Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss, paid an extraordinary price for those lies. Giuliani falsely accused them of election fraud. A federal jury eventually awarded them $148 million.

Defamation, it turns out, can be expensive.

Giuliani subsequently filed for bankruptcy. The case was later dismissed amid criticism of his failure to provide required financial information.

In 2024, New York disbarred him for repeatedly and intentionally making false statements about the 2020 election.

Quite an ending for a man who built his national reputation prosecuting other people for dishonesty.

He was indicted in Georgia’s election-interference case, although those charges were ultimately dismissed without a finding of guilt.

He was indicted in Arizona over the alternate-elector effort, although that case was dismissed in 2026 without prejudice.

A former employee, Noelle Dunphy, has accused him of sexual assault, harassment and wage theft—allegations Giuliani denies and which have not been adjudicated.

Still wondering about America’s Mayor?

Consider what the New York Appellate Division said when it disbarred him.

The judges found that Giuliani’s “16 acts of falsehoods … were deliberate and constituted a transparent pattern of conduct intended and designed to deceive.”

They said he “told numerous lies in the numerous forums all designed to create distrust of the elective system of our country.”

They concluded that he had “baselessly attacked and undermined the integrity of this country’s electoral process.”

And they said he had “actively contributed to the national strife that has followed the 2020 presidential election, for which he is entirely unrepentant.”

Those words are difficult to reconcile with the man many of us thought we saw walking through lower Manhattan on September 11.

But maybe that is the point.

Al-Qaeda’s purpose on 9/11 was not simply to murder Americans. It wanted to provoke the United States, destabilize us and deepen the divisions within our society.

On that horrible day, Rudy Giuliani seemed to represent the opposite.

To me, he was the mayor telling frightened New Yorkers that we were still a city.

That we would bury our dead.

That we would rebuild.

That we would endure.

For a while, America looked at what we saw and gave him a title: America’s Mayor.

On September 11, 2026, Rudy Giuliani is the abject lesson in all that we have not learned from that day.

Twenty-five years ago, we watched him stand amid the wreckage and tell us that New York would survive. We believed him. More than that, we believed in him.

For a moment, he seemed to represent the best of us: resolve without bravado, grief without surrender, leadership when leadership mattered.

Time has revealed something very different.

The man who once seemed to embody our determination to come together would spend much of the next quarter-century helping pull us apart—spreading lies, attacking our institutions and feeding the distrust that now infects so much of American life.

Perhaps that is one of the lessons we should have learned from September 11.

Before we decide to give someone such a vainglorious title we should ask a few more questions and see what lies beyond the media hype and beneath the bronzer.

We should not confuse performance with character.

In our grief and horror we mistook the man we needed that day for the man he actually was.

Twenty-five years later, the smoke has long since cleared.

Perhaps next time we will let it clear before we start casting statues…or building triumphant arches.

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9/11 Plus 25

Posted on September 5, 2026 by 34orion

That morning, twenty-five years ago, began like so many others for me. I rose early, completed my morning ablutions, walked the dog, and was in a cab heading to my office at The Sporting News before 7 a.m.

You could not help but notice it was an extraordinarily beautiful day. The heat and humidity of summer had given way to clear blue skies and crisp, fall-like weather. The kind of day my mother would describe as “positively Swiss.” It was so beautiful that morning I hesitated before entering my building, wanting to savor it before putting my nose to the grindstone.

At 8:15, I was convinced the most exceptional thing that would happen that day was that my assistant had actually arrived early and kindly brought me my second cup of coffee. I thought it was going to be a good day—even when I heard an airplane flying low and fast over our heads. I casually remarked to her that the FAA didn’t take kindly to aircraft flying so low over the city.

That plane turned out to be the first, lined up with the neighboring Empire State Building and flying down Fifth Avenue at five hundred miles per hour. We learned the truth when someone came running into my office, shouting that the Towers were on fire. We ran to the southern windows of our 27th-floor office. From there, we watched in horror as the moments that changed us forever unfolded.

We saw the second plane hit, erupting in a burst of orange flame. We watched the first tower crumble, pancake, and collapse. And then the second. We had no way of knowing—or comprehending—what had just happened:

  • 246 people who had boarded their flights minutes before were killed when their planes were turned into missiles.
  • 2,606 people working at their desks lost their lives in clouds of flame and dust.
  • 343 firefighters ran into the Towers and never emerged.
  • 60 police officers disappeared into the buildings, never to be seen again.
  • 8 paramedics went to save lives and lost theirs instead.

I had no way of knowing that my childhood friend and neighbor, Todd Rancke—the first boy I met when I moved to Summit—was among the victims.

After making sure my staff had a plan to get home and had my address in case they couldn’t, I began my trek home. I remember seeing dust-covered people, heads down, no doubt in shock, mechanically moving uptown.

On Madison Avenue, cars were lined up bumper to bumper, yet there were no horns, no impatience—just the tramp of feet as pedestrians made their way home.

Crossing the park, I saw groups of people huddled around boomboxes, listening to grim news broadcasts. Overhead, unbelievably, fighter jets patrolled the skies. Warplanes. Over my city. At the Imagine mosaic, someone had already laid flowers. I thought of Lennon’s lyrics:

Imagine there’s no countries
It isn’t hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people
Living life in peace…

Never had those words felt so far away.

I withdrew money from an ATM, knowing cash could come in handy in a disaster. I shopped at an empty Fairway, worried that food supplies might run out. Then I went home, turned on CNN, and waited for the displaced and dispossessed to arrive. They came. They went. Together, we watched endless loops of the Towers crumbling.

I remember the frustration of trying to reach my parents. The collapse of the Towers had destroyed a major AT&T switching station, and cell lines were jammed. Only my BlackBerry worked. Hours later, when I finally got through, I will never forget the relief of being able to tell them I loved them.

The next morning, I rose early and went for a long run. I was training for the Chicago Marathon, just weeks away. Running south along the West Side Greenway, I could see smoke rising from the pile and a nearly mile-long line of ambulances waiting to help those who would never need help again. I felt I had to do something.

After finishing my run, I went to the American Red Cross headquarters near my home and waited sixteen hours to give blood that we hoped would be needed. When I emerged, the wind had shifted. The smell from Ground Zero now engulfed the city. It was unlike anything I had ever encountered—the smell of death, fire, and concrete dust. I wondered if this was the smell of hell.

That night, I didn’t lie awake thinking about lessons. I was simply grateful that most of those I loved were safe. But in the twenty-five years since, I have thought a lot about that day and what it taught me.

Some lessons were immediate:

  • Be grateful for everything. Every day is precious. Savor it.
  • Open your heart wider. Love more. Accept others for their gifts.
  • Prepare for the worst, hope for the best. And if the worst comes, still look for the best in people—even if they haven’t earned that trust.
  • My family—my wife, sister, brother, brother-in-law, nieces, and nephews—are my most precious gifts. I do what I can every day to make sure they know they are cherished.

But the most important lessons of that day seem to have faded. This is especially true in these MAGA days.

Over the next few days, leading up to the 25th anniversary of that awful day, I am going to publish a few articles about what we didn’t know then, what we should have learned, what we have forgotten, and how our current government has made us weaker and more susceptible to attack.

But for now, let me say this.

September 11 should have taught us that we are all in this together.

That we need to look out for our family, friends, and neighbors. And that means being woke when woke simply means treating people as they wish to be treated. Pronouns, sexual orientation, religion—these are personal matters that do not affect you, and no one should feel “less than” for being who they are.

When someone is homeless or mentally ill—or both—they should not be arrested or vilified. We have an obligation to help them up. Capitalism is as broken as communism if it creates a permanent underclass that cannot afford housing or food because wages have not kept pace with costs.

Everyone deserves to be treated with kindness and humanity. Even if they didn’t arrive in this country with the right paperwork.

If that day taught us anything, it is this: we do not get to choose the moments that define us, but we do get to choose how we show up for each other. Honor the dead by choosing well.

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Trump Canal

Posted on August 30, 2026 by 34orion

Let’s begin with the first problem, which is that Donald Trump appears to have gotten the history exactly backward.

What a surprise!

Lake Ontario is not named after the Canadian province of Ontario.

Ontario is named after Lake Ontario.

This is the sort of fact that can be discovered in roughly the amount of time it takes to type “Lake Ontario” into Google, assuming no one on the presidential staff was otherwise occupied renaming airports, battleships, writing laudatory Truth Social posts, or the next big lie.

The name Ontario was attached to the lake centuries before the Province of Ontario existed. It comes from an Indigenous word generally understood to mean something along the lines of “great lake,” “beautiful lake” or “sparkling water.” Ontario did not become a province until Canadian Confederation in 1867.

So Trump is essentially punishing Ontario by renaming the thing Ontario was named after.

That is not statesmanship. It is the geopolitical equivalent of getting mad at George Washington and demanding we rename the man because you don’t like Washington, D.C.

But the absurdity really blossoms with the proposed replacement: Lake America.

America.

The name America comes from Amerigo Vespucci, an itinerant Italian explorer who sailed around parts of the New World and never saw Lake Ontario, never saw Lake Erie, never saw Lake Michigan and, for all practical purposes, had about as much connection to the Great Lakes as Marco Polo had to the Garden State Parkway.

A German cartographer put Vespucci’s name on a map in 1507, and through one of history’s stranger branding exercises, half the Western Hemisphere eventually inherited it.

So the grand patriotic gesture here is to remove an ancient Indigenous name from a lake and replace it with the name of an Italian traveler who never came within hundreds of miles of the place.

You almost have to admire the efficiency. It manages to be historically ignorant, geographically nonsensical and culturally tone-deaf all at the same time.

And then there is the small nuisance called Canada.

Lake Ontario is an international body of water. Fifty one percent of it belongs to Canada, a sovereign country that is under no particular obligation to participate in whatever cartographic improv exercise is taking place in Washington.

The United States can call it Lake America. Canada can continue calling it Lake Ontario. Most of the planet will presumably continue calling it Lake Ontario because that is what it has been called for centuries and because adults generally do not rename major geographical features every time somebody gets cranky.

This is what makes the whole exercise so perfectly Trumpian.

Presidents have enormous powers. They can negotiate treaties. They can confront wars. They can reduce deficits. They can build infrastructure. They can reform immigration. They can try to make government work better.

Or they can sit around renaming lakes.

If the guy in the oval office really has developed a passion for improving the nomenclature of upstate New York, though, I have a suggestion.

A little farther west sits Love Canal, the infamous toxic waste site near Niagara Falls where more than 20,000 tons of hazardous chemicals were buried, eventually poisoning the surrounding neighborhood and turning the name into a national synonym for environmental catastrophe, government failure and industrial irresponsibility.

Now there is a place begging for a rebrand.

Forget Lake America.

Rename Love Canal.

Trump Canal.

It has history. It has toxicity. It has lawsuits. It has people desperately trying to get away from it.

And unlike Lake Ontario, the name would finally make a certain amount of sense.

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