The big news today is, of course, President Trump putting the screws to Georgia election officials in an effort to overturn his massive, huge, embarrassing loss to Sleepy Joe Biden. As he may have finally committed a big-boy crime, that story assuredly deserves the headlines it’s receiving. But spare a moment for Ted Cruz, too. He deserves some attention for his most recent skullduggery.

Yesterday, the preternaturally icky Junior Senator from Texas wrote a letter for the full Sedition Caucus, suggesting that we resolve the “disputed” election of 2020, by creating a committee based on the one that drafted the Compromise of 1877. …

The Amazon blub about Kyle Smith’s 2004 novel “Love Monkey” reads:

“Many men aim high; Tom Farrell dares to be average. While his friends accumulate wedding rings, mortgages, and even, alarmingly, babies, Tom still lives alone in his rented apartment with nothing but condiments and alcohol in his refrigerator. He spends Saturday mornings watching cartoons and eating Cocoa Puffs out of an Empire Strikes Back bowl, and devotes the rest of the weekend to his other favorite hobbies: sports and girls. His credo, to think and act like a thirteen-year-old boy at all times, has worked well enough to land him a decent job writing headlines for the New York Tabloid. But neither his personal life nor his professional life has any forward momentum; he’s occupied the same cubicle since the first George Bush was president and is currently “between girlfriends.” …

Media reaction to Donald Trump challenging the recent election results seems, so far, to be one of annoyed bemusement with a touch of gathering anxiety. The recent moves by the President to replace the civilian leadership at the Pentagon with diehard partisan loyalists, and reports of some Republican state legislators considering sending an alternate slate to the Electoral College, should send a chill up every spine. Still, it is a reasonable bet that Joseph R. Biden will be sworn into office on January 20, 2021.

That, however, will not end the existential threat posed to American democracy by Republican attempts to delegitimize the will of the voters. Right now, in ways that are redolent of our darkest cultural history, Trump and his apparatchiks are sowing the seeds of calamity deep in the soil of their furious, white, reactionary, and well-armed base — and that is a reality that should sober us all. …

Since we seem to be sidling up to an attempted coup d’état by the current occupant of the White House, it might behoove us to remember the last time one was attempted in the history of the United States.

In 1934, a group of fascist American industrialists who hated FDR, progressives, liberals and Democrats attempted to recruit former Marine Corps Brigadier General Smedley Butler — a soldier’s soldier if ever there was — to lead an army of 500,000 veterans of WWI in a march on Washington where they would depose the elected government and declare martial law. …

What you see when you look at this picture likely says a lot about your mood as we round the corner into Election Week. This is an image, captured today on the Mario Cuomo Bridge, between Nyack and Tarrytown over the Hudson, about 25 miles north of the City. It’s a picture of a Trump Caravan, one of several around the country today, that decided the closing argument of the campaign should be making life unpleasant for their neighbors on a rainy afternoon.

Talk about lousy marketing.

What they WANT you to see when you look at this picture is a movement unafraid. They want you to see a manifestation of their power, and their commitment to the righteous MAGA-cause. They want you to tremble in fear. But, for the life of me, all I see is a bunch of angry idiots, standing in the rain. …

I was on a Zoom call today with some old friends. All of them are rational, thoughtful, engage, and more than a bit concerned. Maybe even scared. Definitely worried. Perhaps even somewhat freaked out.

So, probably a lot like your friends.

We talked about lost sleep and the intersecting anxieties of eight months under Covid, and — though we tried to avoid it — we talked about the upcoming election and how we’re not quite sure what happens to the world if the bastard manages to once again sneak through.

The conversation got me thinking about how we’re reacting under all this pressure. I’ve noticed — and you likely have, too — that in the rare situation when someone mentions something hopeful about the polling, or the national mood, there is an instinctive reaction to remind one another not to fall into the dangerous territory of positive thinking. We did that in 2016, and ended up ratfucked by the Russians, the Tangerine Tyrant, and a passel of third-rate conmen and criminals into the nightmare of these past four years. …

As we head for the back straightaway on this final lap of the election season, one question stands out for me above the others: What the hell is Donald Trump’s campaign all about?

Like, seriously, what’s the damn message?

I’m tempted to write tonight about the Scooby-Doo / Rudy Giuliani caper that exploded like a kid who ate too much applesauce all over the New York Post this morning, but there’s no reason to give that ham-fisted disinformation campaign any more oxygen. …

President Trump yesterday made yet another remarkable public statement about his experiences with the Covid-19. Aside from all the usual fluff about “the China Virus” and claiming that his becoming infected with Covid was “a blessing from God,” he made two salient, newsworthy points:

1. He declared the Regeneron antibody therapy he received to be “a cure” for this deadly, highly infectious disease.

2. He said that he was going to make it free for all Americans, stating, “I want everybody to be given the same treatment as the President,” and “I want to get to you what I got, and I’m gonna make it free. …