Verbal Fireworks: It’s a subdued 4^th of July under pandemic and cancelled fireworks. The NY Timesreports that up to 80 percent of the fireworks displays in cities and towns have been called off because of the pandemic.

  Not so for President Trump, who travelled to Mt. Rushmore for a rally and a fireworks show yesterday as the US chalked up its largest single-day record with 57,497 confirmed new cases of the coronavirus. It’s the seventh record day high in nine days.

  You wouldn’t have known it at the Trump rally, where the White House pool reported that,  “The seats here are packed and the vast majority of the audience is unmasked.” 

  Backed by the towering figures of Mt. Rushmore and red white and blue bunting, Trump delivered a speech to inspire fear and loathing among his followers. He warned that, “In our schools, our newsrooms, even our corporate boardrooms, there is a new far-left fascism that demands absolute allegiance.”

  “Our nation is witnessing a merciless campaign to wipe out our history, defame our heroes, erase our values and indoctrinate our children,”  Trump said to the crowded amphitheater. “Angry mobs are trying to tear down statues of our founders, deface our most sacred memorials and unleash a wave of violent crime in our cities.”

  Among those sacred memorials are the long-standing statues of Confederate officers who rebelled against the US government and fought to preserve slavery. But Trump is taking their side in a moment of cultural turmoil. He announced plans to establish a “vast outdoor park that will feature the statues of the greatest Americans to ever live.”

  No doubt, he would be among them.

The Numbers: Trump barely mentioned the coronavirus pandemic in his Mt. Rushmore speech, but Kimberly Guilfoyle, the girlfriend of Trump’s son Don Jr. and a top fund-raising official for the re-election campaign, tested positive for the virus. She’s reported to have no symptoms, but she had to skip the Mt. Rushmore event.

  As of this this morning, there have been 2.8 million coronavirus cases in the US and 129,437 deaths.

Political Numbers: As evidenced by his Mt. Rushmore speech, Trump is beating the bushes to whip up his supporters, but he is dragging badly in the polls. The Real Clear Politics average of polls has Trump trailing Joe Biden nationally by nearly nine points.

  In a long article for Vanity Fair, Gabriel Sherman writes about Republican loyalty to Trump and how members of the House and Senate are worried about going down with the Trump ship. Sometime this summer, they may have to decide whether to stick with Trump or go out on their own. Sherman writes that, “A Republican strategist close to Mitch McConnell told me that Republicans have Labor Day penciled in as the deadline for Trump to have turned things around. After that, he’s on his own.”

Police Blotter: The interim police chief in Aurora, Colorado fired two cops who were in a photo reenacting the ultimately fatal arrest last summer of a 23-year-old black man, Elijah McClain. A third officer had already resigned and a fourth who received the photo and replied “ha ha” was also fired.

The Bulletin Board: — Turkey has begun a trial in which 20 Saudis are charged with the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi. Khashoggi’s body was carved up in Istanbul. Saudi Arabia has refused to allow extradition of the defendants. —  More than 750 advertisers are boycotting Facebook, trying force the social network to police hateful content. The advertisers so far are unimpressed with Facebook’s efforts to woo them back.

The Importance of Being Karen: A white couple in Michigan has been charged with felonious assault after a parking lot confrontation in which the woman pointed a gun at a black woman and her child. It’s all on video.

  Among other descriptions, the gun-toting woman was immediately labelled a “Karen,” the increasingly-popular term for privileged and clueless white women. You know the ones; “I’d like to speak to your manager.”

  The “Karen” label has been around for 15 or 20 years, but in the current atmosphere of national racial tensions, Karens have been revealing themselves asking black people why they are in the neighborhood in which they live, or calling the cops on a black birdwatcher. One woman was labelled a Karen for her video claiming that masks are not necessary during the pandemic. A California Karen is on video telling an Asian woman working out in a public park to “go back to whatever f—ing Asian country you belong in.” A new Jersey woman dubbed the “Permit Karen” called the cops demanding to know whether her black neighbors had a permit to build a patio.

  It’s enough to make you feel sorry for women whose real name is Karen.

Naming Rights: The Washington Redskins announced that after years of criticism and in the current atmosphere of righting racial wrongs, they will “undergo a thorough review of the team’s name.”

  Political analyst Jeff Greenfield tweeted, “Here’s how the ‘thorough review’ should go: ‘What’s our name again?’ ‘Redskins.’ ‘My God! No!’”

  The Cleveland Indians announced that they too are thinking about their name.

  Among suggested new names for the Redskins are the Washington Federals, the Monuments, and the Gridlocks.

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