Barr the Door: In what is quickly becoming a post-election crisis of democracy, Attorney General William Barr authorized federal prosecutors to investigate “specific allegations” of voter fraud before the results of the presidential race are certified. As a result, the chief of the elections division resigned his post.

  It has been department policy to wait until the election is certified before digging into irregularities.

  Barr attempted to tread the line between the President’s claim of massive fraud and the reality that it didn’t happen. He warned that “specious, speculative, fanciful or far-fetched claims should not be a basis for initiating federal inquiries.”

  Earlier, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell toed the Trump line. Speaking on an empty Senate floor he said, “All legal ballots must be counted and illegal ballots must not be counted.” 

  This all came hours after Trump had fired his secretary of defense, which would have been the top story of the day replacing the real top story of the day.

  With a talent for stealing from his own good news — yesterday a major drug company announced a working coronavirus vaccine — President Trump abruptly fired Secretary of Defense Mark Esper.

   He did it via Twitter. At the tail end of a post announcing that the current Director of the National Counterterrorism Center will be the Acting Secretary of Defense, Trump tacked on, “Mark Esper has been terminated. I would like to thank him for his service.”

  Esper has been on the ropes with Trump since June when he publicly disagreed with the President about sending active duty troops to quell riots and protests.

  The firing causes more potential turmoil in the government just when President Trump is refusing to cooperate with a smooth transition to the presidency of Joe Biden.  A NY Times story says, “Defense Department officials have privately expressed worries that the president might initiate operations, whether overt or secret, again Iran or other adversaries during his waning days in office.”

The Buried Lede: The drug maker Pfizer announced yesterday that it has proven its coronavirus vaccine is 90 percent effective in preventing the disease that has killed 1.2 million people around the world.

  If that’s so, the Pfizer vaccine has roughly the same effectiveness as the measles vaccine. They’ve cited no safety concerns.

  The Dow Jones closed up 834 points on the news of the vaccine that could also have the secondary effect of reviving the world economy.

  President Trump immediately claimed he was the victim of a political conspiracy, tweeting, “The  @US_FDA and the Democrats didn’t want to have me get a Vaccine WIN, prior to the election, so instead it came out five days later – As I’ve said all along!”

 Getting the vaccine out there won’t be easy. It will have to be shipped at minus 102 degrees and recipients will need two shots 21 days apart.

The Long Count: As the vote count goes on, Georgia’s two Republican senators demanded for the state’s Republican secretary of state to resign. Senators David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler said in a joint statement calling for the resignation of Secretary of State, Brad Raffensperger that, “We believe when there are failures, they need to be called out — even when it’s in your own party.”

  As President Trump and his backers cry fraud, none of them have produced evidence of irregularities let alone anything big enough to change the outcome of the election.

  Trump is pressing his case by tweet. Yesterday he said, “Nevada is turning out to be a cesspool of Fake Votes,” and “Pennsylvania prevented us from watching much of the Ballot count. Unthinkable and illegal in this country.”

  Not true and not true.

  Meanwhile, the chief of police in tiny Marshall, Arkansas, north of Little Rock, has resigned after calling for the  “arrest every Democrat who has participated in this coup” and  that “We may have to shoot and kill many of the Communist B.L.M. and ANTIFA Democrat foot soldiers to accomplish this!!!””

Vrial News: Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Ben Carson has been diagnosed with the coronavirus. He is the third person to attend a post-election party last Tuesday night at the White House to come down with Covid-19.

  Carson told The Washington Post that he contracted the virus “probably somewhere, out there in the universe,” which is one of the truest statements to come out of the Trump administration in recent months.

  The attendees at Trump’s party were not wearing masks. Announcing his coronavirus task force yesterday, President-elect Joe Biden said, “There’s a need for bold action to fight this pandemic. We’re still facing a very dark winter.”

  He said, “It’s time to end the politicization of basic responsible public health steps like mask wearing and social distancing.” 

The Supremes: The Court hears arguments today on whether the Affordable Care Act, the healthcare law otherwise known as Obamacare, is constitutional. If they strike it down, about 20 million people lose their health insurance in the midst of the pandemic.  

Revisionist History: Historical research into Alexander Hamilton, a founder of the country and pop hero of the Broadway musical “Hamilton,” concludes that the man revered as one of the original abolitionists was a slave owner himself.

  Jessie Serfilippi, an historical interpreter at the Schuyler Mansion State Historic Site in Albany, NY, concluded after digging through letters and account books that, “Not only did Alexander Hamilton enslave people, but his involvement in the institution of slavery was essential to his identity, both personally and professionally.” 

  “It is vital,” she says in her research paper, “that the myth of Hamilton as ‘the Abolitionist Founding Father’ end.”

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