The Shooting Gallery: Seven people are dead, including the gunman, this time at a Walmart last night in Chesapeake, Virginia in the fifth mass shooting in the US in less than a week. The people killed at Club Q in Colorado Springs Saturday night are not even buried yet.

  Last night’s shooting occurred as shoppers were busy stocking up for Thanksgiving. Police responded quickly, but early reports say they did not fire any shots. The unidentified shooter was found dead after the gunfire was over.

  An angry Virginia State Sen. L. Louise Lucas said on CNN this morning, “I tell you for all the people who are saying that their hearts and prayers go out to these people, I don’t want to hear any more about that until they get serious about gun violence prevention.” She said, “I am sick and tired of legislators giving mouth service after we have these violent mass shootings and then doing nothing about it when they go back to the legislature.” 

Pandemia: Dr. Anthony Fauci in his last press conference as the nation’s public health physician said it’s unlikely there will be a repeat of last winter’s Covid resurgence when the Omicron variant swept the country.

  While being careful not to commit himself to a prediction, Fauci said the Biden  administration thinks the combination of infections and vaccinations had created “enough community protection that we’re not going to see a repeat of what we saw last year at this time.” 

   Public health authorities still say it’s not time to relax. An estimated 300 Americans a day are still dying of Covid and there’s waning interest in getting booster vaccinations.

  A new variant called XBB is also getting attention. Fauci said it appears to be good at evading the antibodies created by prior infection or vaccination. 

  As Fauci leaves, there’s a wave of hate messages on social media claiming he was involved in the creation of Covid and that he should be in jail.

  Public health authorities worry that, like the Covid virus, right wing conspiracy theories and claims about quack cures  will continue to circulate. In particular some conspiracy-minded occupants in corners of the web have been pushing the use of a drug called ivermectin, a treatment for parasitic infections, to fight Covid even though it has no effect on the disease.

Trump World: The Supreme Court on Tuesday declined to block the Treasury Department from turning over several years of Donald Trump’s tax returns to the House Ways and Means Committee, putting the documents in the hands of investigating Democrats before the Republicans put the lid on things in January.

  Chief Justice John Roberts had granted Trump a temporary stay until the full court considered the matter. Federal law allows Ways and Means Committee to request to see some people’s returns. Ways and Means Chairman Richard Neal subpoenaed Trump’s returns to determine whether he and his companies are obeying tax laws.

  Both the Treasury Department and Trump argued that Ways and Means had no legislative purpose to look at his taxes. Trump has fought for years to shield his tax returns.

Tweet That: With Twitter in chaos under new management, more than a third of the social media company’s top 100 advertisers have not used the platform in two weeks, The Washington Post reports. Among the missing are deep pocket advertisers like Jeep, Mars candy, Merck, Kellogg, Verizon and even Samuel Adams beer.

  Twitter was losing money even before Elon Musk  paid $44 billion to buy it. Musk is cutting costs at twitter so deeply that he’s refusing to pay travels bills run up under the previous ownership, The NY Times reports. The paper says he’s also looking at renegotiating deals with other outside vendors or just stiffing them.

Inside Baseball: Brown University is preparing to field the first woman player on a Division I baseball team when the season starts in February. Olivia Pichardo, a freshman from Queens, NY, was a walk-on who impressed the coaches in tryouts with her abilities at everything from infield to outfield and pitching.

  Pichardo is quoted in a university media release saying, “It’s kind of crazy to know that I’m living out my dream right now and my ideal college experience that I’ve always wanted, so that’s really cool.” 

The Spin Rack: The number of dead in the Indonesia earthquake has risen to 250. — A 53-year-old man who ran his SUV through the  front window of the  Apple store in Hingham, Mass., killing one person and injuring 19 on Monday, was charged yesterday with one count of  motor vehicle homicide and reckless driving.  Bradley Rein told police his foot got stuck in the accelerator. — A helicopter crash yesterday in Charlotte, NC, killed  WBTV meteorologist Jason Myers and the station’s pilot Chip Tayag. The cause is not known. — Grand Canyon National Park is changing the name of the popular  “Indian Garden” along the park’s Bright Angel Trail to “Havasupai Gardens.”

Below the Fold: In a recent interview with the online publication Semafor, Former CIA Director and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said he is often asked “who is the most dangerous person in the world?”

  Having served in those high offices under Donald Trump, Pompeo would have a long list of people to choose from; Vladimir Putin, Xi Jinping, Kim Jong Un, Muhammed bin Salman, Donald Trump, Elon Musk … Dave Chappelle. 

  But, answering his own question, Pompeo did not mention anyone with their finger on the internet or Twitter button. He said, “The most dangerous person in the world is Randi Weingarten. It’s not a close call.”

  For the uneducated, Weingarten is President of the American Federation of Teachers. Pompeo went on,  “If you ask, ‘Who’s the most likely to take this republic down?’ It would be the teacher’s unions, and the filth that they’re teaching our kids, and the fact that they don’t know math and reading or writing.” 

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