"Living inside a cocaine snow globe"; Greenland obsession intensifies; nazis.us points to dhs.gov; an AWFUL uprising; aerodynamic genital scandal
It's National Buttercrunch Day!
Pro-Greenland protesters mock Trump’s MAGA slogan with ‘Make America Go Away’ caps.
Subscriptions are free. There are no paywalls hiding stuff. Everything is visible to all levels of subscribers. That said, a paid subscription will help keep the lights on and, more importantly, keep the puppies and kitties in kibble and litter.
If you like what we’re doing but don’t want to go the paid subscription route, please consider donating a buck or two. Every little bit helps. In this case, it’s not a cliché, but the truth.
—Kevin G. Barkes
January 20 is the 20th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar; 345 days remain until the end of the year. As of this writing, 1,095 days remain in Trump’s term of office.
(Note: none of the links below are behind paywalls. They’re either on free sites or are gift articles. If you land on a page obscured by pop-ups asking for your email or showing a subscription offer, just look in the upper right corner of the pop-up for the close icon.)
Trump links Greenland threats to missing out on Nobel Prize. Denmark dispatched additional troops to Greenland on Monday as President Trump added a new dimension to his pursuit of the Danish island, telling Norway that he no longer needed to think “purely of peace” after being snubbed for the Nobel Peace Prize.
Trump’s letter to Norway should be the last straw. Donald Trump now genuinely lives in a different reality, one in which neither grammar nor history nor the normal rules of human interaction now affect him.
Europe weighs using trade ‘bazooka’ against the U.S. as Greenland crisis deepens.
How to understand Trump’s obsession with Greenland. Erratic though the president may sound, the Trumpian worldview is comprehensible.
The Wall Street Journal(!?): “For more than 75 years, the fondest dream of Russian strategy has been to divide Western Europe from the U.S. and break the NATO alliance. That is now a possibility as President Trump presses his campaign to capture Greenland no matter what the locals or its Denmark owner thinks.”
A year into his return, Trump wields executive power with few restraints.
Anonymous Floridian registers ‘NAZIS.US’ and redirects it to Homeland Security website — DHS tries and fails to block.
Who are the AWFULs? Trump hates them, so they’re doing something right. They’re affluent, white, female, urban liberals—and the murder of Renee Nicole Good will politicize millions of them.
Ski jumping rocked by ‘penis-gate’ claims. Some competitors in the winter sport are reportedly manipulating their genital size in order to gain an aerodynamic edge over their rivals.
Back-scratching bovine leads scientists to reassess intelligence of cows. Brown Swiss in Austria has been discovered using tools in different ways – something only ever seen in humans and chimpanzees.
Late Night:
Why is there a Late Night section? Because late night comedians, unfettered by institutional journalistic and corporate inhibitions, often provide observations and analysis that are more thorough and comprehensive than network or cable news. And the humor helps.
Trump’s bonkers message to Norway over Greenland; Nobel Committee’s response to Trump: A Closer Look-Seth Meyers (“I’m living inside a cocaine snow globe!” ) (Video)
Bookmark KGB Report Notes and check periodically for cartoons, memes, news, commentary and other stuff that didn’t fit or broke between e-mail newsletter issues. It’s also a great place to comment and chat.
Keep scrolling down. Lots of interesting stuff in Quote of the Day, Holidays, On This Day, Birthdays, and Deaths. I can pretty much guarantee you’ll learn something new.
History highlight:
2017 – The musical “Hamilton” premiered. (Video)
Quote of the day:
The simplest and most necessary truths are always the last believed.
--John Ruskin (Wikipedia link)
(More John Ruskin quotes from the KGB Quotations Database)
Today’s holidays:
Camcorder Day, International Day of Acceptance, National Buttercrunch Day, National Cheese Lovers Day, National Coffee Break Day, National Disc Jockey Day, Penguin Awareness Day, Rid the World of Fad Diet and Gimmicks Day, and Take a Walk Outdoors Day.
On This Day:
2025 – Donald Trump was inaugurated as the 47th President of the United States of America. He is currently the oldest person ever inaugurated.
2021 – Joe Biden was inaugurated as the 46th President of the United States of America. At the time of his inauguration, he became the oldest person ever inaugurated. Kamala Harris became the first female and first non-white Vice President of the United States.
2020 – First confirmed case of COVID-19 found in U.S.
2017 – Donald Trump was inaugurated as the 45th President of the United States of America.
2009 – Barack Obama was inaugurated as the 44th President of the United States of America, becoming the first African-American President of the United States.
2008 – “Breaking Bad” premiered on AMC.
1986 – In the United States, Martin Luther King Jr. Day is celebrated as a federal holiday for the first time.
1981 – Twenty minutes after Ronald Reagan was inaugurated as the 40th President of the United States of America, Iran released 52 American hostages.
1961 – John F. Kennedy was inaugurated as the 35th President of the United States of America, becoming the youngest man to be elected into that office, and the first Roman Catholic.
1953 – Dwight D. Eisenhower was inaugurated as the 34th President of the United States of America, becoming the first president to begin his presidency on January 20 since the 20th Amendment changed the dates of presidential terms.
1942 – World War II: At the Wannsee Conference held in the Berlin suburb of Wannsee, senior Nazi German officials discussed the implementation of the “Final Solution to the Jewish question“.
1937 – Franklin D. Roosevelt and John Nance Garner were sworn in for their second terms as U.S. President and U.S. Vice President; it is the first time a Presidential Inauguration takes place on January 20 since the 20th Amendment changed the dates of presidential terms.
1841 – Hong Kong Island was occupied by the British during the First Opium War.
1783 – The Kingdom of Great Britain signed preliminary articles of peace with the Kingdom of France, setting the stage for the official end of hostilities in the American Revolutionary War later that year.
(For comprehensive lists of the day’s historical events, check here, here, and here.)
Read for free with Kindle Unlimited!
Some Birthdays:
1987 – Evan Peters, American actor
1984 – Bonnie McKee, American singer-songwriter
1980 – Philippe Cousteau, Jr., American-French oceanographer and journalist
1972 – Nikki Haley, American accountant and politician, 116th Governor of South Carolina
1971 – Questlove, American musician, record producer, and filmmaker
1970 – Skeet Ulrich, American actor
1967 – Kellyanne Conway, American political strategist and pundit
1966 – Rainn Wilson, American actor
1964 – Fareed Zakaria, Indian-American journalist and author
1958 – Lorenzo Lamas, American actor, director, and producer
1956 – Bill Maher, American comedian, political commentator, media critic, television host, and producer
1953 – Jeffrey Epstein, American financier and convicted sex offender (died 2019)
1952 – Paul Stanley, American singer-songwriter, guitarist, and producer
1946 – David Lynch, American director, producer, and screenwriter (died 2025)
1935 – Dorothy Provine, American actress, singer, and dancer (died 2010)
1934 – Tom Baker, English actor
1930 – Buzz Aldrin, American colonel, pilot, and astronaut
1929 – Arte Johnson, American actor and comedian (died 2019)
1926 – Patricia Neal, American actress (died 2010)
1923 – Slim Whitman, American country and western singer-songwriter and musician (died 2013)
1920 – DeForest Kelley, American actor (died 1999)
1920 – Federico Fellini, Italian director and screenwriter (died 1993)
1910 – Joy Adamson, Austria-Kenyan painter and conservationist (died 1980)
1906 – Aristotle Onassis, Greek shipping magnate (died 1975)
1900 – Colin Clive, English actor (died 1937)
1896 – George Burns, American actor, comedian, and producer (died 1996)
1894 – Harold Gray, American cartoonist, created Little Orphan Annie (died 1968)
1775 – André-Marie Ampère, French physicist and mathematician (died 1836)
(A more complete list of today’s birthdays.)
Some Deaths:
2024 – Norman Jewison, Canadian actor, director, and producer (born 1926)
2022 – Meat Loaf, American singer and actor (born 1947)
2012 – Etta James, American singer-songwriter (born 1938)
2003 – Al Hirschfeld, American painter and illustrator (born 1903)
2002 – Carrie Hamilton, American actress and singer (born 1963)
1993 – Audrey Hepburn, British actress and humanitarian activist (born 1929)
1990 – Barbara Stanwyck, American actress (born 1907)
1984 – Johnny Weissmuller, American swimmer and actor (born 1904)
1965 – Alan Freed, American radio host (born 1922)
1915 – Arthur Guinness, 1st Baron Ardilaun, Irish businessman, philanthropist, and politician (born 1840)
1900 – John Ruskin, English painter and critic (born 1819)
(A more complete list of today’s deaths.)
If you like KGB Report, please share with a friend.
Subscribers get all content for free. If you sign up for a paid subscription, you get my eternal gratitude, and maybe some occasional photos of the dogs and cats here at the South Park Casa de Pelaje y Cajas de Arena.
Old KGBReport.com archives (not the stuff here on Substack), all the way back to the previous century.
Current weather in South Park, PA (Personal station on Weather Underground)
KGB Quotations Database Search (KGB Quote-A-Matic)
DCL Dialogue Online (an archive of my DCL Dialogue columns which appeared in DEC Professional (later renamed Digital Age) magazine from March, 1987 through December, 1995.)