If a person lives in a democracy, which thus far we do, you soon learn that politics is not an orderly business like cosmetic dentistry or carpentry, it is more like pond hockey or maybe a conclave of sociopaths or an ostrich jubilee, and the messiness can drive you crazy, like finding potatoes in your sock drawer and rutabagas in the medicine cabinet, and the alternative to despair is amusement.

So when the Alabama Supreme Court decides that an embryo is a human being and you see Republicans scrambling to distance themselves from this lest they alienate young people of voting age who were conceived in vitro, you wonder if someday sperm will be given the same protection and male masturbation will be considered child abuse

There is no normal anymore. The Orange One is in hock for a half-billion on two court decisions and the court requires him to put the money on the table pronto but he may not have ready cash. Banks and bond companies might well blanch at giving a hand to a guy with so many bankruptcies but maybe Xi Jinping would cut him a check and save his butt. Would the Republican Party be okay with that? It’d be something new in the history of the republic, but hey, change is inevitable, no?