It happened on Friday, but I just found out moments ago:

David Longdon, the frontman and multi-instrumentalist with British prog rock band Big Big Train, has died aged 56.

Longdon died in a Nottingham hospital on 20 November following an accident, the group said in a statement. No further details were shared.

The band’s bassist and founder Greg Spawton said: “It is unspeakably cruel that a quirk of fate in the early hours of yesterday morning has deprived him and his loved ones of a happy future together and all of the opportunities, both personal and musical, that awaited him next year and beyond.”

Steve Hackett, former guitarist with Genesis, paid tribute to Longdon: “He was a lovely guy and had a wonderful voice. He sounded fabulous singing on the vocal version of [Hackett’s song] Spectral Mornings.” Neal Morse of prog rock band Spock’s Beard, the group Marillion and Geoffrey Downes of Yes were also among those to pay their respects.

If you’re not familiar with Big Big Train, you owe to yourself to listen — and I would start right here. Give it 90 seconds. If you’re not hooked, it’s not your style. But if you liked early Genesis with Peter Gabriel . . . it’s your style.

RIP.

[guest post by Dana]

This is surprisingly clever, especially as one considers the source:

Republican or Not? pic.twitter.com/d4x9yGf8p8

— Saturday Night Live – SNL (@nbcsnl) November 21, 2021

The skit made me think of the following statement because if you didn’t know who said this and about whom it was said, would you assume it was a Republican or a Democrat?:

The good news is in X’s state, [they’ve] been censured and [their] state poll numbers have dropped faster than any human being I’ve ever seen. So hopefully they’ll get rid of [them] with the next election.

–Dana

Buh-rilliant.

Some Trump foes have picked up on the former President’s jealousy and are using it to advance their own objectives. Next week, Palm Beach televisions, perhaps including those in Mar-a-Lago, will once again air a commercial by the Lincoln Project intended to remind Trump that DeSantis is the new GOP “it” guy.

Rick Wilson, one of the ex-Republicans behind the Lincoln Project, is hoping to provoke a very specific reaction from Trump.

“We want Trump to kill his own babies,” Wilson said. “We believe if we narrow the field and it’s only Trump in 2024, it’s an easy choice for Americans to say ‘no.'”

I just finished Jonathan Karl’s new book, Betrayal: The Final Act of the Trump Show. I recommend it highly — especially the audio version, which Karl reads himself. Karl reminds us that the Lincoln Project ran targeted ads on Fox News in D.C. and Palm Beach before January 6 taunting Trump over the fact that Pence was going to preside over his defeat.

It’s impossible to say if that helped contribute to Trump’s dangerous fixation on Pence on January 6. My guess: probably not enough to be a but-for cause. Sycophants still would have brought their schemes to him, and he was desperate for any way to hang onto the office that he had already lost fair and square. The ads may have steeled his resolve to coerce Pence into delaying or stopping the count, but I doubt they caused him to form the plan.

That said, the actions of the Lincoln Project are not motivated by a sense of what would be good for the country. They are driven instead primarily by a desire to giggle at how they tormented Trump. That, apparently, is more important than avoiding potential constitutional crises.

And so it is here: since Trump running again could easily prompt a very real constitutional crisis. First, he could win — which would prompt several constitutional crises, since he would not feel restrained in his desire to misuse the military (for example) by the politics of worrying about re-election. And if he lost, he would again deny that he lost and bend our system to try to stay in power. And next time, it could work.

Indeed, it is difficult to see how the Lincoln Project’s actions here square with their claim (with which I agree) that Trump poses a unique threat to the country. This just sounds like a plan to elect Democrats.

But hasn’t it been obvious for a while that was really their goal?