Posts by Alex Miller

america 250 cover

Founding Asteroids

As the United States prepares to celebrate the 250th anniversary of its Declaration of Independence, it’s only fitting we take a closer look at the chart of the Land of the Free, and the Home of the Brave.  This founding document was written in large part by Thomas Jefferson, working on several drafts between June 11th and 28th, 1776.  In the midst of this process, on June 18th, a wee bit of space debris, an asteroid that would be named “America” nearly 150 years later, came to a critical stage in its orbit about the sun.

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Of Trillionaires, Treaties, Triumphs and Travesties

June 2026 saw a bevy of controversies, eccentricities, and record setting.  If this is what Uranus in Gemini is going to be like, hold onto your hats for the next seven years!  Throughout, referential asteroids in significant placement tell the tales, from an NBA championship to an insulted Italian Prime Minister, a tentative peace deal, a rectified name change, and the world’s first trillionaire.

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Trump 2.0:  The Gilded Rage

The defining feature of the second Trump administration so far has been the Retribution Comeback Tour, with Trump venting his rage on any and all who have ever opposed him, from prosecutors to pundits and politicians, many in his own Party.  But providing the backbeat has been an increasingly obvious obsession with gold and gilding.  As a metaphor for wealth generally, one of very few things Trump truly seems to care about, gold is certainly apt, but there’s a limit, and Trump doesn’t seem to have found it.  From tacky scrollwork embellishments and knickknacks in the Oval Office, to a golden Marie Antoinette-style White House Ballroom, a proposed gold-accented massive Triumphal Arch near Arlington National Cemetery, regilding the equine statues by the Lincoln Memorial, even a larger-than-life gold statue of himself at his Doral golf club, Trump is cranking out more gold than Midas himself would know what to do with. 

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Cosmic Grab Bag:  Spring 2026, Part Three

So little time, so many stories.  Once again, AAA plays catch-up with some skipped news over the final weeks of May 2026.  Included:   a pair of top-level Summit meetings in Beijing; the death of a long-term progressive Congressman, a leading light in the fight for gay rights; and the grand finale of “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert.

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Asteroid Sleuth:  The Case of the Frank-Filching Fox

On 11 May 2026, Royal Canadian Mounted Police in Blairsville, Alberta, Canada spotted a red fox absconding with a half-dozen hot dogs in its mouth.  Although the Mounties always get their man, the clever vulpine eluded them.  The out-foxed constable witnessed the animal in a wooded neighborhood, but without a specific complaint, was unable to do more than watch as the fox greedily gulped the evidence against him.  Reports do not specify which condiments were preferred for the cookout contraband, stating only that the fox ate them with relish.

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