2018: Shut. It. Down.

Another crazy year under President Donald Trump is concluding with the government being shut down for the third time, this one over his refusal to sign any bill Congress sends to his desk that doesn't include funding for the border wall he's always wanted along the U.S.-Mexico border.  The same one that not only is supposed to protect this country from ruffians, but also ordinary folks fleeing the poverty and violence of wherever it is they came from.  Trump's more stringent border security has also succeeded in separating families and putting kids in cages, making them wait until they cross the border the "right" way.  It's likely this won't be settled until a new Congress is sworn in, one in which the House is Democratic and the Senate is still Republican.

Elsewhere in Trumpland as the year ends, it's all crumbling down.  The President has no permanent Attorney General, Defense secretary or Chief of Staff because the previous ones either quit or were fired.  Michael Cohen and Michael Flynn are both headed for prison as Robert Mueller's investigation into alleged Russian collusion in the 2016 election reaches its climax, provided Trump doesn't undermine it first.  He pulls troops out of Syria, believing (perhaps prematurely) that the Islamic State has been defeated.   He marks his first Christmas Presidential visit to the war zone of Iraq by unwittingly compromising the identities of some Navy SEALS on his Twitter feed.  The stock market tanks, and Trump talks of replacing the Federal Reserve Board chairman.  There's a trade war with China.  Treaties are dishonored for reasons real or imaginary.  BUT . . . people in the rural areas and right-wing talk radio still love him, even if everyone else doesn't.

Gun violence is a daily occurrence, whether you attend high school in Parkland, Florida, work in an office park in California, or live in Chicago.  Bill Cosby is going to prison and Les Moonves lost his job at CBS because women waited years to be able to tell the world what happened when they were alone with these and other men.  It didn't work with Brett Kavanaugh, though.  He was still confirmed as Supreme Court justice.

Time magazine saluted journalists with its Person of the Year award.  They have been insulted and mocked as "fake news" by President Trump, kidnapped and tortured by extremists, and killed by governments whose money matters more to the United States than in getting at the truth.  Never has the truth been more at peril than the last few years.

As net neutrality is now in the hands of internet providers, Facebook reminds us that whatever you post can also be seen by advertisers and hackers working on behalf of the Russian government.  Is there a better alternative out there?

The Sinclair Broadcasting-Tribune Company merger of local TV stations never went through, once the FCC took another look at it and found it lacking.  Nexstar, which owns a lot of stations themselves, is Tribune's new suitor.  Unlike Sinclair, Nexstar's politics are unknown.

Oh, and a couple named Harry and Meghan got married in the spring.  He's a prince, and she used to be a TV actress.  Should be interesting.

Unlike the government, 2018 is going to be shut down permanently.  And not a moment too soon.

Passing On:  Penny Marshall, Nancy Wilson, Ken Berry, George H.W. and Barbara Bush, Roy Clark, Stan Lee, Paul Allen, Charles Aznavour, Marty Balin, Bill Daily, Burt Reynolds, Neil Simon, John McCain, Robin Leach, Kofi Annan, Aretha Franklin, Paul Laxalt, Margaret Heckler, Charlotte Rae, Ron Dellums, Bill Loud, Tab Hunter, Ed Schultz, Harlan Ellison, Joe Jackson, Dan Ingram, Charles Krauthammer, XXXTentacion, Anne Donovan, D.J. Fontana, Murray Fromson, Nick Meglin, Anthony Bourdain, Kate Spade, Alan Bean, Philip Roth, Clint Walker, Tom Wolfe, Margot Kidder, Verne Troyer, Avicii, Carl Kasell, Harry Anderson, Milos Forman, Susan Anspach, Winnie Mandela, Steven Bochco, Stephen Hawking, Nannette Fabray, Billy Graham, Marty Allen, Vic Damone, John Gavin, John Mahoney, Nicholas von Hoffman, Hugh Masekela, Dorothy Malone, Stansfield Turner, Dolores O'Riordan, Jerry Van Dyke, Barbara Flanagan.