Alan Wilson of Canned Heat, Pete Ham of Badfinger, Pigpen McKernan of the Grateful Dead, Kristen Pfaff of Hole, Chris Bell of Big Star, and Amy Winehouse have all passed in the midst of their prime, at age 27. Some comprehensive lists span 50 names or more. It is an uncanny fact that more musicians seem to die at age 27 than at any other age – one that, since Cobain’s death in 1994, have sent conspiracy theorists reeling. 

Republicans, meanwhile, went about lying with their customary abandon. They slandered the president as, variously and sometimes all at once, Kenyan-born (Donald Trump’s meme); an apologist for Islamic terrorism (Mr. Romney himself, in accusing the president of sympathizing with Benghazi murderers); a secret homosexual (Jerome Corsi, a popular conspiracy theorist and member of the Romney campaign press corps); and a heretic of possibly Christian persuasion who, in supporting same-sex marriage, has “shaken his fist at God” (the Rev. Franklin Graham, son of Billy).