MONDAY, AUGUST 6

Welcome back to One Day at a Time, dearsâwhere weâre thrilled to start this weekâs column with good news! Disgraced Disney star/current queen of redemption Demi Lovato was released today from the hospital following an alleged overdose. In a statement, Lovato said, âYour thoughts and prayers have helped me navigate through this difficult time.â Hey, look at that: Thoughts and prayers actually did something for once! MEANWHILE, IN THE SWAMP... Rick Gates casually glanced at his cuticles, buffed his fingernails on his shirt, and then said, out loud, that he and former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort âcommitted crimes together.â And everyone politely nodded and went on with their days, because, duh, of course they committed crimes! Anyone whoâs ever been in sniffing distance of Trumpâs well-done steak with ketchup has committed crimes! But what a yawn of a quote! âWe committed crimes together.â Who cares, Rick Gates? Your testimony is less juicy than a well-done steak. With ketchup. IN LESS-AWFUL NEWS... Say, whatâs BeyoncĂ© up to? Oh, just gracing the cover of Vogue, in a stunning cover story photographed by Tyler Mitchell, the first Black photographer to shoot a Vogue cover, and speaking with Black writer Clover Hope. Throughout, Queen B says fantastic stuff like, âItâs important to me that I help open doors for younger artists. There are so many cultural and societal barriers to entry that I like to do what I can to level the playing field, to present a different point of view for people who may feel like their voices donât matter.â Dears, we really recommend you stop reading this and go read Vogue. Or should we start calling it Bogue? Hm. Beygue? No, that looks like âBey-goo.â Look, BeyoncĂ© is the boss of Vogue now, is what weâre saying.
TUESDAY, AUGUST 7
All done reading BeyoncĂ©? Good job! Now get ready to die. Congrats to the Mendocino Complex Fire on becoming the largest fire in Californiaâs history! (Maybe Demi can forward some of those thoughts and prayers?) Oh, and also? Hawaii is being ravaged by an angry volcano and a furious hurricane. Place your bets, dears, on which state will get raptured firstâand then wish you lived there! SPEAKING OF... things getting wiped off the face of the earth, the city of West Hollywood has voted to remove the Walk of Fame star dedicated to Donald Trump (who lost the popular election by 2,864,974 votes), not because of its repeated defacing, but because heâs a disgusting person with terrible values. Bye, Don! Weâre truly sorry we never got a chance to spit on your star.
WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 8
Paul Manafortâs trial finally got to what weâve been waiting for: extra-marital affairs! We donât know why affairs are relevant to Manafortâs 18 charges of tax evasion and fraud... but his crime-buddy Rick Gates allegedly had five affairs? Five affairs! To think we were worried all of Gatesâ scenes in the HBO adaptation would lack juice! Now weâre thinking theyâll be juicy as hell. SPEAKING OF EROTIC TELEVISION... Manic pixie power lesbian Ruby Rose has been cast as Batwoman in an upcoming series on the CWânews thatâs doubly delightful, because there are far too few onscreen heroes who are (and who are played by) members of the LGBTQ community, and because the announcement enraged basement-dwelling neckbeards who hate empowered lady characters! Plus, not only is Roseâs Batwoman gay, but according to the Hollywood Reporter, sheâs also âarmed with a passion for social justice and flair for speaking her mind.â In other words: She hates those neckbeards, too! COUGH, COUGH... Wait, asbestos is back in the news?! *Checks phone.* Nope, we havenât been transported back to the 1960s by a secret time machine! Itâs actually 2018, and Trumpâs Environmental Protection Agency is protecting our environment by relaxing rules on the cancer-causing material. Next up for a comeback: Polio, probably? MAGA!
THURSDAY, AUGUST 9
Now, weâd hoped all that Space Force bullshit was merely the senile ramblings of a demented old man whoâd eventually get distracted by a French fry in one of his skin folds. Alas, itâs actually happening, and Mike Pence (who, #neverforget, calls his wife âMotherâ) is talking it up at TrekkieCon, Michiganâs premier Star Trek convention the Pentagon! âVice President Pence laid out an ambitious plan Thursday that would begin creating a military command dedicated to space... as soon as 2020,â reports the Washington Post! Meanwhile, Trump is reportedly asking people for opinions about Space Force logos (only some of which heâs drawn himself using a crayon and Big Mac wrappers) and tweeting, âSpace Force all the way!â Clearly, Americaâs Space Force will be respected throughout the galaxâTHIS JUST IN... Luke Skywalker is tweeting from the Battlestar Galactica! (Or wherever. We donât care, nerds!) âFor those of you worried that SPACE FORCE is the leaked title of #EpIX... Relax!â tweeted Mark Hamill, referring to the title of his next Star War. âTurns out itâs just lie #3,253.â And Jedi masters arenât the only ones clowning on Trumpâso are those pesky Russians! âThe Russian Embassy in the United States... seemingly mocked President Donald Trumpâs campaign for a [Space Force] logo,â gabs Politico, citing a tweet that read, âGood Morning, Space Forces!â along with an image of a rocket that âfeatures the Russian flag.â Hey, that gives us an idea: How about Trump and Putin take the first ride on a Space Force rocket ship? And once theyâre in orbit, everyone on Earth refuses to let them land?
FRIDAY, AUGUST 10
âThe Trump administrationâs decision to impose tariffs on Canadian newsprint is hastening the demise of local newspapers across the country, forcing already-struggling publications to cut staff, reduce the number of days they print, and, in at least one case, shutter entirely,â mourns the New York Times. Skip Bliss, the publisher of The Gazette in Janesville, Wisconsin, pointed to profound damages to American life and democracy in the absence of a free and local press. âWhen theyâre gone, theyâre gone. Theyâre not coming back,â Bliss said of local papers. âThat means those communitiesâeverything we do to hold governments and schools and law enforcement in checkâthereâs not going to be anyone to do that.â We mention this, dears, not to add another depressing bit of news to 2018, but rather to say: Hey, thanks for reading the Mercury! (Especially those of you who pick it up just for our column. MWAH!) For the record, weâre not planning on going anywhereâeven if we end up having to write this thing with crayons on Big Mac wrappers.

SATURDAY, AUGUST 11
This weekend saw the one-year anniversary of the deadly âUnite the Rightâ rally in Charlottesvilleâand, like the unrepentant shitbags they are, Americaâs Nazis decided to celebrate. A group of alt-right creeps, white nationalists, and MAGA hat-wearing Trump voters vowed online that hundreds would march on Washington, DC. The city braced itself for another vile, dangerous march, but... um... âWhite nationalists dwarfed by crowds of counter protesters in Washington,â reported CNN, adding that the âapproximately two dozenâ racists who bothered to show up were âvastly outnumbered by throngs of counter protestorsâ! âEverywhere they went,â CNN continued, ââUnite the Right 2â rally goers were confronted by counterprotestors, who had been gathering throughout the day as part of a series of demonstrations led by members of 40 anti-racism groups.â Nice work, DC! If only the politicians who work in your town would do anything remotely as meaningful, maybe weâd get somewhere.
SUNDAY, AUGUST 12
Hey, remember how we started off the week with good news? And how yesterday had good news too? Wellllll... maybe go back and reread those! Just some advice. You should take it! Canât say we didnât warn you! âFortified by fences and patrolled by more armed personnel, schools will open their doors to students for the start of the new year with a heightened focus on security intended to ease fears about deadly campus shootings,â writes the New York Times, noting that American school districts have back-to-school shopping lists that include more armed guards and facial-recognition systems. âThe massacre in Parkland, Florida, one of the most lethal in American history, unnerved school administrators,â the NYT continues, adding that many administrators devoted their summers to âreinforcing buildings and hiring security,â with some faculties practicing active shooter drills while school nurses were trained for a âmass casualty event.â Welcome back to school, Americaâs beloved children! Hope youâre excited to learn! IN RELATED NEWS... Six months since Parkland (and 19 years after Columbine), thereâs been zero meaningful reformation of gun laws. Which, hey, call us crazy, but maybe thatâd be more effective than teaching nurses how to put tourniquets on children? Sorry to leave you on a bummer, dears! For real, go read that thing about BeyoncĂ© again! That was a good one, right?