Last lunchtime roundup of the year?

We're so close to ending 2020 that I can almost taste it. (I hope to be tasting tacos in a few minutes, however.) True to form, 2020 has apparently decided not to leave quietly:

• Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) has blocked a vote on $2,000 relief checks so that he can add a poison-pill amendment the STBXPOTUS has asked for.
• Writing in The Atlantic, Dani Alexis Ryskamp points out that the life depicted in The Simpsons is no longer attainable.
• New Republic has named Florida governor Ron Desantis (R) "Scoundrel of the Year."
• Michael Benson reviews some satellite photos of Earth this year and comes away horrified.
• Wired looks at the state and evolution of ransomware and also comes away horrified.
• The United Nations Working Group on the Use of Mercenaries (yes, there is such a thing) came away horrified from the STBXPOTUS pardoning the Blackwater guys who murdered Iraqi civilians.

Finally, the Washington Post's Michael Rosenwald reports that Bloom asked 28 historians to determine whether 2020 was the worst year ever. It wasn't even close.