Today marks the end of the Our Ladies of the Trump Virus series.

By melding Melania’s body with the faces of the other Republican First Ladies, I’d hoped to convey a continuity of spirit through the decades.

Alas, there are no GOP bitches left. Which brings us to James Buchanan.

Technically a Democrat, he thought like a Republican. He ignored a national crisis in hopes it would just go away. 850,000 died as a result.

Jamie was a “confirmed bachelor,” i.e., somebody’s bitch. And until recent months considered the worst president the US has ever had.

In the early days of Saturday Night Live there was a fearlessness in who they would mock. There was no person, company or topic safe from them.

As the show gained popularity, however, it started to lose its bite. It felt like everything was vetted by the Legal Department and only the soft targets were being approved. And by “Legal” I mean Accounting would run projections on lost revenue if the mockee was an advertiser.

One winter in the mid-70’s capital punishment was the hot topic around the Christmas holidays. There had been a national moratorium on the death penalty for several years as the courts sorted it out. It was eventually ruled constitutional but each state was left to decide how and when to proceed on their own. Utah, with its predominately Mormon population steeped in the teachings of Christ’s love, was champing at the bit to kill a human being.

Gary Gilmore was the first prisoner scheduled to die. It had been years since the last US execution so lawyers across the country argued both sides of the question. Courts would issue Stays only to revoke them a week later. The back and forth meant months of constant rescheduling.

Gilmore turned the frustration of indecision into an egomaniacal quest. He became drunk on the elixir of name recognition. The preposterous statements he issued daily became the next day’s banner headlines. The newspapers blared things like “I Want to Die!” or “Kill Me, Please!”

SNL sought to address the controversy coupled with the age-old issue of problem gift giving. What do you get that hard-to-buy-for person? You give them exactly what they want. Gilda Radner led the assembled choraliers in a saccharine Christmas Carol entitled “Let’s Kill Gilmore for Christmas.”

Donald Trump has sought to put his name on everything he’s ever had his hand in. A myriad of hotels, casinos and their corresponding bankruptcies. The eponymous vodka that may or may not have been a bankruptcy but was a colossal failure nonetheless. And the block lettered “Trump” on the side of a Chicago building in stark violation of local development laws. He got that by bribing Mayor Daley the Younger

Then there’s the hush money checks to taxpayers that were held up several days while he fought to have his psychotic signature illegally printed on them. This $500 billion payout to individuals diverted attention from the $3.5 trillion giveaway to corporate America for shoring up Wall Street investments. Along with the Iraq War’s pallets of $100 bills unloaded in the desert and the 2008 2BIG2fail-yoyo bailout, the pandemic payday proves once again how fiscally conservative Republicans really are.

So let’s give the Loathed Warrior what he wants. He deserves to have his name associated with the national catastrophe he’ll always be held responsible for. To that end I give you: The Trump Virus.

Sorry, that doesn’t sound right, my mask is on. How about, I christen thee: The Trump Virus.

That works.