November ends; the month's ledger does not balance.

It is the last day of the month. The diner is half full. The waitress is doing the receipts. Here is what the month said it was, and here is what the receipts say it was.

The shutdown ended at forty-three days, which is the longest in American history, with eight Democrats breaking from leadership for a deal that did not include the ACA subsidies that the Democrats had spent forty days saying they would not give up the subsidies for. The President, who had spent the same forty days saying the shutdown was good, signed the bill on day forty-three and called it extortion. The funding lasts until January thirtieth.

The two showcase indictments, of the former FBI Director and the New York Attorney General, both prosecuted by a personal lawyer for the President, were dismissed on November twenty-fourth because the personal lawyer was past the statutory cap on interim U.S. Attorneys. The statute is six pages.

A peace plan for Ukraine, drafted with the Russian envoy, was given to Kyiv with a Thanksgiving deadline. The deadline came. The deadline went. The plan was reduced from twenty-eight points to nineteen. The country in question still has not signed.

A Saudi Crown Prince was welcomed at the White House with a flyover, an F-35 sale, and a pledge of one trillion dollars. The President, asked on camera about the journalist hacked apart in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, said: things happen.

A federal judge ordered the administration to fund SNAP for forty-two million Americans. The administration ran to the Supreme Court for permission not to.

The BBC, which had genuinely made a bad edit, was sued for between one and five billion dollars. The Director General resigned. The corporation apologized. The lawsuit continued.

A New York mayor-elect, called a communist for six months, was called rational for thirty-five minutes.

A congresswoman who had carried the President’s banner for five years quit because the man she had carried it for had pulled her endorsement and called her wacky.

The East Wing of the White House is gone. The donor list for the new ballroom is not public. The Rose Garden is paved.

Two American soldiers were shot at Farragut Square. One died. The administrative response was to halt asylum for everyone, from everywhere, indefinitely.

The President spent five of the four weekends in the month at his golf course in Florida.

Hon. The receipts are the receipts. The receipts are not what the man at the podium said the receipts would say. Trust the receipts. They are the only thing in this country that is not running for re-election.

December comes in the morning.

That ought to concern you.