For about as long as I can remember, Ken Cummins, with his groundbreaking Loose Lips column, was absolutely indispensable reading, recounting each week the national scourge known as D.C. politics in all its hideous reality.

The big-budget competition was forever cowed, but Loose Lips had us gaze long and unflinchingly upon the truth, however repulsive (albeit strangely comical much of the time). Even those of us many time zones away lament the passing of the column that framed with welcome if brutal honesty, and wicked gallows humor, the bizarre and usually appalling antics that passed for political life in the city we once called home. There was nothing else like Loose Lips, and surely our lives are richer for it. And with notable exceptions, including Mayor-for-Life Barry and his lovely wife, we all had a lot of laughs, as there was no point in crying.

Loose Lips as penned by Ken Cummins was simply one of the best things about the D.C. experience, during a time when so many things in it were so very bad. We all move on, I suppose, even the courageous Loose Lips, unfortunately. But Mr. Cummins left his mark on D.C., well and truly. As Neil Young put it, the king is gone but he’s not forgotten.

Moscow

via the Internet