Two ‘historic’ events happened yesterday - by which I mean that they have some claim to be the first events of their type, rather than anything more particularly significant.
Firstly, a woman is for the first time Speaker of the House of Representatives, even if she did make a speech that, I think, over-sold that very commendable achievement and was quite remarkably self-congratulatory. I had thought that this reaction was just that of a Brit, but on canvassing Americans of various political persuasions, I discovered that they agreed with me.
Secondly, the first Muslim has been sworn in to the US House of Representatives. His (reasonable) insistence that he should use the Koran and not the Bible for his swearing-in has provoked some controversy in America. The Koran his is actually shown holding is a translation owned by Thomas Jefferson.
The quite absurd discussion in the US about whether or not ‘The Founding Fathers’ would have approved of either of these developments is almost impossible to credit.