Ticker: Brits issue Monty Python stamps; EPA kills $7B solar grant program
And now for something completely different: Britain’s Royal Mail has issued stamps celebrating the absurdist comedy of Monty Python.
The 10-stamp series announced on Thursday celebrates some of the troupe’s most iconic characters and catchphrases, from “Nudge, nudge” to “The Lumberjack Song.”
Six stamps depict scenes from the sketch-comedy TV series “Monty Python’s Flying Circus,” including “The Spanish Inquisition,” “The Ministry of Silly Walks,” “Dead Parrot” and “The Nude Organist.”
Another four mark the 50th anniversary of the cult classic 1975 film “Monty Python and the Holy Grail,” including one showing the limb-losing Black Knight insisting, “‘Tis but a scratch.”
The stamps can be pre-ordered from Thursday and go on sale Aug. 14.
EPA kills $7B solar grant program
The Environmental Protection Agency on Thursday terminated a $7 billion grant program intended to help pay for residential solar projects for more than 900,000 lower-income U.S. households, in the latest Trump administration move hindering the nation’s shift to cleaner energy.
The funding, part of the Biden-era’s Solar for All program, was awarded to 60 recipients including states, tribes and regions for investments such as rooftop solar and community solar gardens. Solar, a renewable energy, is widely regarded as a way to introduce cleaner power onto the electrical grid and lower energy bills for American consumers.
EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin said in a statement on social media that authority for the solar program was eliminated under the tax-and-spending law signed by Trump last month.
The administration has taken steps to bolster fossil fuels such as coal, oil and natural gas as it pursues American “energy dominance in the global market.
