1. It’s Wednesday, October 5, 2016.

2. The election is 34 days away. The Mets are going to beat the Giants tonight in the National League Wild Card Game.

3. Mike Pence is a despicable man.

As governor of Indiana, he’s approved punitive measures for women who choose not to go through with a pregnancy.

He’s approved measures that legalize discrimination against people who love other people of the same sex.

He’s refused to address the state’s opioid epidemic in ways that would actually help solve it.

And he once denied that smoking causes death.

None of that – none – came up in last night’s vice presidential debate.

Instead, he’s getting credit for deflecting Tim Kaine’s admittedly overcaffinated attacks and getting zinged for not actually defending his creepy running mate.

But Mike Pence is running for Vice President of the United States. That would put him one choking-on-a-KFC-chicken-bone away from the Oval Office.

And he has no business being there.

I understand Kaine’s mission was to defend Hillary Clinton. He did that.

But to me, that was short-sighted. He let Pence emerge as a calm presence on the stage, when everything he’s done in politics screams overbearing imposer of his own morality.

It was a lost opportunity. It might not matter in the 2016 election, but it matters in the discourse of the nation – especially if this election helps Pence emerge as the front runner in 2020 or 2024.

1. It’s Tuesday, October 4, 2016. The election is 35 days away.

2. As helpfully reminded by Google, today is the 434th anniversary of the introduction of the Gregorian calendar by Pope Gregory XIII. Why Google chose to focus on the 434th anniversary and not, say, the 433rd last year is curious but not essential to this tale.

The purpose of adopting the Gregorian calendar, with its leap years and weird month lengths, was to align the seasons with what people think the date should be. They had gotten out of whack – think about how, in the Islamic calendar, Ramadan keeps shifting earlier into each year, and you have an idea what was happening to spring before Gregory’s advisers came along.

By the time Great Britain and its American colonies adopted the Gregorian calendar in 1752, they had to make up 11 days. One day, it was September 2, 1752 in London. The next day, it was September 13. Talk about losing track of time!

And then think of the poor people born before 1752 who had to recalibrate their birthdays. One of them was George Washington. When he was born, the calendar in the Virginia house said February 11, 1732. And for 20 years, as he was growing up, he celebrated his birthday on the 11th.

Then came the calendar change. And now, February 22 became George’s birthday. A whole childhood of anticipating February 11 wiped away by forces beyond his control. Imagine how your kids would feel.

Anyway, let’s hear it for Pope Gregory and his calendar, 484 years old today – give or take a day.

3. Here’s why I’m sweating out tonight’s vice presidential debate:

Mike Pence is a heinous human being. His position on a woman’s right to control her body is out of the Middle Ages. His position on same-sex families is equally awful. And, of course, he subscribes to the Republican orthodoxy that rich people paying taxes is a scourge.

But unlike his running mate, he doesn’t look or sound like a buffoon. He speaks in complete sentences. His hair, while certainly something in which he appears to take great pride, isn’t freakish.

And if, as he’s more than capable of doing, the Indiana governor puts a respectable face on incredibly not respectable positions, he could stop the momentum of a GOP slide that has seen most polls tilt toward Clinton and Kaine. The fact that there’s still 35 days to go is enough time to wreak havoc.

4. So what does Tim Kaine have to do tonight?

He has to remind people that Pence is a jackass, too. That same-sex marriage hasn’t harmed anyone and allowed people in love to affirm their commitment. That women should not feel the scorn of the government when they make difficult choices regarding their bodies. That Pence once argued that cigarettes haven’t been proven to be a health hazard.

And he has to remind people that Pence had the godawful judgment to be Trump’s running mate. To be on a ticket with the least qualified person ever to run for president.

Is Kaine up to the task? I sure hope so. I think he’s a pretty smart guy.

But I am nervous.

It’s September 30, 2016, the end of the year’s third quarter and 39 days before the 2016 election.

And it’s time for 20 Questions Friday – just some random questions that popped into my head this week and in the hour or so it takes to write this.

Enjoy your weekend.

— Is Trump’s hissy fit over Alicia Machado a way to distract people from the fact that he admitted in the debate that he’s “smart” not to pay taxes?

— Is Trump’s hissy fit over Alicia Machado just a way to promote the Miss Universe pageant he owns?

— Did you know that the vice presidential debate is on Tuesday at Longwood University in Farmville, Va.?

— Do you know who’s in the vice presidential debate?

— Who likes the idea of Lady Gaga performing the Super Bowl halftime show?

— Has Trump talked at all this week about any issue that actually concerns the American people?

— Do we think of Al Capone as “smart” for not having paid taxes?

— I think it’s a good thing, but does it seem as though people who are into Halloween are delaying their decorating this year?

— Are you scratching your head when you hear Republicans in Congress blame President Obama because they override his veto of the bill allowing families of 9/11 victims to sue Saudi Arabia?

— Are you as curious as I am as to what caused that horrible train wreck in Hoboken yesterday?

— Should the nation spare any expense to make our transportation systems safe?

— Am I wrong to think most of the country wants the Chicago Cubs to win the World Series?

— Have you ever been to New York’s Carnegie Deli? (It’s closing!)

— Are you registered to vote? Are you sure?

— Did you know that Richard Trentlage, who died this month, is the, um, composer of “The Oscar Mayer Weiner Song”? 

— Isn’t it cool that a spacecraft landed on a comet? 

— Can you imagine that Syria’s civil war is like one of Dante’s circles of hell?

— When was the last time you saw head cheese at a deli?

— Isn’t it a pity? (Fifth in a series of song-title questions)

— Can it possibly be that there are sane people in the United States of America who think Trump’s reaction to the Alicia Machado bait is the way they want a President of this country to conduct himself?

1. It’s Tuesday, September 27, 2016. The election is 42 days away.

2. I wanted Hillary Clinton to act like a President of the United States. Someone who someday will fit nicely on one of those diner placemats with pictures of the 43 guys who preceded her.

She delivered. Big.

Or, as her opponent would say, “bigly.”

Clinton needed to have a command of facts. Check.

Clinton needed to respond to Trump’s attacks. Check.

Clinton needed to look calm and unruffled. She needed to seem as though she was listening to what Trump was saying. Check.

Are there things she could have done better? Sure. Contrary to what post-debate analysts said, I wanted a stronger response to the birther question. I thought there were times when she was calculating whether or not she should cut off Trump’s long-winded rants or just let him draw enough rope to hang himself.

But she was great. She proved she is ready to lead. She did her preparation – which Trump tried to make sound like a bad thing, for some stupid reason. She seemed healthy after her bout with pneumonia – Trump, on the other hand, kept sniffling as if he had a cold.

If that woman can’t be seen as a commander-in-chief, this country deserves the reckoning it will reap.

3. On the other hand:

If you don’t believe the leader of free world should speak in coherent, complete sentences.

If you think a guy who keeps sniping at his opponent when she’s an answering a question is showing some sort of leadership.

If you think a guy who just about bragged about not paying taxes should be able to do that.

If you think the hacker who got into the DNC files was a 400-pound kid on his bed and not the Russians, and that the information he got should be exploited.

If you think Rosie O’Donnell is someone more worthy of badmouthing than Vladimir Putin.

If you think a father shouldn’t be more concerned about monitoring his 10-year-old son’s computer activity.

If you think it’s doing a kindness of some kind to not bring up your opponent’s husband’s infidelities.

If you think a guy can question his opponent’s stamina while sniffling his way through a 98-minute debate.

If you think a guy should be able to scream that his temperament is better than his opponent’s.

You’re looking for Trump. You are beyond hope. You’ll get the hell you deserve.

The CNN poll thought Clinton won the debate by a 62-27 margin.

You know what scares me? That 27% of the people in this country who watched that debate have seeing and hearing problems.

1. It’s Monday, September 26, 2016. The election is 43 days away.

2. OK. The debate is tonight. The polls are as tight as possible, and tighter than they should possibly be.

The fate of the nation rides on the shoulders of Hillary Rodham Clinton.

I’m sure she doesn’t need my advice. This is an amazingly accomplished person. She is brilliant. She is a leader.

And that’s the point.

That’s what she needs to be. If she conducts herself like a President of the United States, she will be President of the United States. If she shows her smarts, if she has her facts straight, if she stands tall and unafraid, she will win this.

It’s not about the other guy, despite the bluster and the insults and the lies.

It’s about her. It’s about showing that she is the leader this nation and the world need.

She is the giant in this race, and her opponent is the pretender.

She has been waiting for this moment her entire life. It is time to seize it.

It’s September 23, 2016, just 46 days until the election.

And it’s time for 20 Questions Friday. I’ll ask questions of varying degrees of answerability You can do the answering. You can imagine what I would answer. You can scroll to the next tweet. It’s your choice.

— What Trump persona will show up at the debate Monday night?

— Will Hillary Clinton try to goad Trump into a stupidity eruption, or will she be smart and stick to telling people what she would do as President?

— Are you like me and checking fivethirtyeight.com’s election forecast every five minutes to see if Clinton’s position has improved?

— Is there a lot of pressure on Lester Holt or what?

— The back alley is a Midwestern thing, isn’t it?

— Was Chris Christie de facto convicted of obstruction of justice, since both the prosecution and defense in the George Washington Bridge lane closing trial say he knew about it in advance?

— Why would Democrats want to impeach Christie when they can have him be a punching bag as governor of New Jersey for another year plus?

— What do you think Wells Fargo CEO John Stumpf did after getting a verbal spanking from Sen. Elizabeth Warren at a hearing on the bank’s cross-selling scandal?

— Will the Charlotte police ever release the video of the shooting of Keith Scott?

— While questioning an African-American man, do police officers ever think about the previous incidents that resulted in the person they’re questioning being dead?

— Has there been a day cool enough this September that inspired you to eat soup and drink warm beverages?

— Do other baseball teams put their fans go through the extreme highs and lows that the New York Mets do?

— Whoever thought eating Skittles would be a political statement?

— Is it just me, or is it still pretty amazing that it only took a day and a-half for the New York police and federal agents to find the guy they suspected of the Chelsea bombing?

— Does everybody remember that the guy is still just accused of the Chelsea bombing, and can’t be called the Chelsea bomber until the legal process is complete?

— How confident are you in anything Yahoo does if it didn’t know for two years that 500 million of its accounts had been hacked?

— Have you read any of David Fahrenthold’s reporting on the Trump “Foundation” for The Washington Post? If not, why not?

— On John Coltrane’s 90th birthday, what is your piece of his? Or favorite album?

— Do you want to know a secret? (Fourth in a series of song-title questions.)

— Did you get a patronus at pottermore.com? (Mine is a white mare)

1. It’s Tuesday, September 20, 2016. The election is 49 days away.

2. Hey Wrigley Co., the Skittles PR spokeswoman, Denise Young, deserves a raise.

Last night, Trump’s idiot similarly named offspring put out a tweet that showed a picture of a bowl of Skittles. It asked the question that if “I” said three of the candies were lethal, would you take a handful?

And then he said that’s our Syrian refugee problem.

Of course, social media is agog as such idiocy. Among stupid things, it probably makes certain that no one at Wrigley, the maker of Skittles, will vote for this gagootz’s father.

Clearly, Wrigley was going to have to weigh in. Ms. Young did so with a soberness that shows she’s far more ready to President of the United States than either Trump père or fils.

She wrote: “Skittles are candy. Refugees are people. We don’t feel it’s an appropriate analogy. We will respectfully refrain from further commentary as anything we say could be misinterpreted as marketing.”

Just as “deplorables” might have fired up the Trump backers, Skittles might get the Clinton voters up in arms.

3. David Fahrenthold of The Washington Post has taken on the task of reporting about The Trump Foundation. So he’s already got a reserved spot in heaven.

What he’s found so far is pretty amazing.

That almost none of the charities the foundation claims to have supported say they’ve received any money from it. That Trump stopped donating money to the foundation several years ago, and has instead been donating money with a Trump imprimatur that was actually given by other people. That some of the money the foundation spent money on was used for objects – including a 6-foot portrait of Trump – for Trump’s personal use.

In today’s revelation, Fahrenthold says the foundation paid $258,000 to settle legal problems involving his for-profit businesses. That is a violation of law and pretty much goes against the whole moral purpose of foundations. 

It might be that the Skittles flap will do more damage to Trump’s campaign than Fahrenthold’s dogged reporting. That’s not the way it should be. Yes, the Skittles thing shows how clueless Trumptopia is.

But the corruption of the idea of charity that Trump has perpetrated for years is more insidious and disqualifying.

4. Here’s a reminder to would-be terrorists from wherever:

New Yorkers are descendants of the Jets and the Sharks of “West Side Story.” We don’t go crazy when something bad happens.

We play it cool.

New York didn’t shut down after Saturday’s explosion in Chelsea. The subways ran – except, perhaps, in the area around the blast site. The Mets played. Broadway shows were performed. There was a line at Shake Shack.

We just roll with it.

Because, in truth, that is strength. The bastards want us to be scared and roll up our lives.

The hell with them. By being New Yorkers in the same way Monday as we were Saturday, we give them the middle finger. All the work that went into putting together those bombs couldn’t stop us from being us.

And that, America, is why New Yorkers are about to reject a native son running for President in the most definitive way ever. Because he might have born here, but he has no idea how to be a New Yorker.

It’s September 16, 2016. It’s 53 days until the election and 100 days until Christmas.

And it’s Friday. Which means it’s 20 Questions Friday, my effort to put my wisdom for the week into interrogatory form. This is done for your information, your entertainment and your love of quizzes.

Here we go:

— Hey, Trump supporters and enablers, what’s the word – hint, it begins with a “c” and ends with “oward” – that describes who shifts a notable position he’s held about the President of the United States, attributes it falsely to his opponent – and then runs away from reporters without answering questions?

— Isn’t it ridiculous that any attention should be paid to Trump’s position on whether President Obama was born in the United States?

— Should President Obama be honored or thrilled that Trump deigns to agree that he was born in the United States?

— Why does sarcasm, such as the previous question, drip? Is it wet?

— Shouldn’t CNN, Fox News and MSNBC send Trump a bill for the ad he got them to run for his new Washington hotel?

— Who really thinks Trump would pay that bill, either?

— Should Hillary Clinton offer Trump a $5 million donation to his, ahem, foundation if he can prove she started the birther movement?

— What possible negative question could I ask about Hillary Clinton so I can show “balance” after the Trump debacle of the last 24 hours? Or the last 13 months, for that matter?

— Does the fact that the first eight (now, nine) questions in this week’s 20 Questions show how pissed I am about Trump?

— How clueless did Samsung have to be for the Consumer Product Safety Commission to step in and conduct the recall of fire-possible Galaxy Note 7 phone?

— Do you think Christoph Waltz is wondering if he put a match to his career with those dopey Galaxy Note 7 commercials that ran during the Olympics?

— With the release of Oliver Stone’s “Snowden” movie, am I in a minority in not seeing this guy as any great hero?

— Does this New York Times piece on the new National African-American History and Culture make you as eager to go here as I am? 

— Why would any sane person go to Missouri after its legislature overrode the governor’s veto and enacted insane gun legislation? 

— Does anybody know the combination to the gym lock in my kitchen?

— As the Mets try to secure a National League Wild Card game berth, what team should I root for in their head-to-head series – the Giants, who are a game ahead of the Mets, or the Cardinals, who are a game behind?

— As good as the numbers were in this week’s Census Bureau report on income, poverty and health insurance coverage, won’t it be hard for Democrats to capitalize on something so wonky and abstract? 

— What becomes of the brokenhearted? (Third in a series of song-title questions)

— Have the leaves started to turn where you are?

— Have you started your Christmas shopping yet?

1. It’s Thursday, September 15, 2016. We’re halfway through the month and 54 days from the election.

2. The lead Hillary Clinton held over Trump through much of August has narrowed, if not closed altogether, according to some recent polls.

Nate Silver, the mastermind of fivethirtyeight.com and statistical journalism, seems to believe Democrats don’t take this narrowing seriously. He says as much in one of a series of tweets this morning – one that also wonders if the narrowing is a sign that recent events have dampened Clinton’s supporters’ enthusiasm.

3. I stopped thinking Trump was a joke late last year.

When this campaign started, I liked the idea of calling him Donny. It just seemed annoying enough – you can imagine the underlying red in his face with the overlapping orange blending into a full-blown firehead.

But he stopped being funny when he won Republican primaries and survived.

What’s lost in all this is what the American people need when there’s an election. A discussion of real issues and how candidates will deal with them.

Hillary Clinton keeps playing by that book. She thinks that putting out plans and offering ideas for solving problems and making Americans’ lives better is how you’re supposed to run for President.

She’s right, of course.

So Nate Silver’s comments should be a wake-up call for Democrats. Believe the numbers. He’s not making this stuff up – he’s basing it on polling from organizations with firm reputations and, despite what Trump says, no bias.

4. And it’s time to go back to what makes Hillary Clinton the best qualified candidate for President in 2016 – and one of the best ever.

She’s smart. She knows what she’s talking about. She’s taken blows from all sides and she’s still standing.

She needs to double down on that.

Clinton might be able to win the election by painting Trump as the dangerous demagogue he is.

But she’ll crush the jackass if she can make people understand why she should be President.

Here’s one counterintuitive tip: Limit the campaign in places where she’ll draw enthusiastic crowds. She’ll get warm greetings among in community college auditoriums where people of varied races and ethnicities show up. She’ll get a big turnout when speaking to groups of women, for whom she represents the hope of breaking the ultimate glass ceiling.

5. But Clinton should take on the doubters.

She should campaign in parts of critical states where she isn’t popular. She should go to VFW halls in rural Ohio. She should speak to farmers in North Carolina. She should talk to factory workers in Iowa.

She should tell them why she’d be a good President for them. She should take on the skeptics and answer questions. She should show off her fearlessness and her intelligence. If crowds persist in shouting up Trump, then she should explain why he’s bad for them.

But the emphasis should be on what Clinton will do to make Americans’ lives better. To show that she understands that the economic recovery hasn’t reached everyone. To reiterate, without equivocation, that America is great – that its diversity, its tolerance, its innovation are what separate it from the rest of the world.

Yes, Clinton is right – at least half of Trump’s supporters are a “basket of deplorables.” I know. I live around them. Their antipathy toward anyone who doesn’t fit into their group is tangible.

Yes, Trump is the most dangerous presidential candidate in American history. Should he win, we will have become supplanted as the world’s No. 1 power by a Russia that would like nothing better than to have a manipulable dope in the White House.

But for Clinton to win, she has to prove why she should be President – and not why Trump shouldn’t be. By definition, you go to the polling place and vote FOR someone. You are not asked who you don’t want.

Clinton needs America to want her. That’s how she should go after this.

1. It’s Tuesday, September 13, 2016. The election is 56 days away.

2. You know all that presidential campaign talk about how Americans are working harder and making less money?

The less money part is now less true.

The Census Bureau announced this morning that the nation’s median household income rose 5.2% last year, the biggest single-year jump since the government began accumulating data in 1967. The gains cover all demographics and regions of the country.

If anything, different groups might begrudge the gains of others. Hispanics saw their income rise 6.1%, while Asians only got a 3.7% boost. Those between age 35 and 44 got a 7%, twice the rate of increase as my 55-to-64 group. Of course.

Still, a raise is better than a drop. And drop is what median income has been doing since 2007, as the recession got underway.

And income wasn’t the only good news about this report. There’s the biggest drop in the poverty rate since 1999. And 4 million fewer people don’t have health insurance.

3. It would be an understatement to say the Obama administration is ecstatic about this.

Up to now, the administration has had an uphill climb in its effort to boost the economy. It came into office amid the worst recession since the Great Depression. And Congress, whether in the hands of Republicans or reluctant Democrats, has been of zero help for most of the eight years.

And yet, the stimulus package, the push for infrastructure improvement, the drive toward more renewable energy and the oft-cursed Affordable Care Act have finally resulted in impressive gains.

The trick, of course, will be to keep going. The White House says it’s confident the 2016 figures will be strong. But after that, the economy will be in the hands of someone else.

You can bet Obama will tout these numbers for the next 56 days as he pushes to have Hillary Clinton succeed him.

And the Clinton campaign, rather than focus on the latest Trump stupidity, should double down on this: While median household income is up for the first time in eight years, it’s still below the peak. That peak was reached in 1999 – when Bill Clinton sat in the Oval Office.

4. All Hillary Clinton’s pneumonia represents is bad timing.

It’s a wonder presidential candidates, who travel constantly in the germ factories that are airplane cabins and shake the hands of people who may have just coughed into them, don’t get sick all the time.

And, like so many other workers in and out of politics, Clinton didn’t feel she had time to let illness slow her down. She paid for it Sunday with the wobbliness at Ground Zero, and that led to the revelation about the pneumonia.

Now if it leads her to be a little more forthcoming about her health, that’s not bad. For one thing, it answers the meatballs who have given her every disease and affliction known to the human race. In fact, it’s surprising that the Trump supporters haven’t speculated about hairballs and ringworm.

Sometimes the Clinton people flinch at the idea that she should reveal more about herself. But here’s the thing: We’re coming off eight years of a president whose been seen draining a 20-foot jumper. And if you want to be non-partisan, his predecessor was supposedly a fanatic about jogging around the White House.

Americans not only want to know that their President is healthy, they want to know how he – and if Clinton wins, she – gets that way.

The Clinton people should, as soon as they can, release more details about her current condition. And I think they should disclose what she does to maintain her health.

No, it’s not as important as being a knowledgeable leader and having ideas for change. But it’s a good way to show people the clearly better candidate.