Dana,
I add my thanks for your posts on this subject and congratulations for your and other hardy Karoo inhabitants' contributions to the understanding of this feature.
After reading and digesting your article last week, i was perplexed this morning to read in American S&T:
http://www.skyandtelescope.com/astro...llanic-clouds/
"It was originally thought that the Magellanic Stream was the result of tidal interactions during close encounters with the Milky Way, but precise proper motion surveys revealed that the LMC and SMC are either passing near the Milky Way for the first time or are in a long (~4-billion-year) orbit around our galaxy — so the Magellanic Stream must result from interactions between the two galaxies themselves."
"This post originally appeared on AAS Nova, which features research highlights from the journals of the American Astronomical Society." Its a summary of a paper by Dougal Mackey (ANU) et al 2018 ApJL 858 L21. doi:10.3847/2041-8213/aac175
I have not read the original paper. The findings re first pass of the Clouds is interesting but the summary assumes that the Magellanic Stream is related to the Clouds when your research shows the Magellanic Ghost is 160,000lyr closer to us than the Clouds.
I hope that my understandings are correct?
regards, L