Post-primary
Hey, Texas actually mattered in an election, for once! I personally never made it to the ballot box—John and I tried to vote early on Friday, but the line was about an hour long, so we gave up.
My mom is an election judge for the Democrats, so she had a hectic 16-hour day yesterday. She said our precinct saw about thirty times the normal turnout on the Democratic side, so they were understaffed and busy all day. The Republican judges, who normally have a much bigger crowd (we’re in Texas, remember, out in the suburbs), sat around with not much to do watching Democrats line up out the door*.
Eventually, though, they shuffled everybody through, and only a few folks got huffy about the wait, so all in all, it was a win for democracy. Plus my mom gets karma points for fulfilling her civic duty.
One unwelcome bonus** is the extra political coverage we’ve been getting. Ads, rallies, signs everywhere. I was hoping after yesterday’s results came back we’d see some normal news again. Ha! The big headline on CNN right now, taking over this morning’s announcement of the Texas totals, is “Battle for Pennsylvania.” The Pennsylvania primary is April 22nd. As in SEVEN WEEKS from now.
Two years out of every four we’re swamped with this presidential campaign crap. In my dreams political junkies spend the other two being force-fed 24-hour news feeds about science.
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* Our precinct holds both primaries in the same room. I don’t know if this is a common practice.
** Can a bonus be a bad thing? Etymology says no, but you know what I mean.
Tags: miscellany