There was already one this morning, and you may have seen it. You know, it’s another in the torrent of information in which the narratives successfully immerse us. There is still “breaking news,” of course, but it is under constant manipulation to suit the various Greater Purposes. We were told before we even got seated not to make points about either of the Nashville issues, or the ones in Louisville or Dadeville. The Company is trying to avoid being dragged into an inadvertent Beer Moment like the team at Budweiser.

The Overton Window is moving at a remarkable pace. Remember the OW? That used to define an area of suitability for discussion of social and behavioral issues. It moved swiftly, then has been left wide open for a while.

That thing this morning in this place? There is- finally- some OW discussion about the two criminal assaults in two high schools located in what used to be Virginia’s Horse Country. It was an awful account when it was initially reported. Almost outside what could be discussed, including the dress worn by the perpetrator. Then it happened again after the perp was transferred to another school and permitted to do the crime again.

There is more, of course, and Legal said we could observe the return of the issue- boys in girls rest rooms- but keep our mouths shut on the aspect of what is breaking. They specifically want no discussion of the proposal in Loudoun County to spend $11 Million to alter bathrooms to better accommodate whatever the immediate goal of the School Board there might be. We agreed, since we could not objectively find a basis for the changes except to make the original crimes harder to detect.

That agreements left us a little short on content for this lovely day. Splash had been tasked with
managing the new book project. There had been a wave of excitement about that, since the story had some memorable moments in exotic places. It could even be construed as a reflection of how some parts of the government used to work if you include the banging the bells at the Shwedagon in Rangoon, a couple bikinis brightly displayed on the GTMO Naval Reservation, and an enjoyable private lunchtime conversation with a Deputy Minister of the North Korean Communist Party in Pyongyang.

There is an immediate issue about footnotes. We understand that the accounts could be interpreted as a self-aggrandizing series of ego-centric recollections with an outsized emphasis on only a few the gears turning in part of a great machine. It is what you get from gearheads, but we are sensitive on instruction from the Legal Team. And we think we are compliant if we periodically remind people not to hold us accountable for things done (or undone) thirty years ago.

Having solved both immediate production problems this morning , except where that strange trip to New Delhi comes in. We are of a mind to include it, since it followed some of the lessons-learned in all of them. Except in that last one, we actually led the Delegation. It was after our little narrative about the stint in the Office of Legislative Affairs, so it was on behalf of another branch of the Government. Same tunes, different orchestra. But it was travel, and there was music in the lobby bar of the Imperial Hotel. It was kind of catchy.

So, stand by! We may all be stuck with what pours in through that wide-open Overton Window!

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