Legal was stern this morning at the Production Meeting. ”Keep it mirthful and moving,” said the Intern, and we nodded,

We aging Salts were going to talk about the mass flights by unknown drone aircraft over Air Force and Navy bases we are not supposed to notice, like the foreign gangs that have taken over some buildings near where we used to live in Colorado. Those stories are part of another stream of emotional blathering.

The new message meanings are a little startling and lots of fun. They should be fun on the last 20-day ride to whatever the result of this circus is going to be.

We were going to lurch from little drones to big ones with mention of talk the Boeing Strike that has resulted in a lay-off of 10% of the aerospace giant’s workforce- 17,000 hourly folks- and the push-back of introduction of a new line of working jets. Or why India might have been sponsoring assassination attempts against people in Canada, two previously fairly peaceful places. Or the fact that the armed man arrested at the Trump rally over the weekend is actually a Red politician exercising his 2nd Amendment rights.

But as you know, we don’t claim to understand much about the end of the endless campaign except marvel at the motion and keep moving the fry pan to ensure the egg mixtre sets up for the sauteed veggies and cheese.

Early voting in Virginia began back on September 25, and most of us took the opportunity to go over to the Courthouse, produce an ID and get the duty out of the way. It was easy, secure, and took about fifteen minutes to be back in the Uber, sipping from that flask of Grand Mariner in celebration.

So, you can see why we voted early. We don’t have to be partisan about this and can spend a little time wondering about why two sons of Osama bin Laden are being supported by the Taliban in Afghanistan in their quest to avenge the death of their father. It is quite a come-back for the older one, who was previously reported as “deceased.”

The outside stuff is all mixed up with the inside partisan activity. If this was a local election, we might not have bothered since this is such a solidly Blue district in Northern Virginia. We are largely populated by the people who operate- or claim to operate- this vast complex machine of government. So, we normally vote for more of it and there is not much point in opposing it. Which is why there an electoral collegewas included to balance things out a little between town and country.

But like the electoral base, the one in which the Auto Workers and Teamsters seem to be leaning toward the Orange fellow, that may be changing. Usually, the Blue tally in early voting is much larger, since the Red voters lack imagination and vote on The Day, In Person. It evokes tradition or something. But word this morning is that a lot of people can’t wait to get things out of the way, and there might be some tension between the vast red swath of districts that lead out to Kentucky from our virtuous Blue NoVA.

We appreciate the excitement of the actual day and the bustle across the parking lot at the district polling station with the lines and signs and people waiting. As of yesterday. there was something new in the tallies. The early voting/absentee ballot numbers cast were reported as around 700,000 ballots (693,662), 52.8% for Blue, 41.5% for Red and the remainder of those unable to choose a primary color.

While Blue holds the advantage in total votes cast, Reds are closing the traditional gap. IN previous General Elections, Blue would be running around 30% ahead, not the less than 12% in this outing. So, you can sense a little unease in the national messaging.

The decision to retire the current President and replace him with a younger, more vivacious candidate seemed to produce some optimism for a new start filled with joy with most of the same people. It seemed to be working while everyone stayed inside and let the bands play, but the bloom seemed to come off the rose and public appearances seemed to worsen the trend, since the two senior officials are apparently not singing entirely from the same electoral hymnal. Something about one staff, the senior one, being miffed at their treatment by the people who showed up the week before the convention to thank everyon for the opportunity to manage the Free World.

Two former Chiefs were trotted out to stem the perception in the messaging, one of them scolding part of his party’s base voters, and the other explaining the border problem with the observation that the falling American birthrate needed to be shored up with the mass importation of undocumented and un-vetted migrants who occasionally take over a “handful” of apartment buildings and bludgeon a few young women to death.

When you make tasty omelets, there is a regrettable but necessary need to break some eggs, right? Legal says we can be concerned about whose eggs those might be, but that conversation seemed to be over a while ago, you know?

A long while.

Copyright 2024 Vic Socotra
www.vicsocotra.com.