Heedless of the roaring machinery and tons of newsprint racing by inches from his elbow, the intrepid night editor rushed along the catwalk, leapt to the fire pole on the upper deck, slid skillfully to the lower level, ran up to the pressman and shouted in his ear: Stop the presses!
The pressman sounded the siren and pressed a toggle switch. The massive machine slowed, the sound diminishing. A worker trundled a cart carrying newly cast cylinders impressed with the reverse image of the front page. The headline, a mirror image of the page itself, screamed out in 72-point type:
"Deceased People on Pamlico County Voter Registration Rolls!"
Oh, the drama!
Cigarette dangling from his lip, the night editor returned to his office, put on his jacket, jammed a battered fedora on his head and called it a night. He felt the rumbling of the building as the presses started up again. He turned out the light, a note of regret on his face. If only he could have written a more surprising headline: "No Deceased People On Pamlico Voter Rolls!" That would be something - the only county in the nation.
Maybe next century. He fled into the dark shadows of the city, a dim street lamp in the distance.
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2 comments:
Ah, David, David... You are a member of the Board of Elections. Your charter and duty is to do your utmost to assure that the electoral process in Pamlico County is conducted in accordance with the applicable laws of the State of North Carolina. The people of Pamlico County deserve a chairman who, at least, appears to take the job seriously. Your flippancy and overblown churlish, rhetoric is indicative of an attempt to marginalize your own failure to give best effort to the office by taking the maintenance of the voter roles and the investigation of polling place irregularities seriously, at least publicly. Instead, over the life of these issues, you have tried to obfuscate, impede and you even stooped so low as to attack the messenger that pushed these issues. David, this is not worthy of the office. You have been chastised by the State BOE for attempting to "defuse" this mess. If you do, indeed, feel that maintenance of the rolls is a work to be scorned and satirized, childishly, perhaps you should consider another way to amuse yourself away from a position that demands, at the very least, the appearance of non-partisanship. I will see you at the next BOE meeting.
PS According to the "You Write Like" website, you write like Stephen King. But elections are not an appropriate topic for fiction from a public official.
David, I do not think that you are implicated in voter fraud but this is a serious issue and you do disservice to yourself, the BOE and the people of Pamlico County with your smarmy piece. This is not appropriate for a BOE Chairman. At least make-believe that you take the process a little seriously. Your position is a public trust and as such it deserves more than this.
You are a smart guy. Is childish satire appropriate to this issue?
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