The election is over

No, that's not a prediction as to any outcomes -- it's just an existential decision on the part of the Montana Headlines editorial staff. It's not that we don't have any opinions about the ongoing campaigns and the various tussles and tangles of this election. It's just that it is just getting to be a gawd-awful bore. All of it. So it has been harder and harder to get worked up about this or that issue, controversy, or race. Certainly, it's been getting ever harder to write about it.

Since Montana Headlines is a virtual reality to begin with, we thought -- why not just declare that the election is over, at least as far as Montana Headlines is concerned? According to the self-imposed rules of this virtual political universe -- anything is possible. Suddenly, the world seems more interesting again. Free at last, as they say.

What has this election cost us? Well, no commentary on the Billings Symphony opener and the brilliance of Valentina Lisitsa's Rachmaninoff. No discussion of the disturbing cultural implications for Billings of having Ed Kemmick's band break up (OK -- we'll tell that part: It was the usual, per the word on the street -- nice kids they wanted to have more time to visit, wanting to enjoy good microbrews with friends rather than practice guitar, happy marriages that made them want to stay home -- the same sad story that afflicts every folk/blues band made up of straight-shooting, middle-aged guys with ordinary day jobs.)

No discourse on The New Criterion's issue on higher education that we picked up while traveling (the May issue -- that's how much this politics stuff gets in the way of life) -- let alone their annual poetry issue. No reflections on re-reading Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice for the first time since college, or on Montana Shakespeare in the Park's summer offerings. Or how about that gratifying New Yorker article on Sibelius -- how long ago was that?

And what of the opening of hunting season, the smell of fall in the air, and the smell of the fall of the Oakland Raiders? It's hard to be missing all of that -- and then the realization hits: one doesn't have to write about politics, just because the election is around the corner and the expectation is that a political blog has to be in the thick of the flying mud.

Wake us up when that November 4 thing is over and tell us who won what. We'll decide if we want to comment on it.