Back in 2000 with the hanging chad and the uncertainty

[question everything]

a former co-worker, who was our PR and a great story teller, wrote an essay "Hoe I see the End of the Race" - which I found recently. Here is a very short version of it:

It is April 4, 2001 the race has not been decided, so Bush and Gore decided to solve it in a duel. Poor Gore shoots in all directions, and Bush, with one shot .357 magnum bullet hits Gore.

But then, the Democratic Attorney General (really?) of Texas, charge the governor of violating an anti-dueling law, from 1839. The state law is explicit and calls for a mandatory death penalty.

Meanwhile, in D.C. a spokesman for the NRA revealed that over two million new members joined during the four day period and the applications keep pouring in..

As governor of Texas, Bush commanded the legal power to to commute his own death sentence. He could also have granted himself a full and complete pardon. This he repeatedly refused to do, despite pleading from his wife and many letters and telegrams.

In the White House, president appointed Storm Thurmond, who later this month will celebrate his 100th birthday and who became a father for the fifth time last December...

[sandensea]

1. Ha! Don't remind me!

I lived in south Orange County (CA) at the time. Most people there just hated Clinton and, by extension, Gore.

The hatred was always vague and irrational; seldom over any particular point, except perhaps that "the black and browns like him - so I hate'im!"

As anyone who lived there at the time can tell you, those were days of roaring prosperity. Jobs aplenty, new construction going up everywhere, home values going up by $50-100k year after year. The sunshine wasn't just in the sky, let me tell you.

Eight years later, of course, things were different - very different. I knew of people who divorced - even a suicide - over not having sold their houses at the height of the real estate bubble in '05/'06. That, plus all the layoffs - and if that weren't enough, the meth scourge. You could feel the pall everywhere.

I left shortly afterward. I understand things have slowly but surely recovered, and that most voters have already forgotten the Bush calamity.

Human nature is probably the biggest advantage the GOP has.

[question everything]

2. And then, last November, OC voted for Hillary!

and housing prices rebound after 2010, I think.

[sandensea]

3. That's right!

Unimaginable in the Bob Dornan era, and even as recently as a decade ago.

Ah, I miss my friends in Laguna - and Laguna itself, of course.