My Democratic Duty (as a Fellow Democratic Socialist of Questionably Sound Mind from a Similarly Underpopulated State)

I just finished voting in the Democrats Abroad primary, where I checked the box for Barack Obama in the hopes that he'll get all 22 of the delegates that the DNC has set aside for those of us who have fled until Democrats take control of the country again. When I showed up at the Rothermere Institute to vote, I went downstairs to a conference room flanked by tables of pens and paper, with a big plastic tub of ballots and a mostly-eaten plate of free Oreos at the far end. Except for the hum of the fluorescent lights, the place was pretty quiet. The whole thing took under a minute - I filled in my name and address, ticked the box next to Obama, signed my name with a flourish, and took off for the library. (And since I'm still full from yesterday's pancakes and preparing to do another round tonight, I reluctantly passed up the stale Oreos.)

On the way up the stairs, I passed a bunch of festively patriotic signs directing people to the polling place, alongside printed sheets that just said HILLARY CLINTON! or BARACK OBAMA! which kind of seemed like a sad attempt to replicate the insanity of Super Tuesday on Ash Wednesday. I stopped for a second, glanced around, and almost wrote MIKE GRAVEL!!! on one of them, but then thought better of it. It's going to come down to the convention in Denver, and I would feel terrible if my misplaced sarcasm created an inexplicable surge of support for Gravel overseas.