Tuesday will mark a beginning for one of the presidential candidates and a new era in American politics. As their campaigns shift into high gear, though, we are already mourning what is about to come to an end — the sassy political coverage that has made us laugh through what could have been an otherwise tense election season.
Sure, we’ll still have “30 Rock,” but we will miss Tina Fey’s spot-on Sarah Palin impressions. Without her mavericky take on our favorite former beauty queen and hockey mom, “Saturday Night Live” will lose its magic and again revert to being that show we TiVo, but mostly fast forward through. We can only hope that Fey will “go rogue” and continue her guest appearances, despite saying her gun-toting, “you betcha” quoting days will end with the election. Her “pew, pew, pew” sounds will always ring in our hearts, but life will truly be a little emptier.
On Comedy Central, the Indecision 2008 specials with Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert made us take a step back from the political frenzy and laugh at how the mainstream media blew many issues out of proportion. Without election spoofs, both comics will probably go back to talking about other issues, like the economy, that we’d really rather not think about.
After Tuesday, Joe the Plumber (and Joe Six-Pack) will go back to their lives as Average Joes. With their 15 minutes of fame over, how will we know what real Americans are thinking? In post-election America, plumbers’ main priority will once again be clogged drains, a less interesting topic than the nation’s future for sure.
Locally, we’ll also miss the unintentionally hilarious Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio/County Attorney Andrew Thomas campaign ads. Whether we agree with their politics or not, their fear-inspiring TV appearance was one of the most laughable local ads of the election.
In Arpaio’s words, voters have “no other choice” but to re-elect him and his good buddy if they want to keep streets safe from those dastardly illegal immigrants. Thomas and Arpaio’s deadpan warnings brought a change of pace from commercials that bored us. After Tuesday, we’ll have to go back to the less-than-funny antics of the Geico cavemen and Esurance cartoons.
With political hot topics decided, our letters-to-the-editor section of the opinion pages will also be a lot smaller. No matter what was going on in the news or at ASU, for the last several months we could always count on several angry missives about the constitutionality of gay marriage. Time will tell what the next issue to grab students’ attention will be, but we could be in for a dry spell for a while.
Overall, once the election is over, what will we have left to talk about? Politics has edged its way into almost all of our conversations in the last few months, so it will take some effort to fill that void. One thing is sure, though — whether red or blue rules the day on Tuesday, life after election coverage will be far less colorful.
