Jealous

It’s not just the mutton barbecue (okay, it’s mostly the mutton barbecue) that has me envying Evan McMorris-Santoro’s assignment this weekend. The Fancy Farm Picnic is a vestige of a romanticized politics of days gone by, but those days aren’t entirely a figment of our nostalgia. If people seemed more engaged with electoral politics in the 19th and early 20th centuries, it’s because before TV, movies, and video games, election campaigns were one of the few shows in town. It was bloodsport as entertainment way before Crossfire came along. Evan reviews his day in Fancy Farm.