2020: a monoblogue year in review

I was very tempted not to do this – because who really wants to relive 2020 – but for posterity’s sake decided to go with it. In truth, this may be one of the shorter reviews I’ll ever do.

At the dawn of the year in January I wanted to take my writing in a new direction while examining the state of the TEA Party. That dearth of posts was made up for somewhat in February as I took a hard look at our political duopoly and played a second season of fantasy baseball. (Will there be a third? Stay tuned.) I suppose it was prophetic for this year that I was looking for the reset button, but not for the obvious reason.

It seems like forever ago, but remember when we heard that Rush Limbaugh had advanced-stage lung cancer and received the Presidential Medal of Freedom at the State of the Union? (It’s more famous now for Nancy Pelosi’s speech treatment.) It was a rush to condemn, and I discussed it twice. Meanwhile, that long series on the Democrat contenders I began in March 2019 finally came to an end with the not-so-elite eight only for me to begin a new series on splitting the opposition – a look at the Indivisible movement, which continued in March with a look at its founders.

In that pre-pandemic era, I was surprised by some turns in the Democrat presidential race (looking back, the biggest shock was yet to come!) But what really got me was the hype vs. the reality regarding the CCP virus and how the world was placed on hold and eventually became a business state of emergency. Suddenly the state of the TEA Party didn’t seem as important.

After some server issues knocked me offline for a time in April, I returned to talk about a clash of the titans in my erstwhile political home, the Maryland GOP. The other clash I got into was the beginning of the anti-lockdown movement – remember 15 days to slow the spread? Some people actually took them at their word.

It was also the first anniversary of Rise and Fall, so I commemorated the event with a look in the rearview mirror.

The merry month of May brought the final installment of one of Maryland’s few remaining conservative blogging outlets, so I had my thoughts about my former cohorts at Red Maryland. But I also had some fun rebutting a request to talk about the National Popular Vote movement. (We now see why it’s so ill-thought out.)

That month the Delaware political scene began to fire up, first with Governor Carnage pulling the football out from First State businesses then my look at the statewide Delaware political races: U.S. Senate, U.S. House, Governor, Lieutenant Governor, and Insurance Commissioner. I ended the month by detailing my weekend to remember.

June began with a long-neglected category of odds and ends, and continued with the conclusion of the long-neglected series on splitting the opposition. It also touched on the controversy regarding the Talbot Boys statue in Easton, which is still standing despite opposition.

Also still standing is the District of Columbia, which some want to make into a state despite the Constitutional mandate that it be a district. But who cares about the Constitution when it gets in the way of political power?

I do care about the Constitution Party, but it got some troubling news during that month, while the Delaware GOP field for governor expanded to five. Just as July began, though, one of the top contenders withdrew and endorsed another.

The sad news to begin the month was the season that never was, and I commemorated Independence Day with an encore performance of a post from 2016. I also came back with a fresh helping of odds and ends.

Our Delaware political races finally came into shape, with the added benefit of the now semi-annual monoblogue Accountability Project.

But most of the subsequent three months was devoted to perhaps my most devoted long-term project: a dossier series covering statewide candidates in both federal and state races. Thanks to that, I didn’t write on another topic until September when I finally discussed a day for adulting. I also made it three editions of odds and ends for the year.

Since it was time for the Delaware primary, I also got to make my fearless forecasts and found they were prescient picks. A few days later, the nation was stunned by the need for the notorious RBG replacement.

It was me that needed the replacement when October began. My trusty old laptop finally quit so I had to get a new one, which explained my absence. Later that month, I endorsed my choices for Delaware and asked if my former home in Wicomico County would lose its Republican County Council majority in a special election.

We had the election in November. The first thing I did was to admit I should never say never. I did even more odds and ends, including a milestone. Predictions were made and results were analyzed. And we also found out that people are leaving certain networks and social media outlets because they find them too biased against their point of view.

Oddly enough, I didn’t do a Thanksgiving post (part of the reason being we were away) but I considered once again the fate of the Constitution Party and defined some rights as the month wore on. It all led to December, which as is traditional led off with my anniversary post and the induction of the newest class of the Shorebird of the Week Hall of Fame.

The month actually had a lot of news about the Delmarva nine, as their fate in the revamped world of minor league baseball was revealed. It allowed me to make some pleasing non-political predictions.

I still found out that the Delaware General Assembly wasn’t waiting to come up with bad ideas and the Constitution Party wasn’t waiting to come up with excuses for their lack of performance in November.

Wrap it up with my annual Christmas post, and that’s how my year went. It went really slow and really quickly all at the same time.