Fireworks reduced to firecrackers

I got my first taste of the current climate at the Summit County Board of Elections today. For the political taste buds, it was more bitter than sweet.

Alex Arshinkoff and Wayne Jones continued their political tango. AA with just enough verbal disdain for any agenda items that aren't quite fixed or corrected ... all while waiting to see what issues make him a punchline in Wayne's World. Jones rarely raises his voice at these meetings, choosing instead to play quiet verbal volleyball and spike the set when necessary.

Last week's meeting certainly one upped any of the Presidential debates. The foul language flew as well as the personal attacks. Good enough for front-page headlines in the ABJ. This week, tempers stayed in check ... even if the tone of the words remained terse at best.

As per usual, the pair agreed-to-disagree on petitions for Central Committee candidates -- the mass of folks who will later select a smaller mass of folks who later select the one mass to chair the Republican Party.

Got it? Make sense? Right!

AA has a mass that he supports; Kevin Coughlin has made it clear that he has his own mass with a goal of making AA's a mass casualty. (Insert joke here).

And no BOE meeting would be complete without Coughlin's name being tossed around. Coughlin wasn't there, but the one time his name did come up, AA snapped back on it. To be honest, I was a bit confused at the board's action regarding Coughlin's absence to defend certain issues, but I heard Coughlin later on WAKR claiming that he hadn't been officially notified of the meeting as required by law (he says) so he was contesting whatever action had been taken.

So all kidding aside .. where does this leave us as a community just six weeks til the election? Tough to tell.

It doesn't seem like anyone can agree on anything at these meetings. And no matter what anyone at the table suggests, someone else implies there's really a secondary agenda.

Plus, the Secretary of State must be mentioned a minimum of 20 times .. ( so much so that at times, I felt like college kids could make a drinking game by tossing one back every time they heard the SOS uttered from members at the table.)

The only sure thing is that at least once per meeting someone on the board must lecture the crowd about the importance of having a democracy and how we should all be proud that we live in one.

Now, if only the board members could agree on that point ...