10. Our Sunday morning starts at 4am... that’s when one of our producers sends everyone the news that happened since we went to bed on Saturday night. From there, we change the show to incorporate that news, rewriting scripts, updating our guests, and changing our line of questioning.
9. Candy reads about fifty pages of briefing PER GUEST. Every week.
8. Our control room, Control A, is equipped so that we can watch nearly 100 different screens at one time.
It’s BRACKET Time! But, you might want to laminate this one, because – unlike the NCAA tournament that kicks off tomorrow – this one will take a little longer to play out than the month-long tournament. Forty-three months longer, in fact.
Yes, it’s the Election 2016 Presidential Bracket, with the promise of bragging rights, victory dances and the ever-enviable “I toldya so” to the most adept political prognosticator.
With the inauguration now over, it’s time for DC to return to normal. Well, easier said than done. Yes, the nets and fences and road closure that tangled the nation’s capital last weekend have gone away, but this city has a way of never really reaching that condition called “normal” – rather, it tends to flit from event to event and mess to mess.
Three months ago, we were in full Election Mode. Three weeks ago, we were falling off the fiscal cliff. January began with fleets of moving trucks bringing new members to Capitol Hill and carrying away the belongings of those who had retired or lost. Three days ago, we were ushering in the second presidency of Barack Obama; and three hours ago the area was still trying to gain its footing after an inch – yes, an inch – of snow. Normal DC? We don’t even know what that is anymore.