2012 review: What the Valley was talking about

2012 has been a doozy, but now it’s on to bigger and better things – I hope!

Here’s a look through my eyes at some of the biggest stories in our area for 2012:

• Fresh on  everyone’s mind is that fiscal cliff. It’s all we could talk about heading up to the end of the year. Here’s a look back at some Daily Item coverage of the issue.
• School districts made big news this year as budget cuts continued to impact everyone. The Warrior Run school district, in particular, saw some troubles with both their budget and teacher contract negotiations.
• But people really came together to honor those that were tragically taken from us and honor their memories - like at the Kirk and Mayson Mahaffey Memorial Ride in September.
• Reality television contiuned to amaze us – but recent shows highlighting Pennsylvania’s Amish populations were blasted by experts.
• We also got reports of Bigfoot in the region – maybe this could lead to some big news in 2013…..

What were your big stories of the year?

12/12/12!

Yesterday was 12/12/12!

While some people scoff, these date-based days won’t be around again until 2101 – so if you missed your opportunity to celebrate, you have a while to wait for the next time!

Here’s some ways our Facebook friends said they were having fun yesterday:

Other cool replies included:

 

• Justin Yoder:  My family and I are at Disney World!
• Marissa Stigerwalt: Possibly giving birth today. Fingers crossed!
• Kristi Bell-Goss: My birthday!!!

I tweeted:

12:12 ON 12/12/12!

— Ashley Wislock (@wisashl) December 12, 2012

What did you do on 12/12/12?

What do you think: it this the end?

A Facebook post yesterday blew up when I asked whether people thought the world was really going to end in 2012, like many people think the Mayans predicted.

Here’s a sampling of some of the replies:

While most of the replies were basically saying that it’s all a crock, some had thought-provoking messages.

Here’s some of my favorites:

From Sarah Leib:

Let’s be realistic here… Someday the world will die. The sun will explode and it will happen very quickly. We will have a short time to gather family before we freeze or the explosion reaches us. BUT… as it has been stated by scientists, we are in no danger of this happening in our lifetime. There will be no zombies or doomsday. It is all just hype stated on the internet that just so happened to go viral. Worst that will happen is a solar storm that will knock out electronics. And to some, that probably would be the end of the world. But.. I think we could all use a good ole dose of reality ad pull our faces out of modern technology. Let the fun begin!!! I, for one, do not plan on leaving my house for any reason that weekend because of the crazies. I will be armed and guard my house in case someone stupid trys looting for whatever reason. If it happens, then I will be with the ones I love… If not, see you all on the 22nd!!!

From Jeremy Moyer:

 I live each day as it’s my last anyway I don’t really pay attention to all the meaningless predictions. I just hope if it does happen that i will be holding my twenty month old son to let him know it’s gonna be o.k.

What do you think? Is the world going to end? And if so, what do you plan to do about it?

Romney/Obama voter mix-up also in Union County

The Daily Item received this video from a citizen who tried to vote in Union County, Pennsylvania. We had reported on the malfunctioning machine, so he sent it to us to confirm.

Votes for the Democratic candidate (listed second) were registered as Republican votes (listed first)

Below is the video. More information is here.

Voting Problems in Pennsylvania from Andy Hirsch on Vimeo.

Tired of the election?

By now, you’ve probably seen the video that’s become my latest obsession – the one with the little girl crying because she’s “tired of hearing Bronco Bamma and Mitt Romney.”

If not, allow me to make your day:

But I think there’s something very interesting here. Have elections just become too much?

In the three months I’ve been at the Daily Item, I’ve written a bunch of political articles – we all have. On Saturday, I followed people canvassing neighborhoods and making phone calls. It’s crunch time for them.

But without a doubt it gets tiring to turn on the TV every day and see another ad. Or read another horse-race article or see another poll result.

Should we stop covering it?

And when is it inappropriate to start thinking about the next election? Without a doubt, some people already are.

How do you tell people to stop it? There’s no law saying you can’t put up  political signs until a certain date. Or that you can’t speculate “who going to run in 2016″ until at least 2015.

What do you think? Is it too much campaigning? What should we do about it?