Casting a Shadow on the Election

Cast is a wonderful word. One can cast a vote--but also a ball, a glance, a calf, a play, a shade, a shadow, a board, a mold, a dice, a tendency, a composit, a plan, a feather, or a fall. One can cast off, on, away, and iron.

As the United States plans to cast their votes, the press is breaking down voting  patterns and voters into tidy, small blocks. All this microdisection of the voters leads to these crazy ideas that a state or two or a county or two in a state or two will elect the next president. It is an ugly way of diminishing the individual vote.

 

Asimov once wrote a short story where one citizen was selected as the prototype citizen and he cast the only vote. Strangely there were two elections, the "elector", then the "president."

In this election the meaning "cast" may be "to vomit."