As this is my final “Left, Right and Center” of the 2015-2016 school year, I’d like to take this time to both partially reflect on the lessons I’ve learned while writing this column and at the same time, I’d like to clue you wonderful readers in to what’s happening politically over the summer. Don’t worry, I’m coming back in the fall with a whole new slate of columns.

First, it’s time to get down to brass tacks. The weather is heating up, and so are the primary contests. On Tuesday, voters in Connecticut, Delaware, Maryland, Pennsylvania and Rhode Island allocated 462 Democratic delegates, with 163 delegates to Bernie Sanders and 284 delegates to Hillary Clinton. This all but puts the nomination out of reach for Bernie, confirming that this time around, the American electorate wasn’t “Feeling the Bern.”

For the Republicans there were 172 delegates up for grabs. As it shook out, 105 went to Donald Trump, one was won by Ted Cruz, and five were awarded to John Kasich. What this indicates is that Trump’s once outsider campaign has become much more, and these victories will likely propel him to a win at the GOP Convention, even if it is contested.

These most recent primaries are followed by ones in Indiana, West Virginia, Oregon, California, Montana, New Jersey (which puts a whopping 142 delegates into play on the Democratic side), New Mexico and South Dakota. In that time there are also solely Democratic primaries in Guam, Kentucky and Washington D.C., with a caucus in North Dakota, and solely a Republican primary
in Nebraska.

It’s also worth keeping an eye on the Libertarian primary, where former New Mexico Governor Gary Johnson looks to be making another run at the White House.

All this leads into the two largest events of the summer: the Democrat and Republican National Conventions. From July 18 to 21, the GOP will hold their convention in Cleveland, Ohio and will decide who their nominee will be in the general election. This could be Trump, Cruz, Kasich or, in the event that none of the candidates hits the required threshold of delegates won, maybe even a name we haven’t heard yet.

Immediately following that, the Democrats will hold their convention from July 25 through the 28 in Philadelphia, Pa. There, one of the two remaining candidates will accept their party’s nomination. At this time, I’d like to mention that you’ll be able to peek in with me on Twitter as I cover the convention live from Philladelphia. Simply log on to Twitter and follow me at @M_J_Kass, where I’ll be posting tweets from the convention floor.

Now that we’ve gotten the necessary stuff out of the way first, I’d like to move on to the Oscar speech portion of my column.

One person that I really want to thank is former Editor-in-Chief Ethan Stoetzer. When I came to him in September with the idea for what would later become this column he helped me to flesh it out fully and make it what it has become. I would also like to thank former Photo Editor (and next year’s Managing Editor) Justin Fata. When I came to him in need of a headshot for the paper, he captured my good side, the face you saw in the paper almost every week. I’d also like to thank the rest of the editors and staff at “The Whit,” who put up with me hyperactively bouncing around the office on Wednesdays during
the semester.

And finally, I’d like to thank you, the readers. With out your support, online page views, and physical readership of the paper, I would just be throwing my opinions out into the void like a loony man, and that’s something I could never abide by.

Have a great summer, and remember to keep up with the election.