But I’m also glad I won’t be doing the reporting gauntlet of Labor Day political parades, picnics and speeches on Monday, starting well before dawn and lasting into the night. The atrophy of Virginia’s political press corps, which once felt a slavish obligation to cover the annual end-of-summer pageantry, bears much of the blame. Warner won 23 localities in the region over Republican Mark Earley, 13 by double-digit percentage point margins — including Buena Vista and Covington. U.S. Rep. Bobby Scott’s Labor Day Cookout in Newport News, held annually since 1977 except for the pandemic years of 2020 and 2021, has held its own. But something has to fall by the wayside, and those Labor Day totems drew the short straw.