Dispatch from City Hall. The headline item from yesterday’s Board of Supervisors meeting — the item that provoked hundreds of people to show up to City Hall and stand in line for hours hoping for the chance to give a one-minute speech in front of their legislators and peers — was Supervisor Dean Preston’s resolution calling for a ceasefire in Gaza. The mass turnout was unsurprising; similar resolutions have now made the rounds in dozens of city councils across the Bay Area and nation, and each has inspired similarly large turnouts, protests and counterprotests. The thrilling (if improbable) premise of these resolutions is that local politicians can influence the outcome of a geopolitical conflict happening almost 8,000 miles away, and in no way under their jurisdiction, by uttering words like ceasefire, end the war, and no more killing. It’s something like an act of manifestation, a magic spell.

As of Tuesday evening, public comment on this resolution has lasted almost five hours and is ongoing. The attendees, most of whom appear to be repeating arguments from a “ceasefire talking points” document circulated via QR code in line, are unwearied. “This is the most important thing they’ll talk about all year,” a Doc Marten-wearing teenager told me, as we watched Preston introduce the resolution on the livestreamed broadcast in the overflow room. She was wearing a shirt that said “Gaza & Ferguson & Chiapas & Aleppo & Oakland & Standing Rock & Mindanao.” Most people had been nodding off as the supervisors voted on an array of local legislation (sweeping changes to the planning code which may bring the city into compliance with state law; a disbursal of $50 million to a nonprofit tasked, strangely, with developing a waterfront park; the redirection of nearly $300,000 to the city’s “Human Rights Commission,” which already gets over $20 million a year). Who cares about this stuff, one bored attendee said to another.

Who cares, indeed. The local stuff — the only stuff, incidentally, that means anything at all in the mouths of local politicians — is unsexy and technical, too niche to be a talking point or a slogan. The crowd wants nothing to do with zoning changes or shady nonprofits. They care little about the dysfunction on their doorstep. They want a moment of glory, a triumphant manifestation. And when do they want it? Now.