my unsolicited side effects...

“Я считаю, что совершенно неважно, кто и как будет в партии голосовать; но вот что чрезвычайно важно, это – кто и как будет считать голоса.”
“I believe that it does not matter who and how the Party will vote; but that what is very important is – who will count the votes.”
- Soviet Premier Joseph Stalin, in 1923, as quoted in Boris Bazhanov’s Memoirs of Stalin’s Former Secretary, III Tysiacheletie, 2002

Floyd: “Doyle, I know I gave him four threes! He had to make a switch! We can’t let him get away with it.”
Doyle Lonnegan: “What was I supposed to do? Call him for cheating better than me?“
- “The Sting“, Universal Pictures, 1973

It should come as absolutely no surprise that in any contest where the stakes are high it isn’t just the game itself that’s competitive – so is cheating at it: We’ve seen it in the Olympics, Cycling, Major League Baseball, NASCAR… heck, even with Scrabble®. And politics - the ne-plus-ultra of competitions, owing to the power, influence, and financial gain it can confer to the winner(s) and their supporters - is no exception. Examples abound, such as this, this, and possibly this, to provide only three.

Let’s face it: In this Presidential Election, all sides are going to cheat whenever they can, wherever they can, and as much as they can without being caught, just as they’ve done in the past and will continue to do – after all, as Vince Lombardi said, “Winning isn’t everything – it’s the only thing!” (…which reminds me, there’s cheating in the NFL, at least by the Patriots and Jets).

So, let’s not be bothered by reports of possible election cheating, such as:

• Some voting precincts in Alabama, Colorado, Illinois, Missouri and Utah have more registered voters than actual residents – and, these states could fall to Obama!
• The Romney family has invested in a company that makes electronic voting machines – and they’re huge Romney supporters!
• The SEIU is responsible for setting up and maintaining some electronic voting machines – and they’re huge Obama supporters!
• On some voting machines, selecting “Romney” actually votes for “Obama” - which would be support for Obama!
• People may vote multiple times – especially when coached by Democrats - who are huge Obama supporters!
• George Soros owns a Spanish company (SCYTL) that will count all the electronic ballots offshore – and he’s a huge Obama supporter!
• Do we have enough ammunition to stop a zombie apocalypse when 1.8 million dead people vote at the polls? – these “undead” could be huge Obama supporters, especially if they were grannies who died in wheelchairs being thrown off cliffs!
• In North Carolina, people over 110 years old are voting – and, they’re mostly voting Democrat!

Instead, please be sure to vote on Tuesday, November 6th (unless you’re illegal, dead, or want to vote multiple times – let’s leave the real cheating to professionals): Otherwise, the vote counters won’t have any votes to manipulate – even hypothetically – and certainly none of us want that!

(Oh, and even if by some rare occurrence nobody cheats, accusations will still be thrown around like claims of who invented the Internet, George Bush “stealing” the 2000 Election, and “Global Warming“. These days, it’s inevitable!)

Thanks for reading!