Friday, March 25, 2005

"Straight up now tell me..."

In 2000, widespread voting irregularities and problems caused confusion and errors in the Presidential Election, throwing its validity into doubt and sparking a call for election reform...which never happened. Ultimately, the Supreme Court stopped the vote count, no solutions were presented, Florida's vote remained screwed-up, and the broken American electoral system remained unfixed.

In 2004, problems persisted in highly contested states, such as Ohio, where outdated machines and understaffed precincts caused numerous reports of voting errors - including some precincts which recorded more votes than voters (I'll let you guess which candidate benefitted from those glitches). Yet, no revote, no electoral reform, no solution offered to fix the problems.

But Fox screws up the vote on American Idol and it's instantly corrected the next night with a complete revote! Yay! Democracy in action! The system works! It just makes me wonder - if an entertaining popularity contest of would-be celebrities garners more respect and faster, more decisive action than the American Presidency, why aren't we voting for the next American President on reality TV? I feel that that may be the only way to save democracy and insure a truly fair vote these days. Or, you know, we could actually allow people to vote.

Speaking of American idols, Paula Abdul is caught in a hit and run. What's the deal Paula? Is it gonna be you and me together (oh oh oh)...are you just having fun?

Ah, well, have some Pie and feel better. Pie!