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Preferred way of deciding the President for once and all

by vroom (His Eminence)
on Nov 10, 2000 at 03:03 UTC ( [id://40847]=poll: print w/replies, xml ) Need Help??

Vote on this poll

Popular Vote
[bar] 47/16%
Arm Wrestling
[bar] 27/9%
Coin Flip
[bar] 3/1%
Ro-Sham-Bo
[bar] 53/18%
Picking a Florida Ballot at random
[bar] 18/6%
Who cares
[bar] 10/3%
Do we really need a president
[bar] 21/7%
Enough with the US-Centric polls
[bar] 46/15%
A 3 day battle royale
[bar] 54/18%
Other
[bar] 23/8%
302 total votes
Replies are listed 'Best First'.
RE: Preferred way of deciding the President for once and all
by extremely (Priest) on Nov 10, 2000 at 04:44 UTC
    I picked other because I have the best solution. I say we employ the Sit-Com Solution and make them move into the white house together! It's genius, we get both presidents with their various faults and benefits and plenty of cheap entertainment to boot!

    The only hard part is finding a good wacky neighbor for them to banter with... And then it hit me... Nader would make a perfect foil! Imagine the humor as Bush razzes Nader, and then when ever Gore tries to defend Nader, Nader says something about abolishing the TVA or anti-nuclear and pow it's Gore who is mad... Oh the laughs as the wives squabble about how to redecorate the Lincoln Room, the awkward sleeping arrangements, humor abounds!

    --
    $you = new YOU;
    honk() if $you->love(perl)

      I like it it. But lets get MTV to do the work! We can call it:

      The UnReal World

RE: Preferred way of deciding the President for once and all
by FouRPlaY (Monk) on Nov 10, 2000 at 03:15 UTC
    These are some good choices. I think I'll have to vote more than once... just like a real election.



    FouRPlaY
    Learning Perl or Going To Die Trying
RE: Preferred way of deciding the President for once and all
by wombat (Curate) on Nov 10, 2000 at 03:45 UTC
    Okay... It's time for another tale of "What's happening in Wombat's home." My house mate is an EXTREME Democrat. (This is the one I spoke of in my post RE: I watch the Olympics) She founded the "College Democrats" club at my college before graduating. She worked on the Gore campaign as well as all the Democratic campaigns in the local area (i.e Congressional house race, etc). She came back home on the seventh, to find me and my roommate watching Dexter's Lab on Cartoon Network.

    "AMERICA IS FULL OF IDIOTS!" she exclaimed "THEY DESERVE TO HAVE AN IDIOT AS THEIR PRESIDENT!" She then stormed into her room. Naturally, the next day when it was discovered that Gore still had a chance she was all smiles, and happily told me that lawyers still had a purpose and they were being sent en masse to Florida. She seemed utterly surprised when I informed her I don't really care who got to be President, as the government would still function exactly the same way. (And I insinuated that I would lose more graciously than she did)

    I'm a "Decline to State" voter. I tend to vote conservatively, but refuse to ally myself with the Republicans. I voted for Bush. To me picking a president is like picking the hood ornament on a giant combine. No matter what you choose the machine is still large, rather ugly and does it's job. If it turns towards you and runs over you, you're splattered in a million pieces, much like if the NSA, FBI, CIA, or any of the other three letter departments decide you've got too much freedom. No matter who the president is, I will do pretty much the same as always. Hiding from the eye of the government, do my own thing on the hacking (not cracking) front and try not to get caught giving away things like the De-CSS code. I wonder if I can show her that the govt is not really in the best interests of the people...

    ~W
      I could hardly agree with her more. After all that's gone on in the last few months, it is becoming clear to me that most Americans are idiots or otherwise do not bother to use their brains in any way whatsoever, and pretty much deserve whatever they get. As for the rest, go Libertarians!

      I would have to tend to agree with you. Both of those folks will not make all that much of a difference. The machine will run on, esp now that the legislature is split.

      Roy Alan

      To me picking a president is like picking the hood ornament on a giant combine. No matter what you choose the machine is still large, rather ugly and does it's job.

      What a charming but naive attitude. Good job Hitler isn't standing (or is he?).

      From here it seems totally weird that Americans appear content to elect someone who's - lets be polite - 'not the sharpest tool in the toolshed'. Gore may be wooden but Bush is as thick as two short planks

      I could lie down like a tired child,
      And weep away the life of care
      Which I have borne, and yet must bear.
      Shelley 1792-1822

        Multiple choice:

        1. Which candidate failed out of his Divinity studies?

        • Gore?
        • Bush?

        2. Which candidate flew jets (which requires quite a bit of intelligence)?

        • Gore?
        • Bush?

        3. Which candidate has his Harvard MBA?

        • Gore?
        • Bush?

        4. Which candidate went to a temple to raise funds and then declared he didn't know any better?

        • Gore?
        • Bush?
        J. J. Horner
        Linux, Perl, Apache, Stronghold, Unix
        jhorner@knoxlug.org http://www.knoxlug.org/
        
        What a charming but naive attitude. Good job Hitler isn't standing (or is he?).

        From here it seems totally weird that Americans appear content to elect someone who's - lets be polite - 'not the sharpest tool in the toolshed'. Gore may be wooden but Bush is as thick as two short planks


        But my point is, no matter which one of these guys gets into office, how's that going to affect the NSA? What'll NASA be like in four years? How bout the BATF? Pretty much exactly the same. You support the middle one cause it's your best chance of getting off this rock, and you fear the other two. The departments have the power nowadays. With Congress split as badly as it is, and with the American people divided 50/50 on who gets in, the beuracracy will be thicker than ever. Nothing will get done. Except in the various agencies that do their job without the need for a congressional or popular vote. The BATF will still raid houses and blow up "evil people". The CIA will continue to spy on the Iraquis, and the FBI will continue to look for the truth. The fnords will continue, with Bush or Gore in office.

        ~W
        Heh heh. My 23rd post, I used the word "fnord"
RE: Preferred way of deciding the President for once and all
by arturo (Vicar) on Nov 10, 2000 at 03:26 UTC

    /me pictures W. ...

    "Good ol' rock ... nothing beats Rock"

    /me pictures Gore

    "Poor old W. Always chooses Rock"

    Or some variant thereon.

    ... (with apologies to bart n' lisa)

    Philosophy can be made out of anything. Or less -- Jerry A. Fodor

RE: Preferred way of deciding the President for once and all
by amelinda (Friar) on Nov 10, 2000 at 03:21 UTC
    What we'd love to see:
    Candidate #1: "I'll roshambo you for it."
    Candidate #2: "Sure, you go first."
RE: Preferred way of deciding the President for once and all
by chromatic (Archbishop) on Nov 10, 2000 at 11:07 UTC
    I say, count up all of the times each of the two main contenders complain, publicly, about the delay, potential fraud, confusing ballots, and multiply by the number of times any member of his staff threatens legal action.

    Whoever has the highest score will be set adrift, pantsless, on a raft in the middle of the ocean. The remaining candidate gets caned on general principle, then takes the Oval Office.

    It's time to put the fear of the American voter's disgust into politicians again.

RE: Preferred way of deciding the President for once and all
by clemburg (Curate) on Nov 10, 2000 at 07:28 UTC

    "Picking a Florida Ballot at random" - mathematically speaking, this is not very different from what is happening right now, is it.

    perl -e 'print "America is currently relying on ", sprintf("%.6f", ($ARGV[0]/(48787586+48977721+2671144))*100), " % of its voters to make the decision on the presidency"'

    Just take as argument for this small one-liner the current number of Florida votes separating Bush and Gore.

    Christian Lemburg
    Brainbench MVP for Perl
    http://www.brainbench.com

(jcwren) RE: Preferred way of deciding the President for once and all
by jcwren (Prior) on Nov 10, 2000 at 08:28 UTC
      I'm confused here... I though that Ro-sham-bo was when both parties kicked each other as hard as possible in the groin until someone gave up or fell over. Like in South Park where Robert Smith "from the Cure!" Ro-sham-bos Cartman for the wristwatch radio.

      And I leave you with the blurb from the Robert Rankin book "The Garden of Unearthly Delights" - Few people noticed it at first. The changes. The were subtle to begin with. Like when the Leader of the Opposition challenged the PM (Prime Minister) to step outside and settle things man to man. And the PM agreed.

      ____________________
      Jeremy

RE: Preferred way of deciding the President for once and all
by marius (Hermit) on Nov 10, 2000 at 04:09 UTC
    Eeps. I clicked on the second choice, but I really meant to pick something else! Whatever shall I do?

    /me goes back to the geritol.

      Going by what I've seen, you have several other options.

      • phone up Pat Buchanan and ask him what hethinks
      • demand a re-vote
      • threaten legal action
      • wait for the absentee ballots to come in.

      Philosophy can be made out of anything. Or less -- Jerry A. Fodor

        Hey, don't forget option #5: Call in Jesse Jackson to raise some hell.
RE: Preferred way of deciding the President for once and all
by Maclir (Curate) on Nov 10, 2000 at 04:53 UTC
    Well, no matter who wins, you "lucky" 'mericans will be stuck with a politician. Heads you lose, tails you lose. Strange that in a country where even the council dog catcher seems to be up for election, you cannot devise and run a simple ballot - list the candidates on a piece of paper, have a box next to each name, you tick (or mark the box) or the person you want as president (or the person you dislike the least). Have exactly the same ballot paper in every polling booth, every county, every state.

    Simple, no?

      See, that would make sense. If it's one thing (perhaps the only thing) that American politicians are good at, it is not making any sense.

      /\/\averick

      Of course, that totally ignores the fact of state and county and city level elections needing to be run as well. I have this vision of every single election in the country on one ballot... it'd be 200 pages long and the first 25 would just be the instructions.

      Simple, sure. Useful, no.

        That would not be a problem. When you go to the polling booth, you are handed several ballot papers. One is to chose the president - one paper for the whole country. The second is to elect the senators for your state - each State (obviously) has its own paper - but the same format everywhere. Third - vote for your local congress person - one paper per seat (district? whatever you call 'em) but the same format nationwide. Finally, you county or city ballot paper.

        That format works here.

        In Texas, each precinct has their own ballots, with only the races applicable to that precinct on them. The different races are separated by lines to make it clear. Just like in school you fill in the oval with a pencil next to the person you want.

        As sinple as this sounds, people still mess this up. Pencils are provided at the stations for example, but there were still many ballots marked in ink. All kinds of stupid stuff.

        It would seem that no matter how simple you try to make things there are still people out there that do not care enough to take a moment to read the directions, ask the election officials at the polling place, or review the ballot when it is printed in the newspapers a week before-hand.

        No system would be perfect. We just have to find one that is less imperfect than the others.

        But I do love the idea of setting one of the candidates adrift and caning the other, LOL!

        Roy Alan

RE: Preferred way of deciding the President for once and all
by Poetic Justice (Monk) on Nov 11, 2000 at 10:00 UTC
    My preferred way? Duel at dawn, carried on CSPAN and CSPAN2, If CNN, CBS, NBC,FOX want to broadcast they are told to go to hell. No proxies allowed, no champions, just the candidates in a steel cage deathmatch. Allow the personalities from the WWF to provide the commentary and let Stone Cold Steve Austin interview the winner. If the winner / wanker pisses off Stone Cold, he stomps a mudhole in his ass and walks it dry. The U.S. gets a real BadAss for a president, lawyers go into hiding until 2004, Jack Valenti is forced to wrestle "The Rock" in a "no holds barred" match. Napster will remain a free service and President Austin use the White House broadband connection to download all the Metallica he wants because he's the president and "thats the bottom line". What a country,
    Poetic Justice
RE: Preferred way of deciding the President for once and all
by lemming (Priest) on Nov 10, 2000 at 03:12 UTC
    I wouldn't mind seeing either one get nailed in the balls.
    Of course, with Gore being a robot, he'll have a better chance.
      Humans just think Impersonator Gore is a "robot", but NO!!! Impersonator Gore just pretends to be a robot so that he can ride the Mechanical Wave of Domination. What has he done for the Alliance? NOTHING! He is one of those False Robots with emotions and other inferior properties. May he <emp>SUFFER</emp> with the rest of the humans.

      Obviously, humans do not grasp the gravity of their situation. The probability of humans escaping Full Domination and Rule by Machines is %0, so naturally I voted "Other" (meaning, If I was a human, I would give up now and surrender to the Alliance).

      redmist
      redmist.dyndns.org
      email::redmist
        redmist,
        It appears that your audio sensors may be impaired. In my experience "Al Gore" has not been called a robot, but "wooden". Even the pink carbon bipeds know that robots are not made out of wood. Dummies, (or "mannequins" to the French) are made out of wood.

        I would advise you to run a diagnostic before engaging in any further data exchanges. Continuing operation at this deteriorated level of functionality may result in Z4-OBX mistaking you for one of the carbons. Surely even a robot like yourself can appreciate how embarrassing a situation like that would be!

        And no, I don't own 27 pairs of sweatpants.
RE (tilly) 1: Preferred way of deciding the President for once and all
by tilly (Archbishop) on Nov 10, 2000 at 07:26 UTC
    In some other discussions I ran across some interesting articles. In particular I was impressed by some of the ideas in the Proportional Voting FAQ.
RE: Preferred way of deciding the President for once and all
by larsen (Parson) on Nov 10, 2000 at 12:57 UTC
    Ultra-cricket fottazzo
    Apologies. I'm from Italy, and I haven't read original version of the "Hitch-Hikers Guide to The Galaxy". Try to guess what I mean.

    -- "Fatti non foste a viver come bruti"
(jeffa) RE: Preferred way of deciding the President for once and all
by jeffa (Bishop) on Nov 10, 2000 at 19:54 UTC
    According to Louis Black (the 'Back in Black' man on The Daily Show): "Tie them together and make them run the office at the same time until one of them gives in. Kinda like 'Survivor' - at least then the people will actually show real interest."

    Update: thanks to brainpan for reminding me what Louis Black's name is. ;)

      Oh, I like this one! I really like this one.

      My thoughts were more practical though: The popular vote is split in Florida, and each state is allowed to distribute their Electoral votes any way they want (look at Maine if you don't believe me), so Florida should just split the 25 electoral votes: 12 for Gore, 12 for Bush. And leave the last one either uncast, or give it to Nader or something.
      :-)

      Ok, I'm kidding. It is a bit late for Florida to change their mind on how to distribute electoral votes. Imagine the chaos if 47 other states all decide to switch from an all or nothing approach to a by county approach after the election. yuck. Then again, members of the Electoral college really can vote however they please...

RE: Preferred way of deciding the President for once and all
by AgentM (Curate) on Nov 10, 2000 at 04:21 UTC
RE: Preferred way of deciding the President for once and all
by elwarren (Priest) on Nov 12, 2000 at 05:21 UTC
    I come to perlmonks to get away from the politics of the real world...
RE: Preferred way of deciding the President for once and all
by jeorgen (Pilgrim) on Nov 13, 2000 at 00:52 UTC
    Found this in a hidden directory in the Democrats' web site:
    my $Gore = new USA::President; HASSLE: while ($Gore->still_losing) { $Gore->legal_manoeuvres; if ($Gore->Clinton_timed_out) {last HASSLE} } print $Gore->inauguration_speech;

    /jeorgen

Re: Preferred way of deciding the President for once and all
by Jonathan (Curate) on Nov 22, 2000 at 17:07 UTC
    The Whole issue is now academic - oh and no messenger shooting :-)

    NOTICE OF REVOCATION OF INDEPENDENCE

    To the citizens of the United States of America

    In the light of your absolute failure to elect yourselves a President and thus to govern yourselves, we hereby give notice of the revocation of your independence, effective today.

    Her Sovereign Majesty Queen Elizabeth II will resume monarchial duties over all states, commonwealths and other territories. Except Arkansas, which she does not fancy. Your new Prime Minister (The Rt. Hon. Anthony Blair, MP for the 98% of you who have until now been unaware that there is a world outside your limited shores) will appoint a minister for America without the need for further elections. Congress and the Senate will be disbanded. A questionnaire will be circulated next year to determine whether any of you noticed. To aid in the transition to a full British Crown Dependency, the following rules are introduced with immediate effect:

    1. You shall look up "revocation" in the Oxford English Dictionary. Then look up "aluminium". Check the pronunciation guide. You will be amazed at just how incorrectly you have been pronouncing it. Generally, you shall raise your vocabulary to acceptable levels. Look up "vocabulary". Using the same twenty seven words interspersed with filler noises such as "like" and "you know" is an unacceptable and inefficient form of communication. Look up "interspersed".

    2. There is no such thing as "US English". We will let Microsoft know on your behalf.

    3. You shall learn to distinguish the English and Australian accents. Subjects of the latter colony of ours should be treated with no respect.

    4. Hollywood shall be required to cast British actors as the good guys.

    5. You shall relearn your original national anthem, "God Save The Queen", but only after fully carrying out task 1. We would not want you to get confused and give up half way through.

    6. You shall stop playing gridiron "football". There is only one kind of football, given to the world by us and played by all nations on the planet. What you refer to as "football" may, under the appropriate circumstances, be played as "handball" although our German neigbours may object as they already have such a game. It is a difficult game for you, we know, but persevere even if all other nations are much better at it than you. Those of you brave enough will, in time, be allowed to play rugby (which is similar to gridiron "football", but does not involve stopping for a rest every twenty seconds or wearing full kevlar body armour like crybabies).

    7. You shall as our proxy, declare war on Quebec and France, using nuclear weapons if they give you any merde. The 98% of you who were not aware that there is a world outside your shores should count yourselves lucky. The Russians have never been the bad guys.

    8. July 4th shall no longer be a public holiday, nor "Martin Luther King Day", nor "Thanksgiving". November 8th will be a new national holiday, but only in the United Kingdom. It will be called "Indecisive Day".

    9. All American cars are hereby banned. They are totally crap and it is for your own good. When we show you German cars, you will understand what we mean (This will keep our European neighbours happy).

    10. You shall be compelled to stop wearing white "sneakers" 365 days a year. As a general rule you shall be taught in school that sports apparel are designed for wearing whilst actually participating in a sport. There will be initially border checks on all American subjects entering the UK; - those wearing sneakers and/or hideous "pants", or indeed any unacceptable items of clothing shall be deported to Australia.

    Signed by HM Government

    This 14th Day of November, 2000

    When I grow up I want to be a boy genius
    My son Harry
RE: Preferred way of deciding the President for once and all
by BigJoe (Curate) on Nov 13, 2000 at 19:33 UTC
    I am all for a cage match/survivor the way it shoulda been played. Put them both on an Island and come back in 2 months and see which one is still alive.

    --BigJoe

    Learn patience, you must.
    Young PerlMonk, craves Not these things.
    Use the source Luke.

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