Electing The Elect

"Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness." So wrote John Keats of autumn, but his fine ode would have unlikely be written had he been in Canada. Here, you see, autumn is celebrated by having an election, whether that election is needed or not. And the one being projected is definitely not needed, and every non-Tory candidate that hoves into view should be asked one key question: "Given the global meltdown, just what on earth would you have done differently?" This will produce silence, of course, and you should cast your ballot accordingly.

Moreover, the cost of this running of the reptiles is roughly $300,000,000, begging a further comment: "Recession? What recession?"

That said, I still have doubts that an election will occur. After all, there are some 98 MP's who, if they lose their seat, would also lose their parliamentary pensions (you need to retain your seat for six years to qualify) and many of these creatures are making the most money they ever have in their life -- or will again. This would change radically in autumn of 2010, but for now..... I also wondered why this fact is not more reported on, but then it occurred to me that any reporter who brought this into the open would lose any chance of ever being appointed to that wondrous Canadian Valhalla -- the Senate. Myself aside, few would risk that.

Now to another election. My colleague Code Barry has just returned from Afghanistan, where he was monitoring, well, something. Certainly not an open and honest election. From him I learned the following:

* Over four times the ballots were returned than had actually been issued;
*They were returned in job lots of 200, 300 and 500, numbers which defy logic (although not neatness);
* In one case, Karzai received 700 votes from a district deep in Taliban-held territory. Great, except for one small fact: the polling station never opened; and,
* There is no word in Dari or Pushtu for "scrutineer".

Given this, it really is time for NATO and the USA to get the hell out of there, given the proviso outlined in my September 1 entry.

Mind you, elections are always tricky, in that it is the counting, not the voting, that is the rub. Just look at the American debacles of 2000 and 2004. Then, if memory serves, there was 1948, where Lyndon Johnson won his Senate primary only after the state Democratic committee voted to certify the ballots of dozens of loyal supporters.

Who, as it happened, were all dead.

I wonder what Keats would have thought about all this?