Monday, November 3, 2008

Adventures in Politics

I’ve had many epiphanies over the years, the most memorable being when I realized the proof really was in the pudding, or that it’s actually possible to eat scrambled eggs without tortillas, or the following which I epiphanized over the course of a year.

My good friends know that I have a voting problem. I tell them my problem and they scoff. I explain my situation, but they tell me to stop lying, to stop making up diseases. One day, you untrusting hobgoblins, one day Ted Striker’s disease will be acknowledged by the AMA.

“Seriously, frank, it’s getting old. Haha, yeah, Ted Striker syndrome—“

“Ted Striker’s disease,” I tell them.

“Yeah, whatever. It was funny on Airplane! and that’s it. Stop creating excuses and get your ass to the polls.”

“The moles?” I say.

“You know what? Fuck you, frank. I’m tired of your incorrigible apathy.”

My friends, it is because of the frequency of these verbal assaults that I must admit something: I do not have Ted Striker’s disease. I made it up one day and the AMA isn’t really considering its validity. I don’t vote because, my good friends, I have Parkinson’s disease. Would you like to know why Bush won in ’04? My hand shook the puncher into Bush’s circle instead of Kerry’s.

“It’s just one vote, that’s preposterous,” you say? How dare you! Voting is not preposterous! No wait, it is.

I’ve shared my thoughts on voting to those I believe are highly intelligent and insightful. Unfortunately, their reasons to vote weren’t able to stifle the nihilist in me. “An exercise in futility,” I’ve been known to yell, spastically attacking strangers with spittle. Yes, I know my not voting is irresponsible because it discourages others to do the same.

This is where the epiphany kicks in: the reason I’m so turned off by the voting process is because nobody should be discouraged by one idiot’s indifference with voting, and yet it’s the primary reason I vote.

It’s not something I’ve fully thought out. I need help figuring this one out. What does it mean that people are discouraged by others not voting? Am I not a team player? Someone help me. Also make me a sandwich, please.

FRANK

4 comments:

  1. "Ted Stryker's Disease" with soundtrack by the
    Pietasters

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  2. "This third Airplane installment takes a serious tone as Ted Striker is told he has a disease so rare, doctors named it after him. Citing his affinity to Lou Gehrig, Striker attempts to play baseball but is immediately thwarted by severe dehydration, a result of his drinking problem."

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  3. I have always used that very same argument over the years. I said "but I loathe jury duty more than my vote will count" and "if I get 10 people to vote who otherwise wouldn't have then I no longer have to register".

    I voted once before. For Ross Perot.
    I was immediately summoned to jury duty.
    This year I will throw away the summons...

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  4. I was also summonsed after voting, except the summons was a subpoena and it was after the 15,000th vote I had cast for the candidate that election.

    ReplyDelete