“Look, don’t blame me, it wasn’t my fault. I stood in the damn queue for over an hour and then there was some angry white guy waving his fist in my face and banging-on about valid voter ID, I never had a chance. So where were you?”
Tag: election
Animal crackers
In an election year, sometimes you just don’t get to choose who you have to follow…..
Advertising #51
View from a Rhino House: “to err is human, to forgive, divine….”
In a week filled with examples of human error (or vile perfidy if you’re more into conspiracy theories) an animal described as an African lion at a Chinese zoo, was exposed as a fraud, when the creature started barking in front of visitors.
Outraged visitors to the zoo in Louhe city said they had been cheated.
According to a newspaper report, the substitution came to light when a mother visited the zoo to show her son the sounds different animals made.
But when they got to the cage marked “African lion”, which had a sign describing the animal, they were shocked to hear the creature bark.
It was then that zoo keepers revealed the so-called lion was actually a Tibetan mastiff, a large type of dog with a shaggy, brown coat.
Other species were also apparently also replaced by “stand-ins”; there was a white fox in the leopard’s den & a small terrier being passed off as a wolf.
Across the oceans, in a further example of human fallibility, Detroit, which has filed for the largest bankruptcy in U.S. history, chooses a new mayor in an election, on 5th November. But billboards that the City of Detroit commissioned, say that the election will take place on the 2nd.
The billboards were re-used from a previous year’s election. Detroit City Clerk Janet Winfrey said that the local billboard company updated the signs to highlight this year’s “bun fight”, but forgot to change the date.
Winfrey said her department approved the original billboards but did not see samples of those updated for this year. The sign company, based in Detroit, was given the correct date from the elections office, Winfrey added.
The city clerk said that all of the billboards would have the correct information showing within 24 hours of the mistake being pointed-out.
She remains happy with the billboard company, which charged the city for 11 of the signs, & threw in a further 3 free ones as an incentive. Winfrey said that after the mistake, “they threw in two more freebies,” which she said would increase the number of billboards, with the correct information, to 16 in the city.
“Confusion has made his masterpiece.” It warms my heart to see people everywhere, just doing what they do best.
View from a Rhino House: paws in politics
In the Mexican city of Xalapa a “collective” of citizens, disenchanted with politicians they refer to as “the rats,” have put forward a different type candidate for mayor: a cat named Morris.
Local resident Sergio Chamorro, who adopted the cat last Summer, told reporters that the plan began as a joke between friends, borne out of their frustration with the Veracruz state government.
“Fed up of voting for rats? Vote for a cat,” read the first campaign poster featuring the black & white cat (using the Spanish “ratas” for rats & “gato” for Morris gives it a nice “sing-song” sound when chanted by enough voices).
Chamorro created a Facebook page in support of Morris’ candidacy in May & the page went viral (as is the way of these things) in early June & now has received more than 125,000 “likes.”
As the news of the mock-campaign spread, disillusioned citizens across Mexico nominated a donkey & a chicken for other political offices in the election to be held on 7th July.
Morris has competition from seven official candidates for Xalapa mayor, including representatives of Mexico’s three major parties. Despite his large following, Morris is not an officially registered candidate & Chamorro is asking voters to write in “Morris” or draw a picture of a cat on their ballot.
The idea of a political candidate who has already been neutered will surely appeal beyond the borders of Mexico, both north & south!
Just another day at the office #114
View from a Rhino House: auto-erotic retrospective electioneering
Just when you think there can be no more election, post-election or pre-2016 stories to come; you find yourself gloriously wrong. Here is the latest (& I’m never going to say “final” ever again) installment from that popular show “2012: This time it’s personal”.
In Arizona a woman, outraged by the re-election of Democratic President Barack Obama, ran down her husband with the family car. This dubiously political protest took place in suburban Phoenix on Saturday after he failed to vote in the election, earlier in the week.
Holly Solomon was arrested after running over husband Daniel Solomon following an extended chase that left him trapped underneath the vehicle.
He remains in critical condition at a Phoenix hospital, local police spokesman Sergeant Jesse Sanger said.
Police said Daniel Solomon told them his wife became angry over his “slack-assed failure to vote for Mitt Romney” in last Tuesday’s presidential election & believed her family was threatened as a result of the Democrat’s victory.
Witnesses reported the argument broke out on Saturday morning in a supermarket car park & rapidly escalated. Mrs Solomon then chased her husband around the car park with the car, yelling at him as he tried to hide behind a lamp post, police said. He was struck after attempting to flee for safety into a nearby street.
Obama won the national election with 332 electoral votes compared with 206 for Republican challenger Mitt Romney. Arizona’s 11 electoral votes were won by Romney anyway.
Nice to see the GOP base energized at last…..
View from a Rhino House: an evolving political viewpoint
In the final review of the US elections there have been stories about dead candidates proving victorious & assorted amusing anecdotes. A personal favourite is the tale of a Georgia congressman who attacked the theories of the beginning of the universe & of evolution & then found himself with an unlikely opponent in the U.S. election, when over 4,200 voters in one county cast write-in ballots for the “father of evolution,” 19th century British naturalist Charles Darwin.
In a speech on 27th September, Paul Broun, a medical doctor & member of the U.S. House of Representatives Science, Space & Technology Committee, called evolution & the “Big Bang” theory, “lies straight from the pit of hell.” If the man’s profession & positions of influence don’t scare you, then his understanding of the universe should; it seems for this guy it’s “the magic pixie in the sky” or nothing!
Since Broun, a Republican (now be honest, you guessed that didn’t you?), had no opposition in the general election, a University of Georgia botany professor, Jim Leebens-Mack, & others, started a write-in campaign for Darwin, the father of the theory of evolution – & the object of much “venting” by the Congressman.
“We don’t feel our interests are being best served by an anti-science looney (OK the word he used was “fundamentalist”) representing us on the Science, Space & Technology Committee,” Leebens-Mack said on Friday.
The write-in votes in Athens-Clarke County will not count officially since Darwin was never certified as a write-in candidate, but Leebens-Mack hopes the campaign will encourage a strong candidate, Democrat or Republican, to challenge Broun in 2014.
Maybe the Easter Bunny could be persuaded to stand, at least the TV debates would be cute.
View from a Rhino House: letter to the GOP – a new strategy for 2016
Dear “Members of the Great & the Good”,
I was just sitting here, reading the global news & thinking about how any group might be able to come back from the humiliation of losing so totally, & I thought I’d share my thoughts with you. Now I am not a citizen of the US & I have no particular affinity to either of the main parties, nor do I have any affection for politicians in general.
It seems to me, as an outsider, that the recent election, think back you remember – when all those people were shouting at each other on TV, was lost by the GOP rather than won by the other guys. To avoid this happening again in 2016 I think there are a few simple lesson that can be learned, & a few strategies that can be put in place to guarantee a landslide victory.
Many of the ploys introduced by GOP-friendly officials for the 2012 election either backfired or were just not effective. Obvious example: had Jesus tried to vote he would have been unable to produce 2 forms of photo ID, even if his citizenship claim had been processed in time. Now the son of God is a huge favourite with the Tea Party folk & for him not to be able even to share his party preferences (& remember he is voting for 3) seems unjust in the extreme. So guys, time to knock-off the attempts to keep all the poor non-whites from voting; just go back to offering them cash to do “the right thing” (maybe with a burning cross in the background to deter backsliders).
Now we are in the groove let’s be honest here, the Son of God would make a great candidate for 2016 but the Washington insiders will have to make a few changes to get him on the ticket. In the first place there is all that business of separating Church & State; clearly while that is meant for Moslems, Jews, Catholics & athiest-hippy liberals without shed-loads of cash, it would prevent the Lord from standing for political office, even for the GOP. So let’s see a little urgency here & get an exemption in the constitution to avoid discriminating so unfairly against God & his family.
Now I know that you have already spotted what might seem to be a serious flaw in the whole idea here because Jesus was not technically born in the US. Trust me, this at least is easy to fix; offer Israel statehood as part of a new defence funding arrangement & straight away you’ve dealt with the Middle East & pretty much tied-up 2016 for significantly less cash than you blew in 2012.*
As long as the Lord isn’t a registered Democrat I think you just have to see this a sure-fire winner, that will energize the party’s grass roots & play well with the poorer non-whites. Let’s face it, who is going to risk pissing-off “The Man” by voting against His boy?
So good luck guys, & if you manage to get him on the ticket, put in a good word for me.
Yours
R.H.
* Extend a similar deal to Austria & you could get the former governor of California on the ticket as VP. The Lord & the Terminator on one platform? How could that fail?
ThursdayAgain 
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