Betcha Can't Pick Just One.

[captainsblog]

This idea came up in an exchange of comments the other day, and I thought I'd put it out here.

You're rummaging through the junk in your cellar and find this oblong-shaped bottle. Before you take it to The Kiosk to be melted down into gold, you decide to polish it up a bit, and a genie appears.

Damn. I was dreaming of this chick with light brown hair. Whachoo want?

Cool! So I get three wishes, right?

One. What do you think this is, a fairy tale?

Fine. I want this 2012 election business fixed. Get Obama his second term and his Congress back.

What, you think I'm all-powerful or something? I was in your goddam basement! No way can I affect hundred of millions of voters on the same day.  But I CAN pick the matchup for you. Interested?

Hmmmmm. So you're basically saying I can pick the Republican opponent for Obama.

No, that would be two wishes. You can pick the opponent, but I get to pick who he- you're not crazy enough to pick one of the she's, are ya?- who he runs against.

So if I pick Romney, the only sane one in the bunch with half a prayer of winning....

I'll go Ralph Nader. Or Bernie Sanders. Or someone completely off the deep end. Essentially, you pick Romney, you GOT him, and everything that goes with him, for four years.

And if I pick Obama to get the nomination again?

Your worst nightmare on the other side. Which might be someone so crazy you haven't even heard of her yet.

I need to think about this.  Despite my hatred of their principles, Nixon gave us the EPA, OSHA, Chinese relations and the guy who wrote Roe v. Wade. Reagan raised taxes, reformed immigration and put O'Connor and Kennedy on the Court.  The only complete strikeout was the last idiot.  I need to talk to my people. Can I get back to you?

Sure. Just leave the top off. It's time to watch Judge Jafar anyway.

So if that was the deal, today, effective 1/1/13, no turning back, would you take it?

[Poll #1788099]

For my part, I'm still undecided. But leaning.

Comments

[sturgeonslawyer.livejournal.com]

I'm praying for an utter crazy to take the nomination -- one that won't have a prayer of capturing the middle.

[captainsblog.livejournal.com]

Here's my problem.

One of the things they larned us in the Law School was an old theory for evaluating risk. Probability times severity equals a constant. (Okay, it's on Wikipedia, not quite in those terms, (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Risk#Mathematical_formulations) but there ya go. It's the basic fear behind most non-mandatory purchases of insurance, warranties and such, where you'll trade some security to avoid even a low-probability Very Bad Thing from occurring.

Everything I've seen on that side is Very Bad Thing. Bad enough, and severe enough, that even a small fractional chance of one of them succeeding is enough to make me want to consider this bet.

[liddle-oldman.livejournal.com]

Not to mention that it will not be a fair and open election. They know how to manipulate elections really well by now; this whole "Identification at the poll" will knock out a couple million poor and minority -- that is, unlikely to vote for the owner class -- right there.

Whichever slavering ideologue moron they run, will be our next President. Why do you think the world will end the next week? (I read it in the Weekly Midnight Star!) It'll be out of sheer moral dudgeon.

[floundah.livejournal.com]

I simply have no words for the upcoming appointment election. Pass the chocolate. :(

[firynze.livejournal.com]

I'm still disappointed that Huntsman was apparently too sane to make it past even the preliminaries.