As I left the student center this morning, a man obviously uncomfortable in his long-sleeved buttoned-to-the-top shirt walked up. He made a little pleading gesture with the many clipboards he had piled up in his hands and entreated me: “Sir? Sir? ”
Very good so far, what with the near-pathos and consummate politeness.
I grinned and gave him my attention. “Would you care to sign a petition,” he asked, “to put an independent presidential candidate on the state ballot?”
I murmured something very much like assent, he asked in which county I was registered as a voter. I told him Madison, he started digging through his clipboards, and during all of this I kept trying to ask the obvious question.
He had that amazing tactic down cold, you see, of feigning absolute submissiveness while actually maintaining total control of the dialogue. Everything he said was in a half-swallowed, self-effacing tone, and no single aspect or element of his behavior could be described as rude or inappropriate, but still he managed total control over our exchange.
He pushed, ever so gently, a board into my hand; I pushed, delicate as a scampering lamb, it back to him and finally managed to get the question across: “So, this candidate you’re asking me to endorse, what’s he all about then?”
There was a flash of terror in his eyes; he obviously wasn’t used to actually having to let people know about who they were petitioning for. He regained his composure after just barely having appeared to have lost it, fumbled around for a bit, and handed me a photocopied brochure. And a clipboard with pen.
I took the brochure, handed back the board. Grinned, said, “I’ll look this over and might be back in a bit, thanks.”
Walking off, the first thing that I noticed was that this “independent candidate” was the official nominee of the Libertarian Party.
When you have to outright lie just to get enough signatures for your guy to get onto the ballot, your chances of winning once people find out who they’re actually voting for a pretty fucking slim, wouldn’t you think?
It is further proof of my ever-increasing radicalness that my first instinct was to go back and sock the liar in his mouth. My second instinct was to go back and give him a nice loud earful, but in the end it was a nice day and a losing battle so I came on back home.