The Winner of the 7-2 Vote is...

Essays, Stories, Adventures, Dreams
Chronicles of a Footloose Forester

By Dick Pellek

 

The Winner of the 7-2 Vote is…

On a day-to-day basis, politics is as important to the Footloose Forester as any other topic, largely because the seeming externality of the political process comes home eventually to affect every citizen, voter or not.  The long, long list of examples of why that is true is not the purpose of this chronicle, but one related aspect about in-your-face politics will make the point.

In the days immediately following the 2018 mid-term elections, both major political parties are digging in for a protracted fight about voter registration, counting votes, and certifying the legitimacy of the whole process.  And, of course, who the legitimate winners are.  The Footloose Forester has a personal tale to tell about his experience with a local, company related election and why he now brings that up, more than 10 years after the fact.

As a conscientious employee at Speedy Rent-a-Car (a fictitious name and company), he was eager to stand for election as the spokesperson for his workgroup.  His workgroup was small, having only nine voting members.  Presumably, a majority of votes would determine the winner of the election, by secret ballot.  He himself voted for another worthy candidate; and one woman announced in advance that she was going to vote for that same person.  That left seven votes.  All of the other people who voted freely revealed later on that they had all voted for the Footloose Forester.  That would make the vote count 7-2 in favor of the Footloose Forester.  But guess who was announced as the winner of the election?  The person who got two votes.  Why was that?
 

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The person who supervised the modest election was the city manager of Speedy Rent-a-Car and the person who counted the votes was the office manager and a woman he was having an affair with.  The manager didn’t like Footloose Forester because the latter frequently posed thorny issues at monthly staff meetings.  Do you think Miss Pretty Eyes was going to go against her boss?

Losing the election was not the end of the world, but losing under fraudulent circumstances remained as a bone of contention until and beyond the time that both the city manager and his office manager lover were fired.  This is a true story, by the way.

The election episode was never reviewed and never resolved, one reason why the Footloose Forester believes that election fraud is far more serious than voter fraud.  When the system is rigged, as it was at Speedy Rent-a-Car, those in charge of setting up the mechanics and the counting of the votes likely can get away with it.  And all the more reason why certain State and local election results in 2018 are looked upon with suspicion.

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