Election List I: People/Things I Would Vote For President Before I Would Vote For John McCain

Posted on October 31, 2008    Posted by      73 Comments

You know, for the last two weeks I’ve been trying to write a long, cogent piece about who I’m voting for and why, but every time I try I am filled with inchoate rage and just want to kick a puppy or someone who voted for Nader in 2000. So instead I’m going to write a series of short, punchy election lists, which will probably be more amusing and will at the very least keep me from beating on something with a hammer.

And so, to begin:

Election List I: People/Things I Would Vote For President Before I Would Vote For John McCain


1. Barack Obama

2. Bob Barr

3. A large, flat, warm rock

4. Hermann von Googlefleugel, the garden gnome under which I keep my spare house key

5. Arnold Schwarzenegger

6. A kitchen sponge

7. Zamfir, Master of the Pan Flute

8. Chewed gum you find under a desk at the DMV while you take the written part of your driving test

9. Toast!

10. A teratoma that vaguely resembles a pony

11. An incontinent monkey or lemur

12. A large order of McDonald’s fries, lightly salted

13. The reanimated corpse of Millard Fillmore

14. A mat of algae

15. A black velvet painting of Wesley Crusher

16. H.R. Pufnstuf

17. A glazed donut

18. That guy on the A train who shouts loudly about his penis from 23rd to Cathedral Parkway

19. A Lite-Brite

20. Fucking Ralph fucking Nader, that goddamned fucking fuck

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73 Comments on “Election List I: People/Things I Would Vote For President Before I Would Vote For John McCain”

  4. Ralph Nader has a lot to answer for. Personally I’ll probably never forgive him for 2000 either. And as for “Unsafe at any Speed” – I mean have you read that? What a hack!

  6. As a representative from the coalition for large, flat, warm rocks, I would like to thank you for your endorsement of our service and/or product.

    Third though? Really? Which would you rather lay on after a nice in the White House pool swim? Barack Obama? Bob Barr? Or a large, flat, warm rock? Geez, so like a sci/fi writer to totally not understand the *important* issues in this election…

  7. 21. Buzz Lightyear (because McCain can’t fly either)

    22. The rotted cucumbers I really should clean out of my vegetable bin

    23. Orcrist

    24. Glamdring

    25. Elmo

    26. St. Elmo

    27. St. Elmo’s Fire

    28. St. Elmo’s Fire (the movie)

    29. Baryons

    30. Mesons

    31. Quarks

    32. Snot

  8. izanobu 6: Which would you rather lay on after a nice in the White House pool swim? Barack Obama? Bob Barr? Or a large, flat, warm rock?

    Barack Obama. By far. That man has teh sexay!

  10. 18. That guy on the A train who shouts loudly about his penis from 23rd to Cathedral Parkway

    Ah. You have been to New York. And you’ve taken the A train during the hours it runs on the local tracks. You should, however, be aware that no one calls it Cathedral Parkway.

    Let me add to Xopher’s list:

    33. Belly button lint
    34. The reanimated corpse of Richard Nixon — wait. That’s probably not a good idea
    35. Pauly Shore/Carrot Top
    36. The Anarchists’ Union
    37. Locker room funk
    38. Jason Giambi
    39. Post-storm runoff

  14. Can I choose Vladimir Putin?

    Why choose the lesser evil? ;)

    (I mean, if we’re voting for sexy… sexy, in that sort of bad boy homicidal awesome way)

  19. #13: Bacon is a given, and thus doesn’t actually need to be listed. Bacon beats everything.

  20. I would definitely vote for John McCain over the reanimated corpse of Millard Fillmore. President Zombie Millard Fillmore would present all kinds of challenges. The last thing America needs is an upsurge of Zombie Anti-Masonry and squabbling over the Zombie Fugitive Slave Act.

  21. Now, Patrick, the possibility of marriage between two zombies, or between a zombie and a living person, would give the wingnuts something else to obsess about than gay marriage. That’s gotta be worth a few squabbles over the Zombie Fugitive Slave Act.

  22. 1. Why is toast only #10?
    2. Why isn’t Fillmore’s corpse higher up. I mean, if it works, he’s not encumbered by term limits! He ended his term in 1853, so the 22nd amendment doesn’t apply!
    3. Seriously, Nader? Nader got on the list? At least you didn’t say a third term of Bush.

  26. Ghlaghghee would be any one of these selections’ chief of staff (except Nader, whose bones Ghlaghghee would likely use for a scratching post.)

    Yes, Ghlaghghee understands the true nature of power and would work behind the throne.

  28. xopher @ 7,

    May I humbly suggest you leave those cucumbers in there for another couple of months? If you pick them up now, they’ll be all squishy and oogey. Two months from now, the liquid runoff will have evaporated and the cucumbers will be nicely mummified.

    Much more pleasant to pick up and totally electable.

  29. John, just to be clear… you would vote for Arnold Schwarzenegger, who is not a natural-born US citizen and thus ineligible to even run for the office of president, before you would vote for John McCain?

    I thought you had more respect for the Constitution than that!

    </snark>

  31. Nathan, your refrigerator is offended by that comment.

    And you don’t want to offend your refrigerator.

  32. 40. Earthquakes
    41. Durian
    42. The Ebola virus
    43. Dust
    44. Famine
    45. Pestilence
    46. Death (note: John McCain himself is War)
    47. Dog poo
    48. Cat litter, used
    49. Diomedes
    50. Little Diomede
    51. Big Diomede

  33. If McCain does win an immediate referendum needs to be held.
    At that point we should just release Cthulhu from R’lyeh.
    Really now, why another 4 or 8 years of this slow drag into bloody chaos? Lets just nip it in the bud and go directly to hell. Do not pass go, do not collect your $200 tax rebate.

  34. I hesitate to say this, and I stress that I never voted for him, but Arnold Schwarzenegger has not actually been the worst governor in the world. California is in deep trouble for reasons beyond his control, but he’s been pretty moderate, he’s appointed some decent judges, he seems to actually care about doing a good job in between the big posturing speeches. Hell, yeah, I’d vote for him for president over McCain. Or just about any other Republican likely to run, and some Democrats, too.

  39. John, I’m gonna go ahead and admit that I voted for Nader in 2000. I promise I have learned my lesson, but you can kick me if it’ll help. Just promise to avoid my eyes, stomach, and nards. Yes, I am a wuss.

  41. It’s nice to see a writer having fun. And anytime you can get a penis, a teratoma and a garden gnome into the same piece of text, well, that’s a good day, no?

  42. Scalzi,

    Would you vote for McCain before the vigorously, non-horrifically (even on Halloween) reanimated James Buchanan?

  43. 20. Fucking Ralph fucking Nader, that goddamned fucking fuck

    My best friend voted for Nadar in 2000. I *BEGGED* her to vote for someone else, but noooo, she was sending a *message*. (!) I told her she was throwing her vote away, and a vote for Nadar was a vote for Bush, and the message she was sending was that she didn’t care enough about who was president to vote for a candidate who actually had a chance of winning the election.

    She deeply regreted her vote in the months and years that followed, and has kicked herself plenty of times (as have I). I could kick her again for you, if you want.

  46. Is the toast with or without marmite? Because McCain might have the edge on plain toast.

    Baron Harkonnen has him beat, though.

  47. 56. Delicious, ice-cold can of Coke Zero
    57. Pretty good, sort-of cold can of Coke Zero
    58. Can of Fresca that’s been standing open on the kitchen counter for three days

  48. 26. St. Elmo

    27. St. Elmo’s Fire

    28. St. Elmo’s Fire (the movie)

    LOL!!! I just laughed out loud at that….!

  49. Adding to the fluff pufnstuf…

    21. Mice, any one of them, even Mickey

    22. A rotted canine tooth

    23. Spiro Agnew – the other one

    24. Cat dander

    25. Bama Pies, any one of them, especially blueberry

    26. Morton Downy Junior

    27. That actor who put sperm in Cameron Diaz’s hair in that movie and she used it as hair gel

    28. Dick Cheney’s daughter

  50. Just a note about Nader: Keep in mind that he could not have influenced the election were it not for the hundreds of thousands of legitimate voters purged from voter rolls by Republican dirty tricks. Yeah, I agree with the criticisms of his actions, but remember to keep focused on the real villains of that election, the ones absolutely trying it again this time – Republican Party stalwarts, at both state and national levels.

  51. – any actual Republican
    Seriously, people, can you please take your party back from these neo-con nut jobs? I would love to get back to arguing about policy rather than having to fend off bat-shit insanity.

  55. “Zamfir rocks!!! I would totally vote for him.”

    That has got to be a sentence/phrase that did not exist in English before now.

  56. I don’t apologize.

    Even if every third party vote in MO had gone instead to Gore, he still would have lost my state.

    If Gore had had the sense to pick Dick Gephardt instead of Leiberman he would have won MO and the election.

  57. You can’t vote for Zamfir, ’cause he’s not US born (he’s Romanian, by the way). So we’re back to the Arnie argument. Besides, Zamfir is as nuts as a bolt, and nazier than Hitler, if you’d hear him talking about politics (I have, and on more than one occasion, unfortunately) you might want to reconsider. But he plays great, that I admit :)

  58. I’ll have some sympathy for the Blame Nader movement when:

    1. The Democrats offer their plan to end the Electoral College that has shafted the Democratic winner of the popular vote four times now–and never shafted a Republican.

    2. Someone explains why Gore kept telling everyone to accept whatever happens, beginning on the night when the Republicans sent their thugs into Florida to protest, and ending when on the Senate floor when he told member after member of the Black Caucus to shut up and go away.

    Bonus sympathy for when someone explains how the principled Democratic opposition to Republican policies of the last eight years was barely defeated by the Republican majorities in the House and Senate.

    Super bonus sympathy for explaining how that worked after 2006.

  60. To distract people from the Nader thing with something nearly as controversial: I’d vote for George Steinbrenner before I’d vote for John McCain.

  62. Re: Zamfir and the Governator: Look, the Constitution only says that the President must be a natural-born citizen. It doesn’t say you can’t vote for someone for President who isn’t a natural-born citizen.

    (I’m going to skip the whole “you don’t really vote for President, you vote for a slate of electors” bit, assuming everyone reading this far isn’t as dumb as a rock.)

  64. I’ll quit bashing Nader voters when they explain to me why they thought that misanthropic nutbar would make a good president.

    I mean, really? Ralph Nader? Really?!

  65. Hamletta, look up Nader’s issues in 2000. Then look up Gore’s. Then remember that the Gore of 2000 was not the Gore of An Unconvenient Truth–if he had been, he wouldn’t have had to worry about Jeb Bush gaming the Florida vote.

    Now, if you like the Electoral College and two-party politics, that’s your right, of course. But why blame Nader for the system that the Democrats continue to support?

  66. Okay, /here’s/ a question; John McCain … or Her Majesty Elizabeth II? Would a return to the Crown be preferable to a McCain presidency?

    (As a Commonwealth citizen I have to support my liege, of course. But I’m interested in what good patriotic Freedom Eagle-saluting Americans think of this question)

  67. If QE2 wants to run for president (in this theoretical world where a large, flat, warm rock is also eligible), then fine. If she wants the gig as Queen of America, though, I’d have to pass.

  68. As a dual US/British citizen, I have to say that I would not want to see the Queen become head of state of the US.

    In the UK at least, the Queen is head of state (but not head of government). She’s got a small role in government, basically approving what Parliament or the people have already decided. But really what she is is the face on coins and stamps, and more generally the rallying point of the nation.

    In the US, we have the flag for that. And, in these tabloid days, it’s worth pointing out that flags don’t have families to insult entire swathes of the population with ethnic stereotypes, get caught on tape talking dirty to people not their spouses, divorce messily die in car crashes, be subsequently sainted by the masses, dress up as Nazis at costume parties, drink to unconsciousness in stairwells, or become the face of Weight Watchers.

    (There are strengths to the British system too, of course, but we really should not cross the streams.)

  69. “13. The reanimated corpse of Millard Fillmore”

    ‘sup? d00derz is buried less than a mile from my apartment. We can make that happen. . . heh.

  70. I would vote for John Scalzi, Jeff C, John H, forbes, Mike B, Isanobu, Kimberly, Blue Tyson, Shindy, Brruce Baugh, Horia Nicola-Ursu, Name Withheld, critter42, micaelann bewsee, eviljwinter, DG Lewis, Shawn Powers, mjfgates, hamletta , Xopher, Will Shetterly, Jack Fletcher, abi, jack fate or Older.

  71. Now, if you like the Electoral College and two-party politics, that’s your right, of course. But why blame Nader for the system that the Democrats continue to support?

    You know, never has an argument (in this case, that of the Nader-2000 supporters) paled so badly in so short a time.

    Al Gore (since 2000): Oscar Award and Nobel Prize
    Ralph Nader (since 2000): Doing the same thing, over and over again, expecting different results.

    That Nader supporters were too stupid to see the difference between George Bush, circa 2000, and Al Gore in the same year is not _actually_ an argument in their defense.

  72. My 20 are:

    1. Billy Dee Williams

    2. John Smallberries

    3. John Ya Ya

    4. John Bigboote

    5. A john from grand central station, east platform

    6. Bunny slippers

    7. John McCain’s coat

    8. a box of shiny new push pins

    9. Morris the Cat

    10. Todd Palin

    11. Sargent Slaughter

    12. a duck

    13. The entire cast of “Time Bandits” in character.

    14. Two hard boiled eggs

    15. A nude painting of Ernest Borgnine

    16. Wang Chung

    17. A Nurf tri boomerang

    18. a ball of wax

    19. The President of Animal Planet

    20. A stuffed beaver

WHATEVER


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