Who
Wants to Be a Chairpurrson?
January,
2000
“The votes are pouring in for the new Chairpurrson of the TLC Cat Club,” said my investigative assistant, Tammy the Greyhound, as she raced into my office.
“We’re going to have to announce a winner soon,” I agreed.
“By the way, Boss, the Colonel is following the returns with great interest.”
“The Colonel?” I asked, suspiciously.
“The Colonel has been scrutinizing the votes for Chairpurrson each day,” Tammy continued. “He says they offer profound insights into the psychology of the electorate.”
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I had been looking at the returns, too. “Almost nobody is voting on the issues,” I said to Tammy. “They’re all voting on character.”
“Precisely. The voters are looking for a real character. And the Colonel’s pollsters believe that if he can present himself as the perfect composite of people’s preferences, he could win the general election with a landslide.”
“Do they have the winning profile yet?” I asked.
“They do, indeed. Taking the most frequent comments of the voters, the Colonel’s gang have concluded that he should present himself as a goofy, yet adorable, hunk whose elevator doesn’t quite go to the top and who looks like Groucho but scratches and bites you while reminding you of your cat at home.”
“Hmm, that doesn’t sound much like the Colonel,” I said.
“This is true,” admitted Tammy. “But the Colonel says he and his gang will practice the scratching and biting part. And he wants you, as his spin veterinarian, to take care of the rest. Some of the voters have been voting twice anyway, so they obviously don’t mind who does what as long as their favorite candidate wins.”
“That’s disgraceful,” I said to Tammy. “But we haven’t started on the presidential election yet. Right now we have hundreds of votes pouring in for the new Chairpurrson and we have to announce a winner.”
“So you’d better start counting the votes,” replied Tammy.
“We can’t possibly do that,” I said. “People will be angry if the cat they voted for doesn’t win. I’m already getting threatening letters. They might even stop reading my column.”
Tammy agreed that this could be a problem. “In Ancient Rome,” she said, “the Powers That Be used to distract the voters by putting on lots of circuses.”
“I hate circuses.”
“So do most of our readers,” agreed Tammy. “But they love game shows, and so do you.”
Before I could say anything, the music had come up, the stage had gone dark, and spotlights were flashing down from the top of the studio.