Register To Vote For Exciting Already-Decided Election

We are now less than a month away from the most exciting time of the year — i.e. the election between midterms and presidential. Could those odd-year elections be any more exciting?

Oh, yeah, there’s also a mayor’s race in Philadelphia between the guy who’s going to win (Michael Nutter) and the guy who’s going to lose (Al Taubenberger). And don’t forget the third-party candidates John Staggs (Socialist Workers, eligible to run for mayor, actually on ballot) and Larry West (independent, not eligible to run for mayor, not on ballot).

If you are very excited to vote for Mayor Al or meatpacker Staggs, be sure to note: Today is the last day you can register for the election in Pennsylvania. If you don’t vote, nothing will happen, but you lose your right to complain about the guy you voted for who’s not paying attention to your stupid pet causes.

Mayor’s Race To Excite ~5 Percent Of Residents

Hey, kids! Don’t forget! We got a mayor’s race coming up!

Despite Michael Nutter winning the election back in May, there’s still a formality of electing him again in November, because of this pesky thing called “democracy” which doesn’t let the Democratic party just win every election even though they have a 9π-to-1 (or something) registration edge in the city. And so, Nutter must fight back such candidates as Republican and ex-landscaper Al Taubenberger, awesome meatpacking socialist John Staggs, nobody from the Green Party — Kerry Foster, where are you? — and independent ineligible write-in candidate Larry West.

So far, it’s been the friendliest mayoral race in history, with Taubenberger going so far as to say that maybe the Democrats haven’t done the best job at running the city, but they haven’t bombed any city blocks in a while, so, you know. Larry West has also apparently been making the rounds attempting to get the Ozzfest voting bloc, from this comment on his Myspace: “Hahahaha, it was nice meeting you before Ozzfest.”

KYW 1060 reports Labor Day is the unofficial start of the campaign season in Philadelphia, but nobody is really going to notice this year since Taubenberger has like 50 bucks in the bank and a website from 1994 with “Page 1″ in the title field.

Philadelphia Mayor’s Race, Easy To Overlook [KYW 1060]

John Staggs Continues To Be Awesome

Pennsylvania Attorney General Tom Corbett has told election officials they can no longer force candidates to sign a McCarthy-era loyalty oath stating they are not “subversive.”

Although the oath was ruled unconstitutional in the 1970s, it remained on the books in Pennsylvania until it was challenged in recent years — by Pittsburgh mayoral candidate Jay Ressler last year and this year by State House candidate John Staggs, also a Socialist Workers Party member.

Staggs, you may remember, was the totally awesome third candidate in the 2003 Philadelphia mayoral election, whose platform included opposition to the war in Iraq and independence for Puerto Rico. He’s also a butcher who was working on an experimental plane.

As you can tell, if there were any justice in the world, right now Philly would be run by our plane-flyin’ meat packing plant-workin’ socialist friend. Staggs challenged the rule forcing him to sign the loyalty oath when before submitting the signatures. He’s running for the State House in District 198. If he wins — which, uh, is not going to happen — the state legislature would increase its awesomeness content by about a billion percent.

Pa. drops loyalty oath for candidates [AP/Yahoo!]
Butcher, candidate to vie for mayor spot [Daily Pennsylvanian]
State orders end to use of ‘loyalty oath’ [The Militant]