Waiting for the UnCouple

[November 3rd, 2004] As the Nose writes this, he has no idea whether Tom Potter won or if gays lost, whether Oregon's doctors can sleep through the night without having John Edwards nightmares or whether hair plugs helped Nick Fish fend off Sam Adams. The Schnoz, like everyone else, must wait 'til Wednesday to find out.

What the Nose does know is this:

Mr. and Mrs. Undecided deserve a special place in hell.

You know that VIP suite where Vlad the Impaler and Pol Pot are saving seats for O.J. Simpson and Omarosa? Make room for a few more.

The Nose holds the Great Wishy-Washed responsible for his clogged mailbox and a rash of late-night phone calls. Because of these people, Mr. Nostril has spent more time with Erin Brockovich over the past month than with his own gal pal.

It's gotten to the point where the Nose feels better about those voters who disagree with him on EVERY issue--the Vegan Muslim Fundamentalists for Bush, the Swift Boat Deserters for Nader--than those who, like the schmucks at Subway, can't decide whether they want whole wheat or Italian.

Why is the Nose so bitter? 'Cause Mr. and Mrs. Un have drained the American economy of the $55 gazillion dollars spent on campaigns this election--money that could have been far better spent on more tax cuts to Halliburton, or even universal health care. These vacillators are responsible for the endless last-minute promises made by candidates, the predictions of doom from ballot measure campaigns. These fickle weasels apparently need just one more piece of information before they can determine if George Bush is competent, or if Multnomah County's income-tax hike should be taken out of Diane Linn's hide.

To which the Nose responds: HAVE YOU NOT BEEN PAYING ATTENTION?

Just who are these people?

According to most experts, somewhere around 5 to 7 percent of the registered voters fall in this camp. In Oregon, that amounts to as many as 150,000 sniveling flip-floppers.

Pacific University political-science professor Jim Moore takes a rather benign view of these folks.

"They are people who support George Bush on the war in Iraq," he says, "but have lost their job. They need to resolve their contradictions."

The Nose doesn't exactly buy this, instead favoring the school of thought shared by pollster Lisa Grove. The undecideds, she maintains, are the people who "are more concerned with their low-carb diets than they are the intersection of elections and the operation of government. They are disaffected. They are not joiners." At the same time, Grove says, she feels sorry for these people, who are specifically targeted by campaigns: "They ought to have restraining orders against the Democratic and Republican parties."

The Nose feels no such sympathy. That's 'cause the rest of us suffer from the spillover. Sure, the undecided may get a few more phone calls from Ed Begley Jr. or a batch more postcards. But all of us have to listen to the radio commercials. All of us were subjected to the television mindsuck of the No on 37 campaign's nauseating "Eeny, meeny, miney, moe" commercial. We all had to drive with extra care on the way home so as not to run over the energetic youth holding the Goli Ameri banner along Barbur. We all suffered through Curt Shilling's last-minute endorsement of Bush and Bette Midler's end-of-election embrace of John Kerry.

Can't all voters be more like the Nose: stubborn, prejudiced and barreling forward, facts be damned?