Question: When is a vote worth $200,000?

Answer: When someone attaches a $200,000 stamp to a postal ballot. (If you were looking for some juicy vote-buying scandals, look elsewhere.)

Sadly, as this was a really great story, the stamp was fake. Even worse (well, not really, but as a budding political scientist I have to act like I think so), the vote was invalid. Sheesh, losing out on the transcendental experience of exercising one’s democratic right just because one wanted to have a bit of fun…

Via The Museum of Hoaxes.

Go Sweden!

Like many other liberals on the blogosphere, I want to congratulate the Swedes for electing a new, conservative/liberal government. But, here is what I wrote elsewhere just before election day:

“If Sweden is anything like Denmark:

They’ll elect a liberal/conservative government which will push through some cosmetic and symbolic reforms and laws, and talk about cultural change, only later to revert to competing with the social democrats on who can put most money into the public sector, because that is what what matters most to 60+% of the population (the percentage of the population that is state-employed or dependent on state benefits), and then finally (un)officially declaring itself as a social democratic party.”

So I’m not holding my breath for Sweden…

A funny comment from the same location:

“The first exit polls are ready and it looks like a social democratic win with the bloc of the New Labour in a lead in all the polls over the Old Labour bloc.”