The Tuna Sandwich Law

I call it the Tuna Sandwich Law. It goes like this. In a two party election a tuna sandwich will get 40% of the vote. There are always enough die-hards who will vote a straight party ticket so even a tuna sandwich is assured of getting 40% of the vote. My law, to this, is if you score higher, than you beat a tuna sandwich; if you get lower than 40% you didn't do as well as a tuna sandwich would have done.

When Hillary Clinton first ran for the Senate in New York the Republicans chose a man, Rick Lazio, who had somehow dazzled his party's leadership into thinking that he had a measurable IQ. When he first entered the race, it was close. Then he spoke. He did worse than a tuna sandwich would have.

After watching all the ads for the Kentucky Governor's race I felt cheated that we in Southern Indiana could not vote. If we had to endure all the commercials, we should have had a right to weigh in. To his credit, incumbent Governor Ernie Fletcher narrowly beat the tuna sandwich out by getting 41% of the votes. He really was a dreadful governor. It is mystifying.

He defeated Ann Northup in the Republican primaries. He used Ms. Northup's Roman Catholicism against her in parts of the state where that tactic would work. It was shameful but effective. It also was an incompetent fool defeating a woman who might have been elected Kentucky's Governor. Unlike him, she had a chance in a general election.

Fletcher's campaign was about not wanting casino gambling. His opponent's best commercial was a clip of Fletcher's inaugural address. That's always frightening. Fletcher ran on the 10 Commandments----things he likes to see posted but doesn't feel any need to obey them, and prayer in schools. Well, private prayer in schools is still legal and public prayer in schools is illegal. Is he suggesting that private prayer in schools is illegal----and doesn't know the law, or is he suggesting that he wants to lead the state into breaking laws?

Frankly, the only thing I saw Fletcher running on was that he was opposed to casinos and or gambling because some people in some other unnamed places lost money in the casinos.

It's difficult for an incumbent to have so little to run on.

He can take great solace, however. He did better than a tuna sandwich would have.

But barely.