I don't usually do deep political analysis, particularly when it comes to getting down and dirty with demographics, but I'm fascinated by this story, and it seems particularly appropriate on Halloween:

An analysis of state-wide records by the Poughkeepsie Journal reveals that 77,000 dead people remain on election rolls in New York State, and some 2,600 may have managed to vote after they had died. The study also found that Democrats are more successful at voting after death than Republicans, by a margin of four-to-one, largely because so many dead people seem to vote in Democrat-dominated New York City.

In light of today's holiday, on which, like Kwanzaa for blacks and Cinco de Mayo for Mexicans, this demographic is particularly celebrated, I'm going to ask the question that nobody seems to ever ask, and one that the Republicans have to be asking themselves: how have they lost that key demographic, the metabolically challenged?

Admittedly, the Dems don't have the dead vote locked up in the same way that they do the black vote (only four to one, rather than the ten to one they traditionally get from the African American community), but that's still a huge "fog a mirror" gap. And the implications have to be frightening for the Republicans. After all, this is the largest demographic group of all--there are many times as many dead people as there are living ones, and that's likely to remain the case for some time to come, and probably forever, unless we develop radical life extension technologies.

So far, the GOP has been fortunate, because, whether due to apathy, or barriers thrown up at the polls, the dead don't tend to vote at all, by and large. But perhaps, if they could not only get many of them to switch party affiliation, but also mount a huge GOTDV drive, they could actually take advantage of this huge potential voting block, and take away a traditional Democrat advantage.

So what is it about the Dems that appeals to the non-living voters?

It really is a mystery, at least at first glance. You'd think that dead people would be naturally conservative. What more static, unchangeable state can there be, after all, but the grave? And after all, it isn't the Republicans who want to tax the dead. You'd think that these people would be voting their pocketbooks, even if the leather in them is rotting away. And yet they still continue to pull the donkey lever.

It can't be the entitlements: they're all at a stage of their life at which they don't really need the Social Security and Medicare any more.

Is it abortion on demand? That wouldn't seem to be a life-or-death issue (so to speak) for people well beyond their prime child-bearing years. And state of health.

Is it the war? The dead have little to fear from war. Their stuff's not going to get broken, because their descendants have it now, and what they didn't pass on, the Democrats taxed away. As for the last measure of devotion, how much worse can it get than being dead? That can't be it.

How about gun control? Well some, perhaps even many, of the dead may be dead as a result of guns. But given all of the other frailties and diseases that come with being human, it seems unlikely that this is a significant number of them. I can't imagine that this is what appeals to them about the gun-control party.

Support for the UN, and immigration? Well, here's a good possibility. After all, most of the dead aren't American citizens. Of course, the ones that aren't, aren't eligible to vote, either. But then, neither are dead people, so this hardly seems to be a major barrier.

You know, I think we may have it.

The key for Republicans is to really tighten up on the voting rolls, and only allow American dead to vote, and actually require, you know, IDs and stuff. Of course, we can expect the Dems to scream in outrage, about "voter intimidation," etc., to such a policy.

You know, on second thought, maybe we should just put up a fence around graveyards.

I'm not sure why anyone would be surprised that dead people primarily vote for the Democrats. The Metabolically Challenged were honor bound to vote for the Brain Dead.

I think it's just because (the first) Mayor Daley is organizing the Democratic GOTDV drive from the other side.

He was so good at it in life, they let him keep the job.

You are so right on. The dead ARE voting Democratic. I hadn't quite figured that out but having read your post, it makes sense. The only quibble I have with you is that they are going to vote in much larger numbers than your post would have us believe.

2800 dead Americans in Iraq => Major swing in political preference in the US over two years.

More dead in Iraq => More living Americans vote against the Repubs.

That's a tragic equation, but I have to agree, the dead ARE voting, more than metaphorically speaking, or will soon.

The only way to avoid this is to scare the nation stiff. Wonder what we are in for this last week.

Actually, Rand, the War is a good reason for the dead to vote against the Republicans. The millions of drafted troops that Bush has killed by sending them to Iraq and Afghanistan have a lot of pull in the afterlife. Living soldiers may vote Republican, but dead soldiers with a grudge tend to vote Democrat. And with Daley I on their side, there's a pretty strong GOTDV drive.

With Diebold code, it don't much matter how people vote. GOP going to win any which way.

Wow... in my haste to lampoon the Left, I see that the troll has, once again, bested me.

I'm surprised that MovableType doesn't record IP addresses...

But, in response to AnonCoward, I'll venture to guess that we'll find OBL this week, to give the NeoCon Nazis their mid-term victory. Unless Rove decides that it's better to wait until the '08 presidential election. In that case, he'll probably just have to level the Sears Tower instead.

I think you're making a mistake here. Dead people mostly have a hard time getting around, except for a small subset of them who are technically known as the "undead." You know, vampires, zombies, and the like. These are the ones who are voting, I'm sure of it. And yes, they do tend to vote Democratic, but can you blame them? The Democratic party is the one that is most sympathetic to the notion of excluding religious symbols like crosses from public property, and from what I understand, the display of such symbols can cause great physical and mental distress to the undead. In light of this, can you blame them for voting Democratic?

You can disagree with me if you must, but personally I think my analysis here is flawless.

Actually, el dia de los muertos is 2 Nov, not 31 Oct, and the 2nd of November is occasionally an election day.

(And if anything AnonElections posts ever makes sense to me, I should be declared brain-dead.)

I am working to uncover evidence that the Diebold voting machines are linked to a timing sequence that when the Democrats win will cause the explosives wired up to the Golden Gate bridge to go off. Of course, Karl Rove will helm the controls of a large animatronic Stay-Puft Marshmallow man wearing a jihad turban look like its responsible for knocking it down. Then, George Bush will jump out in his flight suit, melt the marshmallow mans face off, and declare peace for the next 30 years under his "Democratic" regime.

"I'm not dead yet! I feel happy!!! I feel..." *bonk*

So if I want to continue voting after I am dead I should die boldly?

You know, vampires, zombies, and the like. These are the ones who are voting, I'm sure of it. And yes, they do tend to vote Democratic, but can you blame them? The Democratic party is the one that is most sympathetic to the notion of excluding religious symbols like crosses from public property, and from what I understand, the display of such symbols can cause great physical and mental distress to the undead. In light of this, can you blame them for voting Democratic?

That, and the fact that Democrats are more associated with blood-sucking parasites.

I think Larry is right. tcobs analysis might be sound, but it is incomplete without the acknowledgement of bloodsucking parasite traits.

Seriously, the older and dead Daley locked up this voter block decades ago. It's really old news.

Can death certificates double as valid ID, or could the actual tombstone suffice?