Most have heard the story of the beautiful woman who is asked whether she will go to bed for $1 million. As the story goes, she says “Sure!” The guy then asks, then how about $20? She becomes indignant and says “What kind of girl do you think I am?” The guy then quips “We have already established that … now we are simply dickering over the price!”
I think you will see the parallels when you consider the antics of this week’s special election here in Georgia. It has certainly gotten in your local news. It is the most expensive in history … by a wide margin … so, being the engineer that I am, I did the math. The estimates are that $50 million was spent on advertising, not to mention the other campaign costs. The number of votes cast were just over 250,000. So, it cost $200 per vote. And, given that most minds were made up long before any of this was battled out, the cost per vote changed was probably well north of $2,000 a vote.
I think a lot of those voters would have much rather received a check for the $2,000. That would have circulated through the economy and who knows what good things might have emerged. Instead, we Georgians have endured nonstop commercials for months now. That is the one thing that now unites us all here: the ads will stop. But, of course, now the media will go through a frenzy trying to figure out what went wrong for the Dems, whether the Russians interfered with the election, or whether the intense rain kept turnout low.
Thank goodness this is now over!