The Commission on Rigged Presidential Debates, the bipartisan committee formed to protect the interests of the Democratic and Republican candidates for President of the United States, announced that the East Overshoe (MT) Daily Crier poll was being added to the list of the CRPD’s recognized polls.
Charles Darlington, Chair of the CRPD’s Super-secret Polling and Testing subcommittee, said that the choice reflected the CRPD’s responsibility to fulfill its bipartisan responsibilities. “SPAT has had a tough time finding appropriate polls,” Darlington said. “Libertarian Gary Johnson is doing much too well in most of the polls these days, and there was real concern within SPAT that he might soon surpass even our astronomically-high 15 percent bar. We were worried that we might have to make room for Gov. Johnson on the debate stage, and that just wouldn’t be fair to the candidates of the two parties who created our commission.”
The Daily Crier, a weekly paper which bills itself as “the voice of East Overshoe and the Skunk Creek watershed,” serves a town of twenty-two residents with an average age of 72. “We’ve been asking our readers who they like for President every four years for 36 years now,” said Floyd Berringer, editor of the Daily Crier. Asked if the paper’s poll was truly national, Berringer responded, “Oh, heck, yes! Besides our local residents, we also survey George Wilkerson’s cousin Maude over to Beaver Dam, and Millie Stark’s aunt all the way in Seattle. She takes our paper by mail, so sometimes, we have to wait a couple days to include her.” The paper’s most recent poll showed an even 50-50 split between Democrat Hillary Clinton and Republican Donald Trump. When asked if there was any support for Gov. Johnson, Berringer answered, “Who’s he? Is he any relation to Eli Johnson, over in Aleppo?”
“We take our responsibilities very seriously,” explained Darlington about the choice of the new poll. “We owe consideration both to the two legacy political parties and to the public at large.” Asked how restricting access to the debate stage served the public interests, Darlington explained, “We believe that American voters aren’t comfortable with being confronted with new voices and new ideas. They don’t want to be expected to think. They just want to stay in their comfort zone and evaluate their Presidential choice that same way they always have, based on who gets in the most zingers in the debate and who looks better under TV lights.”