All Politics is Local

Just over a week ago, I stood at a little red mailbox in the center of Copenhagen and dropped in my absentee ballot for the U.S. presidential election.  Little did I know that my vote - my first ever in a presidential contest - would be counted in one of the closest races in recent memory.  I would have liked to be able to offer my perspective on the results of the contest, but like the rest of the world, I am still waiting for the recount.  My vote made its way by airmail to Massachusetts, where the overwhelmingly Democratic state was a clear win for Gore; the final result, however, will be decided in Florida - land of alligators, Disney World, and senior citizens.   Today, two US absentee ballots mysteriously appeared in a mailbox in Odense, Denmark.  Neither of them is mine, however; they somehow got here from Washington state!

Last Wednesday morning, along with a number of other Americans here in Denmark, I attended a post-election breakfast hosted by the US ambassador.  We arrived for the breakfast not knowing who won, heard Bush declared the winner -- and then after we left, heard that Bush had un-won (or something).  Despite the US ambassador being a Democrat, it was a quite Republican breakfast -- big spread of sandwiches, oysters, pastries, chicken wings; held at the fanciest hotel in Copenhagen and attended by numerous members of the Danish political establishment (of whom I only recognized the prime minister and the environment minister).  At 7:30 in the morning after staying up all night, it was a bit much (especially on the food side – I spent the first ten minutes searching the colossal buffet for a croissant!)   It was a good party nonetheless, even though we thought that Bush had won! 

I, of course, have been spending every evening since election night glued to CNN.  Since it is the only channel I receive that is consistently in English, besides MTV-Europe, I am quite happy to have it.  The Danish channels run bad American sitcoms with Danish subtitles, and occasionally a bad American movie with Danish subtitles; however, the news is of little use to me.  Often, they will show quite interesting documentaries, of which I can understand only the interviews of non-Danish speakers.  Most of the time, these interviews are in English.  However, the Danish subtitles when other languages are spoken are helpful enough that I can often get the general idea of what is said by reading them.  Comprehending the spoken Danish word, however, still eludes me. So I often watch documentaries in which I can understand virtually everything but the linking narration, which makes for some amusing sequences of film footage.   The most interesting documentary I’ve seen so far was on prisons in Stalinist Russia; I now have an astounding vocabulary of Danish prison terms.

I realized that I have had too much CNN over the past few days, however, when I started humming that awful CNN international weather tune even when the television is not on.  I am experiencing election overload.  And everywhere I go, people ask me what is going on with the United States.  One thing is certain – if citizens of Denmark had been allowed to vote in Tuesday’s election, Al Gore would have won in a landslide. 

Voters in Massachusetts know a bit about the “punch-card” ballot issue.  Back in 1996, Congressman William Delahunt won his primary election by getting a judge to count half-punched ballots in Quincy, giving him a 108-vote edge over his opponent.   Those ballots are now illegal in Massachusetts.  Personally, every vote I have ever cast has been of the “fill-in-the-bubble” type, so I am unable to comment with any authority on personal experiences with the “punch-card” system. 

So, as 85-year-old grandmothers in Palm Beach decide the country’s fate, I am watching the sun go down at 4:08 pm, waiting to see whether I should plan to stay away until 2004….Right now, the only person who seems content with the waiting is Bill Clinton - his wife is a senator, there's no new president-elect to steal his spotlight, and - though some say he's a lame duck - he says he has "ten more weeks to quack."