Warning: Uh, no real warnings this time, but if you're an obsessive Sarah Palin supporter, skip this chapter.

Chapter Four: Ballots, not Bullets- Election Day

November 4, 2008- Alfred awoke that morning to a rainy, dreary D.C. Day. An ominous start to an election day, he though.

Elections were always awkward, nerve-wracking times for countries. Their daily lives would be completely controlled by whoever the people chose. It didn't help that this year, tensions were higher than usual. Alfred always knew politicians could use some pretty dirty tactics against one another (Thomas Jefferson's opposition had tried to paint him as an agent of Satan himself), but this was just too much.

For example, one concern brought up against opponents of John McCain was his age. He was in his seventies, and some people worried that his health wasn't good enough for him to be the leader of the country. He did a fairly good job of convincing people otherwise... until he forgot how many houses he had. The Democrats made a big deal out of this, saying that someone senile enough to forget how many houses he owned obviously was not up to the task of running the free world.

Then came the mess with Barack Obama's preacher, who some said spouted racist rhetoric. He quickly made a move to distance himself from the divisive cleric, but for some, that wasn't enough. "The damage was already done!" they cried. "You can't take back what you've already filled your mind with!"

Although, if Alfred had to point to one factor that was the proverbial wrench in the plans, it was Sarah Palin. The woman was every single caricature of an "ignorant American" rolled into one. And she was hurting America's image abroad.

Alfred first found this out when he was sitting back and relaxing after a grueling day sitting in on Congress. Good god Nancy Pelosi could talk for hours. He had a Big Mac, and Patriot Games was on the television. He was ready for some serious down-time when suddenly, his cell phone rang. "Hello?"

"Ahahahaha... is this America? Hee hee hee..." a voice laughed.

"Yeah... who is this?" Alfred replied uncertainly. It had to be either a country or their boss... his mobile number wasn't common knowledge.

"Your brother gave us this number. I hope we're not troubling you, but we're radio DJs from Quebec. We just thought it might be important to tell you that the woman you have running for your vice president is a freaking idiot. We just called her pretending to be Nicolas Sarkozy and she absolutely believed us! And when we said we saw the documentary on her life- it's really a porno- she acted like there was actually a movie about her! She's a complete moron! We hope for your sake that she doesn't get elected. Hell, we hope for our sake that she doesn't get elected. She'd probably accidentally launch the nukes!"

"Matthew gave you my number?" Alfred asked, somewhat shocked. "I thought I told him not do that!"

"Don't get angry with him," the DJ replied. "He only gave it to us because he wanted payback for that 5000 pizza prank you played on him last year." Alfred couldn't argue with that... in a fit of drunken stupidity back in 2007, he, Kiku, and Arthur thought it would be a laugh to order five thousand pizzas to be delivered to the residence of Canada's prime minister. It had seemed like a good idea at the time...

"Alright, I can't argue with that," Alfred admitted. The DJs thanked him for his time, and hung up, leaving Alfred to think about things. Had Sarah Palin seriously thought that two Canadian radio DJs were Nicholas Sarkozy? The idea was rather scary...

But he didn't have too long to think before his cell rang again. He answered it with some trepidation this time.

"Hello, Alfred F. Jones speaking."

"Hello America? This is Nigeria, and I have Kenya and South Africa here with me," he heard a woman say. He also heard some chattering in the background. Alfred blinked. The African countries rarely ever called him. Something must be up. He really hoped it wasn't pirates again...

"Abagebe? Is everything OK?" he asked, addressing Nigeria by her human name.

"You do realize who you have running for vice president, right?" he heard South Africa ask loudly from the other end of the line.

"Uh... yeah..." Alfred replied, not really sure where they were going with this.

"Well, we were trying to watch some football this afternoon when Abagebe accidentally sat on the remote," Kenya explained. "It changed the channel to some of your presidential campaign speeches. The lady running for vice president seems to think that Africa is a country!" Poor Alfred wanted to sink into the sofa and fade away. He wasn't that dumb! But now everyone else in the world would think that Alfred F. Jones couldn't tell the difference between a country and a continent. Every time a politician screwed up it reflected badly on him. After the whole Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky scandal, the rest of the world thought he was a philandering douchebag. Every time George W. Bush came up with a new Bush-ism the rest of the world thought that he didn't speak English. If a politician did something stupid, he had done something stupid by association.

"I'm sorry," he said simply. "Hopefully it won't happen again..."

But it did happen again. And again. And again. It seemed that the woman didn't have any sense of decorum at all, and further damaged her credibility when she said that Barack Obama "palled around with terrorists." Some of the country thought she was a national disgrace. Others loved her and saw her as the future of the Republican party, so much that she overshadowed John McCain at times.

But the battle for the presidency still continued, turning downright ugly at times. Alfred was more than glad to see November 4th roll around. He called both candidates to wish them luck, before settling into his sofa with a pile of DVDs. He never went out on election day... it generated too much controversy.

He only got about halfway through the St. Trinian's DVD England had loaned him before he decided he couldn't take not knowing what was going on, and decided to check the news. Big mistake. Alfred almost gave himself a heart attack reading about how close the race was and how people in some areas were antagonizing each other over the campaign signs in their yards, and all of the threats that certain people were getting.

No matter how hard he tried, Alfred couldn't relax. He spent the rest of the day checking all of the major news websites... CNN, Fox, MSNBC, C-SPAN, Politico... he even checked the BBC's international news page to see how the British were reporting on it. He read anything relating to the election that he could find.

Eventually, the polls closed all over the country. The votes were in: Barack Obama had won the election. The television news channel cut to the cheering crowd in Chicago while the new president-elect gave his acceptance speech. He had to smile a bit when he heard that Obama was going to get a puppy for his daughters to share the White House with.

Once the speech was over, Alfred flipped the channel and came across coverage of McCain's concession. He was very gracious about it, not coming across as someone who was in a rage after their loss. The crowd here was more subdued than the one in Chicago- after all, their candidate had just lost.

The thing that worried Alfred was the angry, defiant, close-to-tears look that some of the Republican supporters, and Sarah Palin, had. They were not pleased that their candidate had not been elected to the White House, and Alfred couldn't help but think of a slightly modified, famous Arnold Schwarzenegger quote: "They'll be back."

To Be Continued

Author's Comments:

If you want to hear the Sarah Palin/"Nicholas Sarkozy" interview, visit this link: http:// www .youtube .com /watch? v= QbEwKcs-7Hc Be sure to remove the spaces.

Actually, I have a question for you all: are there any particular issues you would like to see me focus on? I have some ideas, but really don't want to bore anyone, so if there's anything you'd like to see discussed, drop me a line and I'll incorporate it into a chapter at some point. I have up to eleven chapters drafted right now, but I will guarantee that if there's something you want to see I'll incorporate it.

-Kaboom