The 'I voted? sticker: Just stick it

Yes, I voted. And then I karate-chopped the sticker lady on the way out. I'll rock your vote.

By Sean Daly, Times Pop Music Critic
Published January 29, 2008

After you vote today, there's an extremely good chance that, upon exiting the polling place, an 85-year-old woman will hand you an "I Voted" sticker.

You will no doubt smile politely at Madge and thumb this sticker onto your lapel. As Election Day goes on, you will receive an assortment of nods, winks and smirks from the equally bestickered. A few of these nodders and winkers will mean well. A few of these smirkers truly believe in freedom.

But most of them are Evil Sticker People. And I despise the Evil Sticker People.

Here's the deal: I'm a proud voter. I firmly believe my vote counts. I cry watching Patton.

But let it be known that I only wear the "I Voted" sticker out of self-preservation. I've been burned too many times, too many elections, not to wear it.

Surely you've been suckered into one of the Evil Sticker People's nefarious interrogations:

"Did you vote today?"

"Yes, I voted."

"No, you didn't. Where's your sticker?"

"Are you kidding me? I voted Democrat in Feather Sound. Do you know how risky that is? I almost got stabbed by a stay-at-home mom."

"Then where's your sticker?"

"I left it in the car."

"You're a big fat liar! You should be ashamed! People like you have no right complaining about our country if you don't vote! Communist! Communist!"

I used to work with an Evil Sticker Person who, on Election Day, would comb the newsroom searching for the unstickered. If you weren't wearing the "I Voted" sticker - or couldn't produce dry-clean-only remnants of stickerlike adhesive on your button-down shirt - this guy would pounce. It didn't matter if you voted or not. No sticker, no mercy. He cared more about the sticker than who actually won the election. He was a bully, and "I Voted" was his badge.

The sticker was originally meant to encourage civic pride, to show nonvoters that there was this faboo experience they were missing. But now the sticker is merely an instrument of intimidation. It reminds me of the final scene in 1978's Invasion of the Body Snatchers, when creepy podperson Donald Sutherland unleashes an unholy moan at the last human. Ol' Don might as well have been asking, "Where's your sticker, dude?"

So the musical playlist below is dedicated to all of you who voted today - or, at the very least, to those of you who stood up to tyranny, to bullies, to the Evil Sticker People. Let freedom reign, peeps. Let freedom reign.

Sean Daly can be reached at sdaly@sptimes.com or 727 893-8467. His Pop Life blog is at blogs.tampabay.com/popmusic.

The Vote or Else Playlist

1. Fight for Your Right, the Beastie Boys

2. Get Up Stand Up, Bob Marley and the Wailers

3. Freedom of Choice, Devo

4. Don't Tread on Me, Metallica

5. American Idiot, Green Day

6. Political World, Bob Dylan

7. If I Was President, Wyclef Jean

8. Fight the Power, Public Enemy

9. A Change Is Gonna Come, Sam Cooke

10. America the Beautiful, Ray Charles

[Last modified January 28, 2008, 17:19:07]