The long awaited 1988 Presidential election is less than a week away. Can’t you just feel the tension building? How about the surge of excitement?

Even though this year’s race has been one devoid of any issues other than petty name-calling and childish bickering, the American public still has become deeply entrenched in the long-standing tradition of determining a candidate who will best represent our masses, better known as the democratic process. It’s rather amazing when you think about it. Americans all over the country have spent time in their homes, offices, bars, wherever, debating the “issues”—who is taking the lowest of the low shots at who.

The Northern Star is no exception. The battle lines have been drawn here for quite a while now. We have our “Don’t make me puke, vote for Duke” people, our “I think I’ll puke, if you vote for Duke” people and, of course, we have our “I’m going to puke, if I hear any more about Bush or Duke” people.

The heated debates can be heard any time, day or night, raging from office to office. Running arguments over candidates qualifications and ethics have involved anonymous propaganda tacked on doors, left in mailboxes and printed on message boards. Flyers, columns, news articles and campaign material have been exchanged between camps in a vain effort to sway the opposition to the right side.

For a campaign based on non-existent issues, it’s incredible how much election “material” there really is. But I think I’ve finally seen the light. Surprisingly enough, it didn’t come from the likes of a political-journalist god such as George Will or Sam Donaldson. I found it in a poll.

Now normally, I don’t put much stock in polls because people have a tendency to be a lot like the weather—as soon as you report they stand one way, they change. I think it’s their way of having a little fun with the media, or more likely of seeing how stupid they can make the media look today.

Anyway…while I was flipping through the October issue of Harper’s magazine the other day, I found my favorite section—Harper’s Index. The magazine staff combs through polls, news articles, reports and whatnot each month and prints interesting figures and statistics from around the world. And it was here I found the information to help me make my presidential candidate decision.

Harper’s printed figures were taken from Waldenbooks in Stamford, Conn. Someone decided to ask some children who they thought was “highly qualified” to be President. And judging how the election has been run it wasn’t a bad idea, either.

Well, 8 percent of the children thought Michael Dukakis was “highly qualified.” Now don’t start jumping up and down and hyper-ventilating quite yet all you Bush-types because the vice president wasn’t even mentioned. The other choice nominated as a “highly qualified” candidate by 8 percent polled was none other than Pee-Wee Herman.

I guess the other 84 percent, much like the rest of the voting public, either didn’t want to commit or didn’t really care anymore.

Yes, sir, the kids might just have something there. It kind of has a nice ring to it doesn’t it? President Pee-Wee.

As a devoute Pee-Wee fan, I set my alarm for 8:45 a.m. on Saturday mornings, drag myself far enough out of bed to turn on the TV and tune in Pee-Wee—so I’m up on his qualifications. And he could even select Jambi, or Knucklehead or even Cowboy Curtis as his vice president.

Can’t you just see him now…a summit meeting with Gorbachev, the leaders are in the middle of strategic decisions when all of a sudden—aahhhh!—someone said the word for the day.

Don’t sell him short, Pee-Wee just might have the answers, you never know. Hey, maybe I can convince the Star’s editorial board to endorse Pee-Wee for President…