How would you feel about a completely unqualified professional comedian running your government (note: I’m not touching a Palin joke with a 20-foot pole)? Apparently the citizens of Reykjavik feel pretty good about it, as they elected the facetious Icelandic actor/comedian Jon Gnarr and his “Best Party” to power earlier this month, with 34.7 percent of the vote (6 of 15 seats) in the 2010 city council elections.
“No one has to be afraid of the Best Party,” Gnarr declared during his acceptance speech, “because it is the best party. If it wasn’t, it would be called the Worst Party or the Bad Party. We would never work with a party like that.”
Gnarr and his Best Party, which was founded in December of 2009, made various promises to the city’s residents over the course of the campaign, including:
- Building a Disneyland in the airport
- Providing free towels at public spas and swimming pools
- Creating a polar bear exhibit at the zoo
The amusing/alarming political development, covered in a variety of forums including the Atlantic Wire, the Village Voice, and New York Magazine, proves how disillusioned Reykjavik residents are with their political system: promises of polar bears and roller coasters seem more believable than most of the deceptive doublespeak they have heard in the past.
But seriously, how can you resist voting for a guy who uses Tina Turner’s “Simply the Best” as his campaign song and refuses to choose a coalition partner who has not seen all five seasons of the HBO epic “The Wire”? The answer is you can’t.
Source: Atlantic Wire, Village Voice, New York Magazine
Image by biologyfishman, licensed under Creative Commons.
