Take a presidential election year, stir it together with the debut of National Geographic Channel’s Chasing UFOs series and — voilá! — you get a press release declaring that more people think Obama is better suited to handle an alien invasion than Romney.
I’m used to hearing that elections will be swung by the undecided. Now it seems the unidentified will play a role too.
Two-thirds (65%) of Americans prefer Barack Obama over fellow presidential candidate Mitt Romney when it comes to handling an alien invasion. Obama has a commanding lead no matter how you slice it – among women, men, the elderly and citizens aged 18 to 64.
Surprisingly, however, most Americans evidently don’t expect this hypothetical alien invasion to look like a scene out of War of the Worlds, Independence Day or Falling Skies:
According to a new U.S. extraterrestrial survey from National Geographic Channel (NGC), more than 80 million Americans are certain that UFOs exist. In fact, many believe in tangible proof that aliens have landed on Earth and think that government officials are involved in covering up paranormal activities. Moreover, most citizens would not mind a minor alien invasion, because they expect these space-age visitors to be friendly—like the lovable character depicted in Steven Spielberg’s popular film “E.T.”
So do these responses, taken together, mean that most people believe an alien invasion will be a social occasion calling for a terrific speech?
Romney shouldn’t feel too bad about being named by less than 35% of the 1,114 Americans who took NatGeo’s “Aliens Among Us” survey. That’s still a better number than some very well-known superheroes pulled —
Furthermore, if aliens attacked our planet, more than one in five (21%) would most likely call on the Hulk to deal with the havoc. Far fewer would most trust Batman (12%) or Spiderman (8%) to step in.
It makes sense to me that so many would choose the Hulk. Remember what the irascible Admiral King supposedly said when Roosevelt made him Commander-in-Chief of the Navy after Pearl Harbor — “When they get in trouble they send for the sons-of-bitches” — a quality Admiral King and Bruce Banner (the Hulk’s secret identity) have in common. As Banner says in The Avengers movie, “That’s my secret, Cap: I’m always angry.” And one of Admiral King’s daughters (perhaps the one Ensign Heinlein dated?) joked about her father, “He is the most even-tempered person in the United States Navy. He is always in a rage.”
[Thanks to Martin Morse Wooster for the story.]
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Well, I’m glad to see that the American voting public will depend on serious issues while deciding the fate of their nation come next November. Nothing frivolous such as a grasp of monetary theory or a thorough grounding in the principles of the constitution — that’s old news, but aliens might invade tomorrow, who knows?
Mr. Romney has already said that he saw no profit in space exploration and therefore would not support it. With that statement he proved how short-sighted he is, which also reflects his business dealings, all of which seem to have been for short-term profit at the expense of long-term benefit. While his religion has life on at least one other planet (Kolob) as an article of faith, it seems to me that he wouldn’t have the balanced attitude required to represent the Human Race in a first contact.
President Obama has given lip service to the NASA Human Spaceflight Program, but is much more willing to turn it over to private enterprise. This is both a more progressive (as in promoting progress) and a more libertarian attitude at the same time.
Also, as a childhood Star Trek fan, he would have, I think, a better attitude toward dealing with a first contact situation, having seen depictions of both friendly and unfriendly aliens in his formative years.
Interesting arguments. With the proposition being “alien invasion,” however, we have finally stumbled upon the only possible context in which candidate Romney’s infamous fascination with Battlefield Earth is a plus.
Have I stumbled into an imaginary story line, like DC Comics did frequently, going on and on about “if Superman was a Woman” or somedamnsuch. The CHASING UFOS line has only so much information available, of course it’s going to run into fictional speculation. Next up: who would you want in office for the zombie apocalypse?
As for any government consipracy on UFOs, I’ve seen that a lack of evidence is evidence for some people.