I almost forgot about Halloween. I don't know how many readers would care, but I went to a party dressed as Hannibal Lecter. In a last minute idea, I wore a tuxedo with a goalie mask -- and while it wasn't quite as accurate as this mask, I drove the point home by bringing a bottle of wine while apologizing profusely for not bringing Liver of Bureaucrat with Fava Beans, which I'd had no time to prepare. It seemed fitting, somehow, because in my darkest of hearts I secretly admire the man. While I don't approve of his methods, he did target rude people, so I have a soft spot for his ideological convictions. (Even if I'm too cowardly to put a census taker's liver in my mouth.)

I was reminded of my Halloween costume by Glenn Reynolds' link (indirect as it was) to a post about a costume that never would have occured to me, but which was worn by Mickey Kaus, who went to a party dressed as the Bradley Effect.

Went to a Halloween party dressed as The Bradley Effect. The elemental conceptual simplicity of my costume somehow failed to terrify, even in a Dem heavy Hollywood crowd. ... This may be the first election where average Web-surfing, procrastinating liberal comedy writers know more about the last Insider Advantage poll in Pennsylvania than Howard Fineman does.... Unfortunately, they thought the photo of George Deukmejian on my costume** was Robert Rubin.

**--Pinned to the red half of the costume under a blue flap that--easier to show than tell--flopped over to obscure a photo of long-serving L.A. Mayor Tom Bradley, whom they mistook for an Asian man. They had been drinking. ...[Had you worn the White Liberal Guilt Effect costume, I would have been impressed.--emailer DM It was at the cleaners.]

And it made me think that while I might not have been consciously aware of the political implications, perhaps my Hannibal Lecter costume was a subconscious act of passive-aggressive protest. Not so much against The Bradley Effect itself, but the underlying rudeness involved.

I do see a problem with the discussion of the Bradley Effect, which is almost always described or analyzed as some form of dissembled racism.

Some analysts say the race could be much closer or even tied if the Bradley effect is factored in. iReport.com: iReporter pleads with voters to 'stop the racism'

I realize a lot of people have been trying to make this election about race, but I think most of that is bullshit. I don't think race is anywhere near as large a factor as the Obama advocates claim it is.

Or am I being accurate there? Don't false accusations of racism make race a factor? In this election, a pervasive attempts have been made to label virtually all criticism of Barack Obama as racist -- even objections to socialism.

If objecting to socialism is racist, then I'm one of the biggest racists around, and my blog has been spouting racism from the beginning.

I'm being sarcastic, but my point is that if you're accused of racism, then the debate is about race. What that means is that the extent to which Obama opponents are accused of racism, then in logic, the election is about race.

Unfair, perhaps, but since when does fairness have anything to do with anything? Remember, to Obama and his supporters, redistribution of wealth is carried out in the name of being "fair." (This fairness theory is also known as "social justice.") If I have 200,000, and my neighbor has 100,000, then it is "fair" to take 50,000 from me and give it to him. My unfairly lost 50,000 and his unfairly gained 50,000 are considered fair. And if creating two unfairnesses is what fair means, then there is no fairness. Besides, it's racist to complain!

To be fair to the Obama camp, this is not the first time that such dissent has been labeled racist. Anyone remember the Seattle Public School definition?

Cultural Racism:
Those aspects of society that overtly and covertly attribute value and normality to white people and Whiteness, and devalue, stereotype, and label people of color as "other", different, less than, or render them invisible. Examples of these norms include defining white skin tones as nude or flesh colored, having a future time orientation, emphasizing individualism as opposed to a more collective ideology, defining one form of English as standard, and identifying only Whites as great writers or composers. (Emphasis added.)

A shame, really. And it does not bode well for the ability of black candidates to be judged on their own merit.

Does anyone think this would be different if the GOP had a black candidate on the ticket? Imagine that they had. Suppose Colin Powell or Condoleezza Rice had been running in place of John McCain or Sarah Palin. Would criticism of them by Democrats be called "racist"? Maybe by a few conservative or libertarian cranks like me, but it would not stick. That's because the left has a near-total monopoly on the use of the term "racist." It is theirs alone to use, abuse, redefine at will, and deploy in whatever way they see fit, and it is meant to terrify, and yes, terrorize (if the colloquial use of that word is still allowed).

I believe the very use of the term "Bradley Effect" is another instance of misused terminology. The way it is being used, it magically tranforms people who fear being labeled racist as racist. Yet ironically, the only people who don't mind being called racist are -- surprise -- genuine unapologetic racists.

A pity, really, because I think there might be something going on besides race. I think there are a lot of people who think Barack Obama is too far to the left, and have misgivings about him because he's new and they don't know enough about him. This is not racism. I also think that there are a lot of people voting for Obama because he is black. While that would be considered racism if the term were used in a logical manner, forget logic. The "R" word is simply a political weapon, and one which unlicensed people have no right to use.

Now, I know this will sound racist, but sometimes I wish Barack Obama were white, like John Kerry. He would lose decisively because he's so far to the left (certainly to the left of Kerry) and that leftism would be a legitimate area for discussion. I don't like the baggage that goes with his skin color, because it makes legitimate discussion of his politics problematic. It doesn't stop me, because I'm a blogger and bloggers are supposed to be outspoken, but it's an annoyance.

For many non-political, non-blogging people, it's more than an annoyance; it's a reason for extreme self-censorship. I said "extreme," because I think it goes beyond the ordinary self censorship that occurs at election time.

To illustrate, let's deracialize this election by going back in time. Not that far, just to 2004. Here's what I wrote on Monday, November 3, 2004:

...ordinary people tend to be private people. They don't want to talk about private matters to people they don't know -- especially those they might perceive as activists who'd pigeonhole them as being on the "problem" side of the (activist) equation that "you're either part of the solution or you're part of the problem."

This whole thing reminds me a bit of workplace partisans who ask their co-workers who they're going to vote for. (Co-workers who don't want to talk about it can be hounded mercilessly.) Thinking back to the 2004 election, I recall that it was more often the Bush voters who were the evasive ones. They just plain didn't want to talk about it, because if they did, they'd have trouble with the Kerry voters. Depending on the workplace, I'm sure this happened on the other side too, but I think that in general, the silent, non-activist types tended to favor Bush. (No doubt the activists would equate their silence with mindlessness, sneakiness, or cowardliness, but that's another topic.)

Voting is of course still conducted in secret. ("Your vote is secret!" was a winning slogan in Nicaragua when the Sandinistas were turned out of office, and while I'm not comparing American activists to Sandinistas, I don't doubt that had the Sandinistas conducted exit polls, they'd have been happy with the results.)

What I can't figure out is why the activists are already worrying about a possible conflict between the exit polls and the election results in advance of the election itself.

You'd think the masses were refusing to tell them how they're going to vote.

(How "undemocratic" those masses can be!)

Sheesh.

I'd hate to think American democracy is degenerating into a form of "don't ask, don't tell," but there are distinct similarities between voting booths and closets.

My point is, if voting preferences were being kept in the "closet" in 2004 out of fear, imagine what has happened to that closet now that the element of race has been added. Not just added, but deployed in a huge way.

I think characterizing this phenomenon as "the Bradley Effect" is misleading in the extreme, but I think that is in line with the twofold goal:

pronouncing all opposition to Obama as racist regardless of who wins; and

making it impossible to acknowledge a McCain victory as anything but a victory of "racism."

What if the masquerade backfires, and the UNO Effect is exacerbated?

(If only the pollsters could ask Hannibal Lecter who he plans to vote for...)

MORE: Zombietime thinks that the bias of the people who conduct polls might influence the results:

...I posit that the vast majority of people actually doing the polling are themselves Obama supporters. Not necessarily the CEOs who own the polling companies, but the people actually picking up the phone and making the calls, or walking door-to-door.

This fact has potentially significant implications for the outcomes of polls. Imagine, for a moment, that you were one of the rare McCain supporters in a polling call-center; wouldn't you be a little depressed if person after person you called stated that they were intending to vote for Obama? How could you not be? But what if you were an Obama supporter working in that same call center? Wouldn't you be elated or enthused to hear the votes for Obama piling up? Of course you would. Ah, but pollers are under strict instructions to not reveal their personal opinions to the people they're polling. And I'm sure that most try to follow the rules. But even if you grant that, say, 90% of them manage to maintain complete neutrality, and not let some kind of expectation creep into their voice or attitude, that still leaves 10% who might consciously or unconsciously be slanting the results. And that's all it would take to screw up a poll. Even a 95% honesty rate leaves room for 5% bias in the results, which can be very significant in a close race like this one.

the attitude of questioners can affect respondents' answers even if the questioner is trying to remain neutral.

So, when the phone rings and the pollster calls -- and your Clever Hans social antennae tell you the pollster is young and liberal and likely an Obama supporter -- would you have the nerve to tell the pollster the truth that you wouldn't vote for Obama in a million years? I mean, they called you; they know your number. They know who you are. Can you be absolutely sure they aren't putting a check mark in the "Racist" box next to your name in some mysterious database?

I also liked this

In 2008 there is no silent majority: there is the silenced majority.

Here's Zombietime's conclusion:

..it may very well be that an army of glum, dispirited and pessimistic conservatives will reluctantly trudge to the polls on November 4, each one imagining they are the only remaining person in the entire country voting for McCain, and lo and behold -- they'll turn out to be a silent majority after all.

While it would be ironic if such a thing were to happen, I think the response (once the racist accusations wore thin) would be some sort of push to abolish the closet -- if not get rid of secret voting.

And speaking of closets, what about all those people without lawn signs, who drive around in cars without bumperstickers?

Might they be hiding something?

AFTERTHOUGHT: I'm thinking that maybe I should have titled this post "The Silence of the Voters."

On second thought, that's no good. I wouldn't want readers to think I'm comparing American voters to sheep, because I don't think they are.

UPDATE (11/04): Rick Moran thinks the above scenario is likely:

Scenario #2: The "Dewey Wins" scenario

This particular scenario is a favorite of Republican Kool-Aid drinkers and people who are paid to fantasize. We discover to our surprise that the polls are actually full of it and McCain wins every state listed above. [Colorado, Virginia, Missouri, Nevada, North Carolina, Montana, Indiana, Ohio, Florida, and Pennsylvania.]Result, a narrow win for the Republican.

Odds: 1 in 50

Still, I think there's a difference between hope and denial, and I'd like to think that if I'm wrong, my error is more on the side of hope.

There's little else I can do, other than vote in the only poll that counts.