EDITORIAL: Halloween ties to the presidential elections

With the spirit of Halloween taking over campus this week and the recent elections just around the corner, The Volante wanted to make this week’s editorial a fun list of Halloween and Presidential election facts.

Halloween has long been the celebration of superstition but here is a list of how the holiday can tie into presidential elections:

• The New York Yankees have made it to the playoffs in 9 of past 15 presidential election years we have had since 1952. In every post-season that the Yankees end up winning the World Series, the Republican candidate ends up winning the election. In every post-season that the Yankees make and do not win the World Series, the Democrat candidate wins the election. The lone exception was in 1996 when the Yankees won the World Series and Democrat Bill Clinton was re-elected.

• The Washington Redskins football team also has a strange tie to presidential elections as the outcome of the most recent Redskins home football game has determined who wins the election. Since 1937 when the Redskins moved to Washington D.C. there have been 18 presidential elections. In 17 of those elections if the Redskins won their last home game before the election the party that won the previous election wins again. If the Redskins lose the challenging party wins.  2004 was the only year that the Redskins lost their closest home game to the election and the opposite party did not win the election. So the election might be decieded Sunday rather than Nov. 6.

• 7-Eleven cups start selling Obama and Romney cups to customers during the first week of October. Starting in 2000 the most profitable cup sales candidate ends up winning the election.

• The candidate with the most Halloween masks sold since 1980 has won every election. However, Jason hockey masks from “Friday the 13” have outsold both candidates.

• TV has allowed for judgements on which candidate with better hair to almost always win. Kennedy defeating Nixon being the first true example and Bush beating Kerry in 2004 as the lone exception.

• Since 1992 each First lady or potential First lady has entered a cookie reciepe in “Family Circle” which voters choose the better cookie. Winners of the better cookie reciepe have ended up winning the election as well except in 2008 where Cindy McCain’s oatmeal-butterscotch recipe beat Michelle Obama’s shortbread cookies.

All in all do these superstitious facts really play a role in who wins the election? It depends the voter