The Fury and Barrioticness of Da Scorned Pinoy Flying Voter

I woke up to an email correspondence that a group of Filipinos had requested a breakdown of the voting on the American Idol finale 2012. I had to pinch myself again to check if I was dreaming, had a hang over, or what not.

I have seen many non-profits in my time – but this takes the cake. A group by the name of the “Migrant Heritage Commission” - a non-profit run by Fil-ams that was actively involved in voting for Jessican Sanchez on American Idol is asking about how the 132 million votes were counted and how the results were arrived at.

My first reaction was one big WTF! I have nothing against transparency. But the line of questioning was unmistakable and my gut tells me where it was headed. As I remember so well, nobody losses in Philippine contests – they get cheated.

I do understand why this Fil-am non-profit is asking for a recount. It wants to understand how they lost – despite their 24/7 efforts to rally Pinoys from wherever to come out of the wood work and vote for Jessica.

The voting process of American Idol is essentially a battle of flying voters. And no one beats Da Pinoy when it comes to being a flying voter. After all they did multiple times to get Efren into the CNN Heroes circle – they figured they can do it again in American Idol. Tough luck, they didn’t.

I would suggest to Pinoys that before they vote on American Idol or on anything for that matter is to read the instructions -if you are not qualified to vote – do not vote. It will save you time and the aggravation.

So here we are – Da scorned Pinoy flying voter getting ready for another tradition of Da Pinoy – recounts.

Now, people voting multiple times for an “idol” might sound newfangled to western audiences, in the Philippines , voting multiple times for one candidate is an age old tradition – and a livelihood.

Heck, even the Philippine HCOS PCOS machines are hacked to become automated flying voters. Think about it – current Transportation Secretary Mar Roxas has an electoral complaint against Jejomar Binay. And that’s on top of the stories of election results being reversed and awarded when a term is nearly over. Which raises another point – if the HCOS PCOS erred on counting results for the Vice Presidency – could it have also erred on counting the results for the Presidency? Does the Philippines have a faux President impeaching a legitimate Chief Justice of the Supreme court? I guess Da Pinoy has better things to do with time – like ask for a recount of American Idol voting and demand that non-qualified voters be included in the count.

But I digress, going back to the 132 million votes, the first thing that Arnedo Vallera, Grace Valera-Jaramillo, and Jesse Gatchalian of Migrant Heritage Commission should have done – before committing the resources of a non-profit and its volunteers to go on a flying voter rampage is to read the rules on who can vote.

Who can vote?

(1) Toll-free Voting: Anyone calling the toll-free numbers from an area code from within the Continental U.S., Hawaii, Alaska, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands will be able to cast their vote(s) for American Idol.

(2) AT&T Text Voting: Any AT&T wireless subscriber who has the ability to text message and has an area code from within the Continental U.S., Hawaii, Alaska, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands will be able to cast their vote(s) for American Idol.

(3) Online Voting: Anyone with a Facebook account registered within the Continental U.S., Hawaii, Alaska, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands will be able cast their vote(s) using the online method.

The intent of these rules is clear - the voting is for audiences in the US only.

Now I don’t know whether the non-profit encouraged people who were not in the US, specifically, people in the Philippines – to vote. I don’t know much effort they exerted to get pinoys and OFWs – who are not in the US, to vote for Jessica Sanchez – in complete and utter disregard of the rules.

I also don’t know if the non-profit was aware that American Idol exerts efforts to enforce those rules. A website called votefair.org even pointed out that votes from the Philippines were coming through and had to be removed

Originally it was stated here that the votes in this VoteFair poll that were coming from the Philippines were being removed. Indeed, some of them were removed.

Today it was discovered that other votes from the Philippines have been getting into the VoteFair poll results without being removed. Those votes tend to mark Jessica Sanchez as their first choice, although some votes from the Philippines have ranked male singers in first place.

We apologize for any misleading implications that may have arisen due to these poll results being tainted by voters who are not qualified to vote in the official American Idol voting. (Hopefully the official AI vote counters have not made the same mistake.)

Next season votes from outside the United States will be removed from this VoteFair poll using a more rigorous method. Votes from outside the U.S. will not be identified at the time the votes are cast, but those foreign votes will be removed periodically as needed, and before the final result.

Although this advertising-free VoteFair American Idol poll is conducted for fun and to promote the idea of fairer government elections — without providing any income to cover the time invested in these polls — the fairness of the results here reflects on the also-free VoteFair ranking service, where fairness is the highest priority. Therefore, the added financial cost of more rigorously identifying non-qualified voters will be undertaken.

Bottom line is Da Pinoy Flying voter thought it could fool all people all the time. Obviously it was wrong.

I thought I had seen everything of the tomfoolery of the Pinoy – I am so mistaken and flat-out wrong.

One things for sure – you can take Da Pinoy out of the barrio – but you can’t take the barrio of of Da Pinoy – kahit pa ilagay mo sa Washington DC.

About the Author

BongV has written 377 stories on this site.

BongV is the webmaster of Antipinoy.com.