An official smartphone app designed to help Azerbaijanis keep track of the presidential election in early October caused embarrassment to President Ilham Aliyev when it released voting figures giving details of his massive victory 24 hours before polling day. In the event, Aliyev extended his family’s decades-long grip on power by winning 84.6% of the vote, an even better performance than that suggested by the app. Foreign observers warned the vote was “seriously flawed”; Aliyev hailed a “triumph for democracy”. (The Week)

If the current trend continues and the remainder of American constituencies are gerrymandered, the results of elections in the US could be announced before Election Day, thus saving a lot of hot air and expense. If you fix the election by gerrymandering constituency boundaries you are really no better than President Aliyev.

Epicurus lived in an era of warfare and turmoil. He concluded that, if you were to realise a life of pleasure, you should avoid politics. But Alivev is only one of many bad players. Note that all political crooks jabber on about democracy, while quietly strangling it. In the U.S we have politicians, spouting hypocritical stuff about freedom, cynically destroying the fragile thing they claim to be defending: democracy. It becomes increasingly difficult to have an enjoyable life while the world around you is being corrupted. And the people just play video games! Maybe the are right?