One of the most important things to know about this column is that it is a part of the Yarbrough Worldwide Media and Pest Control Company headquartered in Greater Garfield, Georgia, under the management of Junior E. Lee, our general manager. No other column can make that claim.

Junior, as you may know by now, is not only one of the country’s most astute political observer, he is also a pest control professional. That is not as odd as it might seem at first. Pests are pests whether they are gnawing away on the collard leaves in Arvel Ridley’s garden or eating off lizard-loafered lobbyists in Washington.

When not poking around in Aunt Flossie Felmer’s drawers looking for fire ants (or so he claims), Junior can be found working on the latest version of Round or Square Polls. Our motto is “We will cook the numbers if you will provide us enough dough.” For those of you who keep up with such things, our survey has a factor of plus or minus. That is an important factor.

Junior E. Lee chafes under too much supervision. Pest control professionals are like that. But I wanted to get a sense of what he was planning for our next poll. Whatever it is, Junior is going to be hard-pressed to top the results of our last survey which revealed, among other things, that the University of Georgia, located in Athens, the Classic City of the South, is indeed the oldest state-charted university in the nation and has more Rhodes Scholars than You-Know-Where Institute of Technology has algorithms. I had long suspected that, but it was nice to have it confirmed.

Junior said that the presidential primaries are just around the corner and that would be the focus of the next Round or Square Poll. In fact, he has sent me a requisition for the purchase of a boxcar load of paper in order to list all the Democratic candidates currently running for president. He says there are more of them than fleas on a dog. Junior just can’t resist tossing in a pest control analogy whenever possible. It makes him feel superior.

Of course, there is a long way to go before Round or Square Polls can predict with pinpoint accuracy who will win the Democratic nomination in 2020 but Junior says one candidate to keep an eye on is South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg.

If elected, Buttigieg would become the first self-proclaimed male wife to hold the nation’s highest office. You see, his, uh, husband happens to be a former junior high schoolteacher by the name of Chasten Glezman, although as of April 2019, Chasten has begun using the surname of his wife, Buttigieg. Don’t let the Woman Who Shares My Name hear that. She will insist I do the same thing and that would mean changing the monogram on all our bathroom towels.

Junior says Glezman-Buttigieg would be known as First Gentleman which would make his wife First Lady, except not really because his wife would be president, too. Junior thinks the U.S. Constitution prohibits the first lady from being president and first lady at the same time. Frankly, I have no idea how that stuff works. I’m still trying to figure out Boy George.

The only thing I am sure of is that MSNBC, the Washington Post and the New York Times would be so happy, they would hyperventilate. They live for this kind of thing. That is why they are called mainstream media.

On the Republican side, former Mass. Gov. William Weld has announced he will challenge the incumbent, Pres. Tweet-Tweet, for the 2020 GOP nomination. Junior says while he will await the results of his latest polling, it is his considered opinion that a chinch bug soaked in cyhalothrin has a better chance of survival than does this guy. Junior E. Lee and his pest control analogies again.

It will be interesting to see what Junior finds out in the next Round or Square Poll regarding the upcoming political primaries. I don’t mean to cast aspersions on any of our competitors who will be conducting their own polls in the coming months but if they approach you, first ask them if they know the difference between a filibuster and a flax notch caterpillar (Tmetolophota steropastis.)

Political pundit and pest control professional Junior E. Lee certainly knows the difference and a whole lot more. That is why I and all Greater Garfield, Georgia, sing his praises.

You can reach Dick Yarbrough at dick@dickyarbrough.com; at P.O. Box 725373, Atlanta, Georgia 31139 or on Facebook at www.facebook.com/dickyarb.