Get a big whiff of the vote

POLITICAL GOSSIP. With so many voters still “undecided,” it may be time for McCain and Obama to bring out the big guns: perfume.

Russell Brumfield, author of “Whiff! The Revolution of Scent Communication in the Information Age,” has been getting the word out about the power of “endorphin branding” and how the candidates can use it to their advantage: “Research shows that scent speaks to people in a powerful language that triggers emotions and memories that influence perceptions and decision-making,” Brumfield says.

Let the folks at askthewhiffguys.com spell it out: “Endorphin branding is the use of scent to imprint a highly emotional, positive experience in tandem with a targeted signature scent, which can be reintroduced at a later time to trigger and recreate the desired response.”

Well, that’s not creepy at all. But which campaign will seize on this first, turning our precious holdouts into a legion of “Manchurian Candidate”-style sleeper swing-voters? And how will they get close enough to the voting booths to pump in the appropriate trigger scents? There’s obviously only one solution: The candidates will have to get voters to associate them with the smell of elementary school gymnasiums.

I love the smell of subliminal voter manipulation in the morning. It smells like … well, CK One, actually, which is weird.