Vote recounts are much in the news today, but there’s no good reason they should be limited to politics. This is where Jethro Tull comes in.

Tull was a fabulously successful band that sold tens of millions of records in the 1970s and ’80s. Yet, for some mysterious reason, they’re still not in the Rock ’n’ Roll Hall of Fame. Yes, they were arty and pretentious, but so were Emerson, Lake & Palmer, Pink Floyd and Yes, and those bands are in the Hall. It doesn’t add up.

One possibility is that the voting for new inductees has deliberately been rigged to keep Tull from entering the Pantheon of the Immortals. One theory I’ve heard posits that the ballots submitted by rock critics are replaced in the dead of night by bogus ballots shipped in by jealous fans from places like Hawaii and Idaho, where there are no great rock bands. There is an easy way to settle this controversy: Check the ballots to see if they smell of taters or pineapple.

An honest recount of Hall of Fame ballots would also ensure that heavy metal titans Iron Maiden—just snubbed again this week—finally get the honors they so richly deserve. I personally suspect that lots of the ballots cast in favor of those stars were altered by miffed fans of bands like Echo & the Bunnymen and the Psychedelic Furs because they loathe headbangers. And only widespread ballot tampering can explain why the great ’60s band Paul Revere & the Raiders is not in the Hall. Talk about getting taken for a ride.

Recounts would be warmly welcomed in other areas where fame—or infamy—is the issue. Historians routinely vote for James Buchanan as the worst president ever. That’s because Andrew Johnson aficionados always stuff the ballot box. And they get lots of help from Warren Harding and Herbert Hoover supporters. Yes, Buchanan was awful, doing nothing to prevent the Civil War. But Johnson was worse, deliberately undermining everything the Civil War was fought to achieve. He was a racist and a coward and nobody liked him. A recount is long overdue.

And while conducting the recount, someone should check the ballots for the scent of liquor. If even the faintest smell of spirits can be detected, it was definitely Andrew Johnson supporters who hijacked the vote.

An honest recount of the 1994 voting for the Baseball Hall of Fame would demonstrate once and for all that Phil’s Rizzuto’s elevation to Cooperstown resulted from massive ballot box stuffing by Yankees fans. There is just no way that Rizzuto should be in Cooperstown; he’s only there because he played his entire career for the Bronx Bombers.

And Pittsburgh Pirate second-sacker Bill Mazeroski—paltry lifetime batting average of .260—only got voted into the Hall because he hit a legendary homer to beat the Yankees in the 1960 World Series. Unfortunately, he only hit 137 other four-baggers in his entire career. It’s time to haul out those musty, dusty old sportswriters’ ballots and do an honest recount. Pittsburgh used to be known as the Steel City. The Steal City is more like it.

Vienna is routinely referred to as the most livable city in the world. Was ist das? Nein, nein, nein. I seem to remember some fairly dubious voting results in Austria back in the 1930s, and I strongly suspect that this tradition lives on. On a related note, Evans, Ga., cannot possibly be the most livable city in the U.S., as a well-known magazine’s list claims. It is often said that the numbers don’t lie, but here they do.

One final recount possibility: The Harris Poll reports that pizza is the single most popular meal in America. Baloney. The most popular meal is mac and cheese, and everybody knows it. It’s time to call in the pros and take a closer look at those Harris Poll numbers. And if a recount shows that pizza is more popular than mac and cheese or the classic American cheeseburger, I’ll eat my hat.

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