A new seam of alienated voter potential for the Republicans may have been "unearthed" in New Mexico by the party's candidate for the vice-presidency, Mr Dick Cheney, writes Patrick Smyth.
Visiting the town of Roswell, the site of the US's most celebrated UFO incident, Mr Cheney was met by a crowd of cheering supporters. In their midst was a placard featuring a little green man and a heart emblazoned "Cheney". Aliens love Cheney, the message seemed to be. Perhaps even an endorsement of the Republicans' Star Wars II National Missile Defence plans?
Roswell has long been regarded by UFO aficionados as the site of the best-authenticated alien landing in the early 1960s, an event systematically covered up, it is alleged, by the US authorities at the highest level. The town is now host to a UFO research centre and museum and its shops sell souvenirs ranging from masks to alien inflated dolls.
The extra-terrestrial endorsement is not the first, however, for Mr George W. Bush. According to the headlines of one of the US's more imaginative supermarket tabloids, the Weekly World News, in May, "Space Alien Backs Bush for President". It was apparently the same alien who "helped Clinton win top job in 1992".