So I hear we held an election. (It’s kind of like holding a party, only the police never magically appear and bust you for noise pollution — shouldn’t they be busting automobile drivers for real pollution?)

And the Republican critics were right: the pre-election polls were crammed with that notorious liberal bias showing President Obama in the lead, and the light at the end of the tunnel is the next four years of President Romney roaming the West Wing.

Um, yeah. That’s the way it happened.

Not to pat myself on the back or anything (I’ve discovered, through much practice, that you tend to sprain your elbow attempting that particular maneuver), but around six weeks ago, a friend asked me who I thought would win, and I said Obama, barring an October surprise. (At the time, Romney was leading in the polls. No, the polls, not the Poles. And not the North Pole, either. Which has the tendency to wander, from what I hear. Kind of like the polls.)

As it turned out, we had something of an October surprise — and no, we’re not talking about the Iowa football heading south for the winter, even though it wasn’t quite winter just yet. (Hello — check your calendars, football players. Thousands of Chinese didn’t make those things for nothing, you know. Well, OK, next to nothing.)

Our October surprise turned out to be Meta-Storm Sandy. (Yes, I know: Everybody calls it Super Storm Sandy. Everybody also says “try and” instead of “try to” — just think about it. Besides, I met a storm once. She was a lot of fun, until she wasn’t.)

Obama appeared quite presidential in the aftermath of the storm. Of course, President George W. Bush, in his response to Hurricane Katrina, set the bar rather low (to put it politely).

And Obama should, at the very least, send a thank-you note to Gov. Chris Christie, the hard-core Republican governor of New Jersey, for handing the election to the president.

(Well, at least Christie used to be a hard-core Republican; who knows what 2016 will bring, except another election. Or election cycle, as the licensed political pundits like to say. I picture the election riding a mountain bike and doing those clever X-Game tricks.)

Christie’s comments praising Obama for how well the president handled the aftermath of Meta-Storm Sandy enraged conservative Republicans but seemed to sway some independents.

OK, Christie’s comments did not “hand” the election to Obama; there were many reasons for Obama’s victory.

But they sure helped.

Of course, the Tea Party Republicans also knocked off some a shade-more sane Republicans in Senate primaries and then saw their people flash and burn when the electorate at large said, to use a word, “NO.”

(Why is that electorate still at large ? Hasn’t the NSA chased them down yet? Why do we pay the NSA all the big tech bucks if it can’t find the electorate at large? I mean, what is this? The Soviet Union under Andropov?)

Then there’s the L’Affaire Petraeus (yes, I realize that’s a double “the”; sometimes, you just get in a double-“the” mood, probably because you should ease up on the daily double espresso — I’m talking about you, of course, not me; I would never, never have a daily double espresso, double espresso)) is somewhat reminiscent, in its comic (not to mention cosmic) potential, of the NASA astronaut who drove to Florida or somewhere equally depressing wearing a NASA astronaut diaper so she wouldn’t have to stop to confront a perceived rival for some guy’s attention. (The sort of attention that we don’t mention much in a family newspaper, so that parents don’t have to have awkward conversations with their children. Children age 19 or so.)

What if the light of the tunnel is Mitt Romney with the GOP strapped to the top of his car?