Mayor wins in a landslide (despite not being alive)

He's undoubtedly smiling down from somewhere.

You think Barack Obama is popular? Try Harry Stonebraker.

Stonebraker, the mayor of Winfield, Missouri, won in a landslide election on Tuesday capturing more than 90 percent of the vote. The only down side is, well.... he's not alive.

But that detail didn't seem to matter to residents of the 732 person town. They elected him anyway.

The four-time mayor passed on a month ago, but since the ballots had already been printed and absentee voting was underway, town officials let the election continue. Although he captured 205 votes out of a possible 231 ballots cast, Stonebraker won't be required to govern the small town. The city council will select an interim mayor until the next election in April, 2010.

City Clerk Cindy Hemmer put the win in perspective. "That speaks for what they thought of him as mayor," she said.

Deja vu

If this sounds somewhat familiar, it is.

The same thing happened in Missouri when US Senator Mel Carnahan's name stayed on the ballot after he died in a plane crash weeks before the election in 2000. Like Stonebraker he won the election too.