Welcome to the inner workings of my mind. In writing this column, I have a mission. I can't say that I usually have such direction in my life, but in this case I do. My mission is to point out everyday things in our lives, and the world around us, that are, when you really think about it, pretty silly. This is not to say that I give campus and national issues any less thought than my esteemed colleagues here at the Review. I just take a different look at them. The way I see it, if you have the inclination, you can make light of almost anything. And that's what I try to do. So sit back and relax. Grab a Coke, perhaps. Today, the Mystery Tour is going to take you away to a mythical and perhaps somewhat frightening realm -- that of the presidential campaign arena.
You can always tell by the smell of blood and the sound of mud being slung through the air that it's time for those damn presidential election campaigns again. Another clue is the flood of politicians into Iowa. You can always tell it's campaign time again when half of Iowa's population suddenly becomes Presidential candidates. You know, if there's one question I'm asked more than any other, it's, "what the hell goes through that perverted mind of yours?!?" Another, slightly more relevant question people tend to ask me is, "what the hell is it with politics?!? I mean, all we ever get is a bunch of weenies and cretins running around insulting each other. So what's the deal?" In exploring what the "deal" is, it's necessary to look at the steps one must take to become a presidential candidate. God knows the world would be a better place if more of the Presidential candidates knew what was going on.
¥STEP ONE: You must decide which political party to affiliate yourself with. Currently there are two major parties, the Democrats and the Republicans. Other parties try to run candidates, but it's kind of a futile gesture, much like when fans of the Detroit Lions shouting, "Wayne must go!" when they should all realize that Wayne Fontes cannot be removed from the Detroit Lions with nuclear weapons. I mean the guy keeps screwing up, and he is never going to get fired! Ever! Not even if he dies! Hell, they just let Chris Spielman go, one of the best defensive players around, the kind of guy coaches ask God for, but they still have Wayne! But I digress. Anyhow these candidates belong to parties like the Libertarians, the United Workers, the Socialists, the Antisocialists, the Peons, the Bajorans, the Braves and so on. Only rarely has a non-Republican or non-Democrat ever had a hope in hell of getting elected. The most recent example is that billionaire nutball, Ross Perot, but I prefer to think that his presidential run was a massive practical joke, played by Richard Nixon or Jimmy Carter or someone like that. Again, I digress.
¥STEP TWO: Decide what your platform will be. This is made easier by being a member of one of the political parties, as they tend to decide most of your platform for you if you really think you're going to be their presidential candidate. If you go around trying to have original ideas or take a stance that is a just a tad bit different from your party's official stance, you probably stand a good chance of falling out of favor with them, and they likely won't let you run under their party. For example, if you're a Republican, you will stand for less government spending, smaller government, less taxes, and getting trashed daily by the liberal media, among other things. If you're a Democrat, however, your job is a little trickier. You're going to have to be liberal, meaning you'll have no second thoughts about taxing everything that moves and then spending it to create more wasteful bureaucracy. The only problem with that is that most Americans with an IQ higher than bathroom mold don't really want to pay higher taxes and have more government bureaucracy, so if you really want to get elected, you'll have to pretend to be a Republican, at least a little bit. When and if you get elected, you will, of course, reveal that you were lying through your teeth and go right the hell back to being a tax-and-spend liberal. This method worked particularly well for Bill "Governor of a Small, Failed State" Clinton back in 1992. His ideas were so conservative he had the Republicans looking more liberal than Karl Marx. But we all know what's happened since.
¥STEP THREE: Amass an incredibly large amount of money. Really large. You'll need more money to run your campaign than most Third World countries spend in a decade. You could always rob several banks, but there's always the chance that you'll get caught and have to try and explain it in a debate ("Well, it wasn't so much robbery as much as forced approval of an interest-free loan"). There are, on the other hand, many various legal ways to raise campaign funds as well, but they all pretty much break down into two main ideas: (1) you're already filthy rich, or (2) you've been begging like hell for it. Now if you're interested in number (1), I can't help you, because if I knew the answer to that, I'd be incredibly rich, instead of considering selling my spleen for extra cash. I am, however, pretty knowledgeable about number (2). I'm not talking about panhandling here. What you need to do is have a thousand-dollar-a-plate fund-raiser (making sure to have food so bad as to only cost about three dollars a plate). You can also find campaign volunteers who are willing to take lists of names of people loyal to your chosen political party and proceed to call them, ad infinitum, right at dinner time, asking for a contribution. Or, you can invest in shady real estate ventures and questionable livestock futures, and then try and tell everyone your returns of over 10,000 percent were "just lucky."
¥STEP FOUR: Start campaigning for the primaries and caucuses. These are held by each party to determine who will be their candidates for president. The difference between primaries and caucuses is that primaries are normal elections, while caucuses is a range of mountains and land between the Black and Caspian seas in -- woops! Sorry! That's the "Caucasus!" Caucuses are confusing little meetings of the smallest units of the party that vote for delegates to a larger subunit of the party, who vote for delegates to the state convention who elect delegates to the party convention, who then forget what the hell they're supposed to be doing anyway. Or something. You will have to start in New Hampshire and Iowa, the first states to start this nonsense, at least 25 years before you plan to run for President. You will need to try and talk to everybody, and generally be annoying and pretend to be concerned about what goes on in a little state like Iowa that really doesn't have that many people and may not even exist.
¥STEP FIVE: Start advertising like hell. Do this by taking out advertisements that, instead of pointing out your strengths, point out your opponents' weaknesses, even if they don't actually have any weaknesses. Especially if they don't actually have any weaknesses, in fact. Just make anything up. These ads should be as vicious as possible, and should also, if possible include at least one joke from the "Official List of ÔMama'¨ Jokesª." Well, at least, I think they should. That would be really cool. You would, of course, have to modify the Mama¨ Jokesª involving age when dealing with Bob Dole (STEVE FORBES: "Bob, you are so old, yo' mama is dead!").
You should begin these ads first in the primaries, attacking fellow members of your party. When you gain the nomination, switch over to insulting the person who's running for the other party. A proper ad will be a complete mudslinger. For example, saying that "I am a man who has served in ___________ for ____ years and have accomplished _________, _________, and ____________, and thus feel I am qualified to bring about the kind of change we need," where _______ equals something positive, would be improper. Not one thing untrue or negative has been said about your opponent.
Using the above guidelines, you should either gain a better understanding about what goes on in our political system, be better informed if you yourself plan to run for office, or be inspired to emigrate to Canada. Of course, I don't make any guarantees here -- I've never actually ran for Presidential office myself. But if you plan on running in about 30 years, don't bother. With my Department of Bob idea and the steps listed above, I have the race all locked up, you criminal communist illegal-alien-hiring weenie. If you don't plan on running, then please vote for me instead of those criminal communist illegal-alien-hiring weenies.