The 21 Stooges

Do I really want to start the day making fun of other Americans?

You bet your sweet, southern rear end, I do.

I’m just poking fun, but at least its bi-partisan poking and no, that does not mean Bill Clinton is running again. The idea that buying for next Christmas starts before the turkey and ham are gone is enough to make you sick. The idea that the next election cycle begins before the last one is over is worse. It has taken less than three years to narrow it down from 313 million Americans to 21.

Well, that’s not completely accurate. There are 21 viable or not-so-viable candidates, it’s according to how you look at it. A least five are average Americans who have taken it upon themselves to save our country — they have a snowball's chance. The worst part, they will be beaten by several write in candidates that appear every cycle.

The most successful write in, to date, Mickey Mouse? Not bad for an 80-year-old rodent whose inappropriate behavior is well documented. The only write in to ever beat Mickey, Hillary Clinton? In the 2008 election she and the 15 different ways her name was misspelled beat him for the first time in history. Got to love us Americans, we ignore the possible Americans who might actually represent we the people and vote for cartoon characters.

George Washington and Abraham Lincoln continue to get votes. If you turned the TV on during their address the nation you’d need to check the guide to make sure you weren’t watching Tales from the Crypt reruns. “Hehehehehehe, I dig what you’ve done with the Capitol, love those cherry trees. I did not have axual relations with that tree.” What could a guy who has had all his organs, including his brain, removed get done? It appears to me, we’ll find out.

So once we get done laughing at the 15 Americans who have less chance of being president than Chuck Norris or '70s rocker Ted Nugent we must turn our attention to those few who actually have the money to buy the presidency, Oh, sorry I misspoke, I meant get elected. Wait, before I go on let’s not dismiss the real possibility of Ted becoming president. Ted's platform, kill it, cook it, stuff it and hang it on the wall. If he’d have been president, Saddam and Bin Laden would have been smiling down from the walls of his Michigan ranch in the late '80s, eliminating the need for our boys to leave the country at all.

Back to the true contenders. We are faced with the following choices — Barack, Mitt, Newt or Ron. My grandfather always told me to never trust a man with two first names. Ron has three. Ronald Ernest Paul. What happened here, is he trying to hide something? For the love of Pete, get a last name! Ron, would you like to buy a vowel or perhaps a last name? I’d like Ronald Ernest Pauline Jones. It has a certain ring to it, don’t you think?

I am continually mortified that Newton Leroy Gingrich is from Georgia, every time someone points it out, I cringe. Imagine my relief to discover he is actually from Pennsylvania — I was relieved, but not surprised. Who would name an innocent child Newton Leroy? What long-lasting, troubling effects could pop up later? I mean, the only thing that would be worse is to shorten it to Newt, dog gone it, too late. Will we end up in world war three because someone calls him Leroy?

Now to Willard. Who would name their child Willard Mitt or the bigger question, once it was done, why would they call him Mitt? All these guys were picked on as children, I guarantee it, leaving them with only two options, one going into law enforcement or two politics. How can a man who has made $42 million in the last two years have any connection with a man who falls short a hundred bucks a month on his bills? Or a single mother who that same hundred bucks causes to pay ninety bucks in late fees that compounds her problems monthly? He’s concerned with compound interest while most Americans are more concerned with compound poverty.

I refuse to get started on our current president, who has the funniest name of all, but if the name fits? I’m not saying these guys won’t make good presidents and in fact, I’m just horsing around. I try to get serious every election cycle and it usually lasts about 10 minutes. Then I laugh, giggle, snort, burp, poot and blow whatever I’m drinking through my nose as I write stuff like this. We as Americans have learned two things, it’s better to laugh than cry and it’s easier to smile than ask why.