PLATFORM

Jesse Ventura

Yes, I'm serious. He didn't get to be governor of Minnesota just by telling people he was in Predator. He's the man with the plan. How do I know what his plan is? OnTheIssues.org has your hook-up. Ventura is a "fiscal conservative, social moderate," meaning he's tight with a buck and doesn't have any problems with gays or non-Christians. You can gobble up all the sensible swing voters with that mantra.

Ventura considers himself a moderate Libertarian, meaning that he thinks the government should mostly stay out of people's lives but will still admit that it has some role to play. You could say that Libertarians are the party of personal responsibility. Ventura has no problem with people owning guns, but he pushes for people to be more responsible with them. After all, guns are devices that bring hot lead death. They command a lot more respect than what people currently give them. Ventura doesn't like abortion, but he's not about to make it illegal. It is a decision that should be made by the woman, not the government. In just those two issues, responsibility is in the hands of the citizen, not the government.

Ventura's platform when it comes to war would win moderate swing votes as well. In his book "Ain't Got Time to Bleed" Ventura says, "War isn’t civilized. War is failure. It’s the ultimate result of a breakdown in public policy, and soldiers are the machines that handle that breakdown." So the voters who are wary of war know that this is a politician who knows the gravity of war and won't rush blindly into it. But that quote also lets people know that if we get into a war, we're not going to pussyfoot around. We're going to whoop ungodly amounts of ass and pull out every dirty trick in the book to win. That'll win over the moderates with hawkish tendencies.

So if you look past the feather boa and his commentator job with the XFL, Jesse Ventura actually had some really good common sense ideas that a majority of Americans can get behind.

For more on Ventura's platform, click here.

Bill Clinton got oral treats from a fat chick, lied about it, and was almost kicked out of office for it. But after it was all over Clinton ended up with a higher approval rating than Ronald Reagan. Thus is the charismatic power of Bill Clinton. He had the Republican party gunning to remove him from office from day one of his presidency and the man never lost his cool. He was the Elvis of the White House, and Elvis was one of the smoothest men to ever walk the planet. Elvis walked right into the Oval Office and with a straight face got Richard Nixon to make him an honorary DEA agent. Smoother than a teflon baby on a frozen pond.

Clinton knew how to make everyone feel at ease. He'd be the best host of a party. You'd see him floating around, handing people beer, and making sure everyone was having a good time. If a fight was about to break out, Clinton would be right there making everything all right before any punches were thrown. And you'd most definitely invite Clinton to your party, no question. Why? Because he's the cool guy who makes everyone feel cool. Hell, black voters came out in droves to vote for a white boy from Arkansas, a state that's always a favorite to win the non-existent Top Redneck State of America trophy. He went on The Arsenio Hall Show and played the sax. He was on MTV answering questions about his underwear. How can you not like him?

The benchmark of Clinton's charismatic powers was near the end of his second term. He circumvented the U.N. to bomb Kosovo and he launched missiles at Iraq. People thought he was insane to do that, even Republicans. France and Russia weren't happy about it in the least, but when Clinton left office everything was back to being cool with those countries. There was no huge rift between us and the French and Russians. Clinton let everyone know that, even though he had to act like a dick for a little bit, it was all good. That's what you need in a President: when shit's going down he's going to let you know everything's kosher.

There's a good amount of people who are pushing for General Wesley Clark to run for President for the Democrats. Others want him to be on the Democrat ticket as Vice-President. Why? Because like I stated in one of my ICB articles, Clark is a former Supreme Allied Commander of NATO. And Supreme Allied Commander is the coolest title anyone on Earth can have.

Aside from the ultimate awesomeness of the title, the best part about being Supreme Allied Commander is that no one will question your toughness. You can't call him soft on military issues; he WAS the military. Not even Karl Rove could concoct a campaign to discredit him on matters of national security and patriotism. If the Republicans ran a negative campaign questioning the patriotism of Wesley Clark like they did in Georgia against Sen. Max Cleland (who left three limbs in Vietnam), Clark's résumé would come to life and hand them their asses with their own dicks stuffed in them. This is the man who held the same job title as Dwight D. Eisenhower. He wrote a book called "Waging Modern War." He bombed the hell out of Kosovo. You'd have to resurrect General Patton to get someone with more credibility than Wesley Clark.

When you're Supreme Allied Commander, you don't demand respect. People crawl naked across razor wire and acid to give you respect. You can question the Supreme Allied Commander, but you never doubt him. That's the reputation you want in your President.

If you've got a big reputation, you've got to have the will to smack people around with it when need be. When you're right, you have to pound that fact into people's heads. When something pisses you off, you need to let people know you're not going to stand for it (even if you're super cool). You need balls, and the biggest ones we can find belong to Senator Robert Byrd of West Virginia.

We're not talking about his dubious civil rights stance. We're not talking about how he was a KKK member when he was in his twenties. And we're not talking about his Chris Rock-like use of the term "white niggers" in an interview with Fox News. We're talking about recently how Senator Byrd is pretty much the only Senator who has the balls to get on the Senate floor and bitch out the Bush administration (which is especially ballsy considering Ari Fleischer told everyone that they'd better watch what they say). He's a pissed off old man who knows how to both eloquently and viciously let people know he's not happy about something, and he'll crush you with his fifty years of Senate experience if you try to screw with him.

Byrd isn't afraid to let everyone know that he's pissed to high heaven that his fellow Senators pussied out and gave Bush the power to wage war whenever he wanted. He's super-pissed that the administration may have lied about Iraq having WMD's and being an imminent threat to America, as well the false notion slyly inferred by Bush in his speeches that Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden were in cahoots. What other Senator has the balls to call the President a liar? Not any of the senators going for the '04 Democratic nomination, that's for damn sure. Byrd got Bobby Knight-pissed at Bush for that aircraft carrier landing because he knew the Republicans would be using that for the 2004 election. You can't stop him from getting up and speaking his mind in his signature stately-yet-brutal oratory style that looks like how Senators used to do their epic speeches in the 19th century. Plus he's a former member of the KKK who has a civil rights record worse than Trent Lott's and he belongs to the same party as Al Sharpton. That's so balls. That's Iraqi Information Minister balls. When Byrd finally dies, the coroner's probably going to find a scrotum covered in brass and housing three softball-sized testicles. These are the balls a President should have.

When you've got the right platform, Elvis-like charisma, the reputation of a bad-ass, and the balls to throw down with anyone and win, you need the right physical package to deliver all of these attributes. And that package is the human shell that houses Christopher Walken.

When Walken enters a room, everyone takes notice. He has a presence that no one can ignore. He's got the poise to look like a President. It amazes me that no one has cast Walken as the President in a movie (Bill Pullman gets to play the President, but not Walken? There's no justice). Maybe producers think he's too creepy to be a President, but I disagree. He's not creepy-looking, he's intense. Really, really intense. And I want an intense looking man to be my President. Imagine any of Bush's war speeches done by Christopher Walken. They'd be 100 times more powerful and damn right scary too. When President Walken says war is coming, it's going to be full of hellfire and brimstone. That'll teach those foreign bastards to ruin our good time buzz. And it would make the State of the Union address actually interesting to watch. Plus intense equals alert, and we all want a President who looks like he's on the ball at all times, rather than a confused-looking Muppet.

The best part about a President that looks like Christopher Walken is when he meets the leaders of other nations. No country has a leader who could stand next to Walken and not be overwhelmed and overshadowed by his presence, especially if President Walken had the combined powers of Jesse Ventura's platform, Bill Clinton's charisma, Wesley Clark's reputation, and Robert Byrd's balls. Russia would have to genetically engineer a prime minister who looked like Boba Fett and had Benjamin Franklin's brain just to get close to equal footing with my President Walken creation.

CONCLUSION

With these high standards of mine, it's very clear that I'm probably not going to be voting for anyone anytime soon. Oh well, I could use that time to battle Super Macho Man and have a bowl of Lucky Charms.

Return to DATELINE 141

Return to 141EMPIRE

John Kerry

Pros: Vietnam vet = instant credibility in military matters.

Cons: A bit of a waffler, kind of looks like Eric Stoltz from "Mask."

Howard Dean

Pros: Anti-war candidate but has national security experience as governor.

Cons: Seen as weak on defense and too liberal to win against Bush.

John Edwards

Pros: Easily relates to the common citizen.

Cons: Aside from the common man stuff, he doesn't have much of anything else.

Dick Gephardt

Pros: Lots of experience in the House, has a health plan idea for America.

Cons: Has run for Democratic nomination before, lost every time.

Al Sharpton

Pros: Leader of the black community, name recognition.

Cons: Bitched about the movie "Barbershop." Seen as more of a racial polarizer than a uniter. No chance of winning vast Southern redneck vote.