Vote Jerk In 2004!

Myself, Rich "Lowtax" Kyanka, kissing a baby in anticipation of the upcoming 2004 elections.

It has come to my attention that neither the Democratic nor Republican parties are meeting my personal needs these days. I base part of this assertion on the fact that just yesterday I was in the bathroom making a little deposit into ye olde Chocolate Vault when suddenly I noticed we were out of toilet paper. I began to panic and shouted at the top of my lungs, "Democrats! Please help me, for I am in need!" but I received no response. I then moved onto Phase 2: shrieking "Republicans, lend me a hand!" No dice. At that point it became painfully clear that neither political party has my best interests in mind and I was all alone, all by myself, in the middle of a jungle without a tour guide who uses smartyman terms like "minority whip" and "midnight basketball." I know many of you SA readers feel the same way about the current democratic process in America, unless of course you don't live in America, in which case I hope one of our unmanned robot drones shoots a Hellfire missile at your home and incinerates your family. Here's a brief rundown of both major political parties, formatted in a way that will make it easy for you to date them online.

PARTY: Republicans
LIKES: Tax breaks, guns, war, big business, fat white people, Jesus, money, cellphones, SUVs.
DISLIKES: Minorities, trees, foreigners, Allah, the government (except when they consist of "the government"), corruption (except when they are part of the corruption), parties, children.
OVERVIEW: The Republican Party was founded in 1753 or 1854 or 2018 or something by Abraham Lincoln, who successfully put an end to slavery while capturing Quebec, England, Cuba, and most of the moon. One of the most popular Republicans throughout history is James A. Garfield, who is fondly remembered for promptly dying four months into office. Other Republicans weren't as lucky, such as Warren G. Harding (invented the steam broom), William McKinley (defeated the filthy Spaniard, unclean Frenchmen, and dirty Phillipinos by hitting them with a folding card table in a steel-cage grudge match), and Benjamin Harrison (outlawed gravity). These days the Republicans can be found occupying just about every branch and corner of the White House, just hanging out or, as they like to call it, "chillin' with the homies."
THEIR CRAZY EXTREMIST GROUP: Conservatives. These guys just hate the government. They would like to have a government which either doesn't employ anybody or just hires ghosts or something; I don't know, no matter how much they say they despise the government, they still continue to run for political office. Conservatives are very fond of Jesus, who blesses them when they give the $190-million church of their choice all money they won during the last NASCAR bet. They support religious rights, just as long as you're a Christian and therefore your religion is right.

PARTY: Democrats
LIKES: Water which doesn't dissolve you, weird gods, Phish, poor people, crazy people, people in the minority, people in / from other countries, people who are anybody except Republicans, Satan (probably).
DISLIKES: Huge corporations which won't employ them because they haven't taken a shower in 28 days and smell like cow shit, white people who aren't "hip," anybody who supports free speech but doesn't speak freely about things other democrats believe in.
OVERVIEW: The Democrats, always ahead of their time, started the Democratic Party around 1840, nearly 14 or possibly 178 years before the Republicans. Back then, the Democrats were very passionate about what they believed in: slavery, big business, taking over land from minorities, and generally doing all the crap which they bash Republicans for these days. Notable Democrats in history include Andrew Jackson (stabbed a record amount of enemy soldiers in the face during the War of 1812, AD I assume), Jimmy Carter (got attacked by a swimming rabbit which infected him with a severe case of malaise), and Lyndon B. Johnson (protected America from the 100-foot tall mutant ants that terrorized this fine land during the days of wine and atoms).
THEIR CRAZY EXTREMIST GROUP: Liberals. This wacky group of college students and 50 year old burnouts who aren't aware they were kicked out of college years ago believe in mankind's freedom, such as the freedom to grow a ratty beard and do crazy drugs off the chest of women who won't fucking stop talking about Woodstock. Liberals also like riding bicycles because they have a less chance of being arrested for driving while stoned out of their mind.

As you can see, neither of these parties are interested in my wants and needs, such as a 24-hour cable television channel dedicated to large pandas driving around those little electric cars in circles. Luckily I am not a person to sit idly by, bitching and moaning without bothering to get up, take the future into my own hands, and then decide to bitch and moan in a slightly different location. I am a dynamic man, one of change and innovation, which is exactly what I told the parole board last month. Since our two-party political system is failing us faster than an English-only speaking student majoring in computer engineering, I have decided to create a brand new political party, one which will put both Democrats and Republicans to shame. I have created The Jerk Party.

Myself, Rich "Lowtax" Kyanka, signing in legislation that allows me to drive a nuclear tank.

What is The Jerk Party? Simply put, we're a bunch of jerks. Now don't get me wrong; we're not any bigger jerks than you and your stupid friends who spend all night playing "Dance Dance Revolution" and then see who can spit phlegm wads the farthest off the balcony. Well actually, now that I think about it, we are bigger jerks - that's why we're The Jerk Party. However, we have no qualms about being up front and honest regarding our jerktastic tendencies. You'll always know exactly where we stand on each and every issue because we're jerks, we do what any jerk would do, and we're frankly too goddamn lazy and disinterested to lie. Here's a sample of our major issues:

ABORTION: We believe that every mother has the right to kill their baby if they want. We don't give a crap; if the mom wishes to do so, she can start murdering whichever random internal organs she desires. However, we understand that there are a lot of silly people out there who feel that baby murdering is against the law of God, whatever that is. So, in order to appease both groups, abortions will only be legal on Sundays, when the Conservatives are all at church praying for us and our wagon load of sins. That way the religious folks will be happy, as they won't have to worry about wading through a pool of overflowing fetus corpses coming from the nearby Planned Parenthood, and the abortion people will be happy since they'll weigh 15 pounds less and have one less living creature lodged inside of their, well, wherever the hell babies live. I think the esophagus.

TAXES: The Jerk Party hates paying taxes. We pay taxes every goddamn day yet we never see what we're getting in return. I mean, why should our money go to finance roads we'll never use, police forces which we never call (but are often called on us), and some government fatcats who use it to fuel their giant money-burning turbo jet which transforms into a train and a giant robot with a gun that blows up oil tankers? With this in mind, we are offering a "Press Your Luck" option for all American citizens. If you choose this option, you won't have to pay a single dime in taxes, but at the end of the year you will be invited to our state-sponsored game show, "You Could Be Fucked," in which a punchcard-fueled supercomputer from the 1970's spends 15 minutes calculating a number between 1 and 100. If that number corresponds to the state-given number you were issued when you walked onto the show, you will have all the money you made the previous year taken away and you will be forced to work for the government in our state-run salt mines. We don't really need the salt you'll spend 12 hours a day mining; we just like forcing other people to work.

Myself, Rich "Lowtax" Kyanka, talking to a constituent about my views regarding giant blimps.

FOREIGN POLICY: It is our opinion that every foreign country out there is full of lunatics should be avoided at all costs. I mean, for Christ's sake, enough United States citizens are fucking psychos as is; we don't need to start dealing with overseas nutwads. All immigrants attempting to earn citizenship will have to pass a grueling series of physical activities ranging from "the 900-yard sprint" to "climb the Statue of Liberty, you goddamn greasy pigs." We will declare "American" to be the official language of America and we will appoint language task forces that imprison people who don't speak American, such as those goddamn Mexicans and those goddamn Canadians and those goddamn Wisconsinians. We will withdraw all foreign representatives from all countries, as frankly I don't think any of us gives a crud what happens in all those crazy, backwards countries whose main export is illegal Charmander stickers. We'll take all our troops and money out of Israel and let them and the Arabs fight it out until they kill each other, at which point we'll sweep in and declare any country with oil as a new American colony, assuming we find a way to drill for oil without all the latent radiation making our balls shrivel and fall off.

THE WAR ON DRUGS: The war on drugs is retarded. We don't care if you want to do drugs or not, just as long as you don't shoot up and start trying to eat our legs while we wait in the checkout line at Vons. However, there is a lot of money to be made in the drug industry, as shown by the success of various rap artists. We propose opening up governmentally sponsored crackhouses which will sell high quality drugs of all kinds to anybody who has the money. However, there is a catch; you must do the drugs inside our crackhouses which are all wired with hidden cameras. These cameras will broadcast a live, direct feed to Jerk TV, a channel dedicated to entertaining the rest of us with the drug-induced hilarity that can only come from a disheveled unemployed bum convinced that the walls are all gigantic birds trying to open up his brain and put Christmas presents inside. We predict great ratings for Jerk TV, so not only will we be gaining revenue from the Crackhouses, but we'll have some great advertising cash as well.

These are just a few of our many amazing ideas which we're thinking of at an alarming rate. By the time the 2004 elections roll by, we'll have like a billion zillion great ideas like the aforementioned, thereby securing our position as the party of the future. Don't be fooled by the empty lies and promises of the Democrats and Republicans out there! Instead, why not be fooled by The Jerk Party instead? You'll have a more amusing time in the process and we'll also make CSPAN a lot more entertaining. If you donate more than $100 to our cause, we'll also punch out the Senator of your choice.

Gear up for the Goldmine!

This week's hot new Goldmine feature focuses on gems of parental wisdom that the goons of the Something Awful Forums have relied on to shape their lives. Reading them will go a long way to explaning what went wrong with a lot of these people.

Billiam's Mom: "You shouldn't be in a hurry to have sex, it only feels good in the way going to the bathroom feels good."

Wow, ok dude, your Mom sure did have a point there. Anyway, hop along Cassidy to the Goldmine and see how crazy these people's parents are. Maybe it will make you feel better about the time when you were four and your Daddy locked you in the Special Room and gave you the Special Drink and when you woke up your mouth tasted funny and you couldn't see for three days.

– Rich "Lowtax" Kyanka (@TwitterHasBannedAllMyAccountsEver)