Washington, D.C. (API) Some 14 months after the party was trounced by the 2008 elections and the landslide victory for President Barack Obama, the Grand Old Party has regained its sea legs once again, and a new party leader has emerged in the person of one Private Forrest Gump.
Republicans searching for leadership at a time when their party is out of power have swarmed around this political upstart whose main claim to fame is that he is a developmentally disabled former athlete and entrepreneur who effortlessly comes up with bland, heartfelt aphorisms.
“Life is like a box of chocolates,” said Gump, thumping one of his favorite old saws for reporters at a press conference. “You never know what you’re going to get.”
“The G.O.P. has been looking for a new face for a long time,” said party consultant Jack Avers. “Bobby Jindal. Charlie Crist. Mitt Romney. Everybody hoped that one of those guys might come and pick up our fallen Republican party standard. But then along comes this poor fucker Gump. Nobody’s got these kinds of bona fides. He makes you feel good about yourself in a way that we haven’t felt since George Bush took office.”
Promising to pick up every American and bodily remove him from harm’s way, Gump launched his political career at a stump speech in Alabama last Thursday amid cheers from conservatives, angry about the direction of the country.
“I am not a smart man, Birmingham. But I know what love is,” Gump announced to rapturous applause from conservatives holding up signs such as “Obamanation” and “America for Americas” and “End the Fed.”
“We want no more tax increases!” yelled an angry member under the stump.
At that, Gump stood up bolt upright, “Well yes, drill sergeant!”
When asked later by a reporter if perhaps anger about tax increases might be misplaced, since middle-class federal tax margins have barely increased since the 1980s, he said, “Well I don’t know anything about that.” Once again, the audience responded with cheers and signs of “Drill, baby, drill” and gunfire into the Alabama night air.
Gump’s apotheosis as new G.O.P. star and conservative pace-setter has provoked a frantic scramble for response from embattled Democrats, whose large and expensive bills to overhaul health care and finance have been widely unpopular. The hostile atmosphere toward Democrats has led at least two senior Congressional Democrats to signal that they would be retiring at the end of their most recent terms, including Chris Dodd of Connecticut, who has made financial services reform one of his signature issues.
“Am I missing something,” said Dodd. “This Gump guy … I mean. He’s kind of not there. Am I smoking crack?”
“Stupid is as stupid does,” said Gump, a witty rejoinder that had Republican stalwarts in the crowd jumping up and down, lighting firecrackers and setting trash cans on fire.
When asked what he thought of possibly extending many of the benefits of Medicare and Medicaid to more American citizens, Gump offered, “Momma always said dying was a part of life. I sure wish it wasn’t.”
“Gump has the right profile,” said Republican analyst Mitch Michaelson.”He’s not your typical elitist East Coast political careerist. He’s of the people. He’s American through and through from the virtuous innocence to the simple piety to not having any idea how the government works. Whatever he’s got, they ought to bottle it. That sort of speaking in non sequiturs and his slack-jawed, sloe-eyed, jittery quality.”
“There’s a fight for the soul of the Republican Party going on,” said Michaelson. “It’s the moderates versus the hard-core conservatives. And just when you think we’re out of the game, here comes this cretin Mongoloid who just steals your heart and makes you believe.”
When asked how he might deal with runaway unemployment, interest rates, huge deficits and two wars being waged at once, Gump was thoughtful.
“Washington. It’s like a whole ‘nuther country.”
Grover Norquist, the famous anti-tax crusader, was confident that Gump could best Barack Obama in the 2012 election.
“Gump has the simple values of Ronald Reagan. The simple communication skills of Ronald Reagan. The simple view of government of Ronald Reagan. Gump and Reagan are both just simple. … We ought to drown the government in a bathtub. Leave me alone.”
Gump’s handlers, David Sheffield and Audra Banks, two Alabama political allies, plan to take Gump on a listening tour through the heartland states.
“People are angry,” said Banks. “They’ve lost their jobs. They think the government wants to get between them and their doctor. They can’t afford anything. They don’t know why this is happening to them. They don’t know who John Maynard Keynes was. They don’t know how stuff is paid for. They don’t know what infrastructure is. They don’t know who sets weights and standards or who builds roads. They’re angry.
“And then they look at Forrest and say, ‘Wow, that guy’s pants just fell down,’ and they feel better.”
“I don’t know if we each have a destiny,” said Gump, “or if we’re all just floating around accidental-like on a breeze, but I, I think maybe it’s both. Maybe both is happening at the same time.”
When asked what he would do about recommending Supreme Court investigations into George Bush-era policies on torture, Gump ran away.
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