Political convention time is finally upon us as the 2012 Election gets set to take off. This week’s Republican National Convention welcomes more than 50,000 politicos, partiers and press to downtown Tampa, Florida where RNC delegates prepare to select Mitt Romney as their candidate to vie with the Democrat incumbent, Barack Obama, for the Presidency of the United States.
But wait, Not so fast….
Rumors are swirling that as consequence to Romney’s recent gaffes and miscalculations some of the more radical elements of the party are desperate to sabotage the current nominee-apparent and enliven what promises otherwise to be a rather moribund and desultory affair. Clandestine operatives within the GOP’s brain trust are reportedly planning on putting on quite a show at the Tampa Bay Times Forum, and will be reaching way deep into their bag of tricks for wax figures, forged documents, re-animation, spiked hair…and more!
Look for these five “Eleventh Hour” entrants to battle Romney-Ryan for control of the floor and REALLY shake up the 2012 Republican convention.
William Henry Harrison
Barely surviving a few weeks past his own inauguration, our nation’s ninth President is apparently raring to give it another go. And why not! Yesterday’s Whig might be even more fashionable today…botoxed, embalmed and paired with the craggy-faced Aerosmith frontman and recently retired deliberator for American Idol.
“Tippecanoe and Steven Tyler too!”
VOTE THIS WAY! VOTE THIS WAY! Just gimme a kiss. Like this!
In preparation for the traditional campaign rite of baby kissing, and taking his cue from Harrison’s own disastrous 1841 bout with pneumonia, Tyler has reportedly been aqua jogging 2 hours a day in a vat of industrial strength Purell.
Bob Hope
Harnessing the advances of today’s state of the art technology, a team of old-line conservatives have everything primed for “A Man Called Hope” to miraculously emerge on the Tampa Convention Center stage as a hologram. Hope will be joined again with his longtime partner, the avuncular crooner “Bling” Crosby (newly constituted as rapper) to announce a barnstorming nightclub tour across the USA, culminating in a meth-laced, Gatorade fueled “Run to D.C.” marathon, complete with merchandising strategy and DVD launch, ROAD TO THE WHITE HOUSE! Flyers being distributed in the parking lot are encouraging delegates to order now and they’ll throw in the complete Dorothy Lamour Skincare line (SFP-500) absolutely FREE!
Joe the Plumber
Joe Wurze…Wurtzet…Wutzeh… Plumber. Joe the Goddamn Plumber.
A fringe GOP caucus, self-dubbed, Refudiating Muckety-Mucks, feel they have come up with a sure fire way to clean up swampy DC with a reprise of starring rolls for the Allstars of the ’08 campaign. Look for entire sections of the Convention Hall floor to be awash in block lettered signs and shouts of:
VOTE in ’12 for Wrench and Wench!
One of Snakey Joe’s handlers has hinted, off the record, that as the week progresses his campaign will get a PR power boost through an ingenious re-appropriation of story lines from Watergate. Multiple leaks are also confirming that hours before final roll call a mysterious source named “DeepGrout” will deliver to the floor video footage of the erstwhile handyman, reportedly performing “special client services.” Advance copies of the sex tape’s trailer, “Drill Baby Drill!” showcase a flush-faced slippery Joe speaking softly and carrying a big copper pipe.
Their strategy lies in the belief that delegates are bound to be swayed by the candidate’s winning combination of flexibility and steely resolve as he contorts into all sorts of impossibly compromising “under the sink” positions flushing the lines with the bombshell former First Lady of Alaska. (For more information, follow Sarah & Joe on Twitter! @beaverandbuttcrack)
Arnold Schwarzenegger
Pictured: a man elected to public office by the state of California. (Image © Warner Bros.)
Starring in a Birther conceived candidacy, as well as a simulcast of his own political reality show, a liberally oiled and grossly over-tanned “Ahnold” is set to shock and delight the world, as he storms into the TBT Forum astride a monstrously large mechanical elephant wearing only his bright white body-building skivvies, frantically waving a single piece of paper in his hand. Supporters are hoping that this elaborate presentation of the “long lost” proof of his birth on American soil will finally drop the bridge to Pennsylvania Avenue for the big guy.
While no one from Schwarzenegger’s inner circle has yet to return calls confirming his pick for the #2 slot, we do know that a second, but smaller, Jumbo has been rented for the week from the local zoo. Some predict, in keeping with the candidate’s prior preferences towards bi-partisanship, that he has reached across the aisle and is attempting to harness the soon to be retired Massachusetts Congressman, Barney Frank, for what would certainly be (for Frank) an uncomfortable position on the ticket. Nonetheless, pundits from coast to coast are toasting this pairing of odd bedfellows and have been unanimous in giving credit to the Terminator for a brilliant, if bald, ploy to sew up “The Girlie Man” vote.
Nancy Reagan
Informed recently by RNC Chair, Reince Priebus, that she simply has to “Do it for the Gipper”, the ninety-one year old former First Lady has enthusiastically agreed to a punked up re-brand, in a deft appeal to both young voters and late baby boomers.
Painstaking preparations have been undertaken to deliver Mrs. Reagan back to the spotlight, darkly resplendent in bondage trousers, brass chains, rivet belts, body piercings and a black shredded “Anarchy in the US” t-shirt. Her once conservatively feathered FLOTUS hairstyle has reportedly been re-coiffed into a brilliant row of satin white Liberty-Spikes.
With efforts to revive the real Mr. Vicious proving futile, GOP operatives have instead opted to press Gary Oldman into service balancing the ticket as Nancy’s “Sid”. Sources tell us that the consummate actor has been sequestered for much of the summer developing a convincing Liverpudlian accent while simultaneously building up a heroin tolerance requisite for the coming Fall campaign. Well rehearsed and raring to go, Oldman is expected to deliver the sound byte of the Convention:
Never Mind Barack’s Bollocks! Ya Wankers, There’s Something Rotten in Washington…God Elect the Queen!
Just say "Oi".
According to a series of intercepted production e-mails, a strobe washed, and nose-ringed Nancy will then descend slowly from the roof rigging in a sea of helium filled life size Sid & Nancy dolls, pre-wired to spontaneously combust and release their payload of bonafide Voter ID cards to the gathered GOP faithful slamdancing raucously on the Convention floor.
While Reagan’s play for the nomination seems to have the most momentum of the various outlier factions, well placed sources are reporting that a Super PAC behind her candidacy, enigmatically titled, RIPP, has been exposed as the Republican Inviolable Presidency Project, brainchild of Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld.
Additionally, earlier this evening, reports hit the wires of the discovery of two unconscious older men in a sophisticated control center of an abandoned missile silo deep below Wyoming ranchland purportedly owned by Cheney. Investigators followed the sound of a mysterious voice which turned out to be a non-stop loop of Nixon’s Checkers speech. There is strong evidence to suggest that the two men, Cheney and Rumsfeld, though their identities are still uncorroborated at this time, were listening to the tape while re-engineering Diebold voting machines and preparing shipments of confusingly designed counterfeit ballots for battleground states when something caused them to simultaneously wheel and commence to peppering each other in the face with identical Remington 20 gauge double barrel shotguns.
Doug Bond resides along the Northern California coast in a foggy, windswept dune field once referred to as the Outer Lands. His work has appeared (or will soon) in the pages of Mad Hatters’ Review, Stymie, Defenestration, The Big Jewel and Necessary Fiction. Additional confabulations and portals to virtual worlds may be found here: www.dougbond.me