It has been an election season mired in underdogs, outliers, and most importantly some damn good jokes. SNL writers have been reveling in the jokes that seemingly write themselves. A New York socialist Jew running for president? Somebody call Larry David, he's definitely not doing anything. Donald Trump, the billionaire megalomaniac, is running for president? Let's get him on the goddamn show.
Politics are fun and hip now. It's trendy to slap a Bernie sticker on your laptop next to your favorite indie band. With this cool cigarette-and-beer buying political scene that lets us drive its convertible which is way cooler than Dad's Corolla, comes a new litany of factors to consider when we finally get to the polls. What should we be looking for in a candidate?
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As someone who spends much of their time reading political news and falling into a deep dark lonely hole of graphs and polls, I would like to suggest a factor that we haven't considered yet. Joke potential. How funny will it be if this person gets elected? A lot of people like to say during George W. Bush, SNL thrived. And how can we forget the brilliant W impersonation by Will Ferrell? Look, I like Obama. He's a cool guy who makes doing your homework sound fun. But I can't keep living off of big ear jokes. We need something new. Obama is just too cool to make fun of. Luckily, this campaign season we don't have that to worry about. Nobody running is cool and they're all nerds. And if we can't have a cool president, we might as well get one we can make fun of.
Now we don't want to plunge our country into a deep dark turmoil of idiocy and considering a lot of the humor of these presidential candidates comes from how crazy they are, we should proceed with caution. That's why I have devised a chart that will measure a candidate's Funniness Potential versus their Craziness. I present the 2016 Election Funny vs. Crazy Graph. Don't ask about methodology, does this look like FiveThirtyEight?
First let's discuss the "W" curve. This curve represents George W. Bush's craziness versus his funniness throughout his presidency. Ideally we would want a candidate that can fall somewhere on this line. Let's get started...
Bernie Sanders
Bernie Sanders is a socialist old Jew with bad hair from New York. That sentence on its own has Jewish comedians salivating at the mouth. But I fear that Bernie might be a one-trick pony in the comedy department. Are we really funny enough for four years of presidential Jew jokes? I know I'm sure as hell not. I'll have to start scraping the bottom of the barrel looking for puns involving single payer health care system and single player video games. Bernie's initial funny output may be high but it may run its course by the time the general election comes around.
Ted Cruz
Ted Cruz is a greasy slimy mass of sunscreen crammed into a boring suit and pushed out into the world, creepily dripping on the people around him. And goddamn is it fun to make fun of him. The type of humor that plays itself best on Cruz is the kind that shakes you to your core, the kind you laugh at and then the smile fades from your face and you stare forward blankly at the wall. The voices and sounds around you get drowned out by a faint buzzing. You're numb. The buzzing gets louder and louder. There's a face forming in the wall. Ted Cruz's face pushes out of the wall. His entire body comes out and surrounds you. You try to scream, but you can't. You have no mouth. His body envelops you, his grease sinking into every pore in your body. Your jaw fights to rip the skin covering your mouth, it rips. You let out a blood curdling scream.
Ben Carson
Dr. Carson is by all measurable tools an idiot. Which is good, that's what I like. But you may be saying the man's a neurosurgeon, nobody who can do brain surgery is an idiot. To which I say, that entire statement is contradicted by the fact that Ben Carson is a neurosurgeon. Ben Carson jokes seem to be getting better and better. It all started with him needing a nap. Then he blessed us with this whole pyramid thing. I mean, Christ that's a big jump, can you imagine the stupid shit he'll say four years from now? And how bad could the administration be, after all he is a neurosurgeon.
John Kasich
John Kasich is so reasonable a candidate and moderate that he is the least funny person in this whole situation. There's nothing funny about a governor from Ohio who made it third in New Hampshire. If we were voting based on policy, then maybe you'd have a shot, John. But this is comedy. Pass.
Donald Trump
The Donald is cheating. He's a comedian running amongst a bunch of jokes and he's trying to get himself inside the White House and make jokes from the inside. Ninety percent of the shit he says is so clearly wrong and misinformed, I can't believe people don't see the smirk after each sentence. It's like watching Bill Hader play Stefan, the man is on the verge of breaking character everyday. Well I won't stand for it, if you want to make jokes you sit out here with the rest of us in the uncomfortable seats. He does not get a spot on our graph.
Jebary Clintush
The dynastic nominees of Hillary Clinton and Jeb Bush are being melded into two. They are the evil establishment and honestly I don't think the jokes are going to be very good if either win. We've heard them all. That's what happens when you get related people running for president, the joke well runs dry. The children plead their parents for water, but the drought has no end in sight. The men grow weak, unable to hunt and provide for their villages. Next comes the sickness. Plagues of recycled jokes sweep the countryside. First the children go, unable to fight back against the lazy humor with their weak bodies. Then the adults. All that is left is the whispering flowing through the empty homes and the barren wastes of comedy. The endless whispers of Amy Poehler and Will Ferrell appearing every week on SNL and saying the same jokes.
Vote Ben Carson. For the Jokes.
