"Earth Hour" Futility, Google Hypocrisy Revealed

**Update--Earth Hour Denver timelapse and video:


As you can tell, not much was turned off. About the only participants in Denver were the Hard Rock Cafe and the Denver Convention and Performing Arts Center:

The Hard Rock dimmed lights inside and out. It was joined by the Virgin Megastore and Lucky Strike Lanes, which turned off their huge neon signs. Meanwhile, the marquee of the nearby Paramount Theater shone bright.

The Paramount wasn't alone, as businesses up and down the mall, both big and small, kept lights blazing, operating in the dark when it came to Earth Hour.

However, nonessential lights were turned off in the City and County Building, the Wellington Webb Municipal Building and the Denver Performing Arts Complex.

And at the Northfield Stapleton shopping center, some restaurants planned to serve customers by candlelight.
. . .
Power savings in the Denver area were expected to be modest. Xcel Energy said that lighting accounts for about 7 percent of home energy use, so that savings from people turning off lights will be only a portion of 7 percent, depending on how many households participate.

That'll stave off climate change. But it's the gesture that counts, right?

As I read on another blog (and can't remember where), we each voluntarily perform "Earth Hour" every night--by going to bed and turning off the lights and electronics inside the house.

This pathetically empty symbolic gesture achieves nothing more than assuaging global warmenist guilt. If it were really that important, these measures would become mandatory. How long is it before "Earth Hour" observations become energy controls, with fines and punishment for profligate consumers (except the limousine liberals, of course)?

Wait. I shouldn't be giving them any ideas . . .

---

"We applaud the spirit of the idea, but our own analysis as well as that of others shows that making the Google homepage black will not reduce energy consumption. To the contrary, on flat-panel monitors (already estimated to be 75% of the market), displaying black may actually increase energy usage. Detailed results from a new study confirm this"--Google, on turning its screen black, which it is doing once again for "Earth Hour"

Earth Hour's site is currently running slowly, no doubt due to traffic:



Moonbattery highlights Google's hypocrisy and black-screen futility--the color change saves no energy, as Google itself admits:

Reducing climate change by saving energy is an important effort we should all join, and that's why we're very glad to see the innovative thinking going into a variety of solutions. One idea, suggested by the site called "Blackle" (which is not related to Google, by the way, though the site does use our custom search engine), is to reduce energy used by monitors by providing search with a black background. We applaud the spirit of the idea, but our own analysis as well as that of others shows that making the Google homepage black will not reduce energy consumption. To the contrary, on flat-panel monitors (already estimated to be 75% of the market), displaying black may actually increase energy usage. Detailed results from a new study confirm this.

The Drunkablog has a fun bunch of links to Tim Blair (from down under, who is tracking the event around the world), who is combatting "Earth Hour" moonbattery with the "Hour of Power", and a roundup of local MSM cheerleading coverage.

Ed Morrissey has much more on Google's hypocrisy at Hot Air.

Earth Hour's "Ten Things to do in the Dark" (annotated):

Host a Green Party

Get your friends together for an Earth Hour eco-party. Fire up the flashlights and battery lanterns, serve organic food, avoid the disposable utensils, use natural décor (like flowers and hanging plants) and have a friend provide acoustic music. Talk to your guests about how you’re each reducing your environmental footprint and share ideas and solutions for saving more energy, money and carbon dioxide.
--Yes, have all of your friends DRIVE to your EH eco-party. Be sure to have them charge those batteries ahead of time--you are using rechargeables, aren't you?

Give Yourself an Energy Makeover

Use Earth Hour to make your home more energy efficient: Replace your old light bulbs with compact fluorescent bulbs; install power strips (so you can turn computers and electronics on and off more easily); and change your air conditioner filters. Or go one step farther and install one new energy-efficient item, like an EnergyStar qualified DVD player. And on Monday, call your local utility and sign up for green power—like wind, hydro or solar.
--Replace incandescents with CFLs--and don't worry about all that harmful mercury. Make sure to find the most expensive alternative source of energy--you are committed, aren't you?

Go Green with Your Kids

Earth Hour is a perfect time to talk to your kids about the environment and why we need to protect our planet from the dangers of climate change. Check out books on the environment from the library and read by flashlight, or head into the yard and have a night picnic. Or how about a night of board games? There are even Earth Hour kids’ activities you can download at www.earthhour.org.
--Indoctrinate the future polluters Educate your kids, and make sure they properly fear climate change. Al Gore says so.

Do a Recyclables Scavenger Hunt

Get your flashlights and scour your cabinets and shelves for cans, bottles and cardboard (like cereal boxes) that you don't normally recycle. Make a list of all the non-recyclable containers you’re using now (like plastic shopping bags and butter tubs), and figure out ways to reduce your consumption of items that end up in landfills. One easy tip: get reusable grocery bags...and reuse them!
--Recycle, recycle, recycle--make it your mantra! Find more expensive, organic alternatives for all of your consumption. Or ELSE.

Green That Workspace!

Working the night shift? Even if you can’t turn off all the lights at work, look around and see what you can unplug, turn down or use less of (like consuming less paper by printing double-sided). Every day millions of computer screens and speakers are left on overnight—shut ‘em off! And talk to your coworkers about what they can do to help make a difference too.
--Conduct surveillance on your wastrel colleagues and report them immediately! You can also afford to strain your eyes by turning off all those annoying lights.

Involve Your Local Leaders

If your city or town isn't already hosting an Earth Hour event, ask your local government to set up a community "green" discussion in a public building from 8 to 9 p.m. on March 29. Help organize attendance by reaching out to local environmental and community groups, and come prepared to ask your leaders what they’re doing to make your city greener.
--Enforce your views on your neighbors by insisting local government bend to your every demand. Make sure to eliminate all dissent. Shame those who dare to ask questions.

Clean Up Your Neighborhood

Grab a flashlight and take a long walk through your neighborhood, picking up trash and recyclables as you go. It's a great chance to do some stargazing too!
--Make sure to do it in the dark, so that picking up trash can turn into a game of "name that trash!"

Unplug and Chill Out

Most of our daily activities—like watching TV, shopping online and texting friends—require loads of electricity, but do we really need to do so much stuff all the time? Take one hour for yourself to just chill...turn off the screens, put down the handheld devices and just take some "you" time to reflect, read or talk to your family. After all, why do more when you can do less?
--Yes, read in the dark. It's easy if you try. Or better yet, sleep. Recreate the conditions of bedtime, when you normally turn off all the lights/appliances/electronics . . . um, yeah, basically do what you do EVERY night. That'll make it EXTRA symbolic.

Take Your Temperature

Your thermostat and your refrigerator are responsible for a huge portion of your carbon footprint. If you lower your thermostat by just 2 degrees and set your fridge to 37° F. and the freezer at 0° F., you'll make a big difference.
--Doable. It is Spring or Fall around the globe, and so you won't exactly freeze or swelter.

Make a Pledge for the Planet

Earth Hour shouldn't end at 9:01 pm—it's a chance to take a first step toward lowering your overall impact on the environment. So use part of that hour to make a personal pledge to do more—recycle, drive less often, remember to turn off or unplug electronics, and beyond. The only way we're going to stabilize our climate is if we make real changes in our everyday lives. That change begins with Earth Hour, and ends with a healthy planet.
--Rather than waste your time on symbolic gestures that accomplish nothing but make you feel really, really good about yourself, make a plan to actually conserve in a meaningful, sustainable way. We don't actually want you to return to the Stone Age, now, do we?

MSM Columnist Praises Earth Hour Youth Going Door-To-Door In Denver To Enforce Lights Out

Yes, I'm serious--brainwashed elementary school kids pounded the pavement on behalf of Earth Hour, encouraging guilting harassing their nighbors into darkness by insisting that lights be switched off in their neighborhood (h/t Drunkablog, who has included several "photos" purported to be the children in question):

This column came knocking at 8:10 p.m. Saturday.

"It's Earth Hour," said one of a gaggle of seven young neighbors holding candles on our front porch.

"Why are your lights on?" asked another, eyebrows furrowed, glaring at me with 120 watts of disappointment.

These were the children of the 500 block of High Street, a plucky bunch of grade-schoolers whose games and laughter grace our neighborhood even more than the tall trees.
. . .
The troupe went global Saturday.

When the clocks struck 8:00, they mobilized to save the planet by knocking loudly on neighbors' doors with a metal key — a technique one of the older boys learned selling tins of caramel corn for Boy Scouts.
. . .
Most of our neighbors' homes also darkened, one by one, after visits from the little organizers.

Ah the young--they grow up so fascist fast.

The "greenshirts" were just doing their part to save the planet:

"We need to save all the juice in the earth so there will be some left when we're old," said 8-year-old Dara Pasquino.

"Just this hour of darkness is saving, like, trillions and trillions of gallons," added her brother, Dante, 10.

Nine-year-old Daniel Scher expounded on the need to "reduce, reuse and recycle" and "plan for sustainability."

"We're teaching grown-ups not to be wasters," added Juliana Pfeifer, 6. "Besides, firelight makes you sing songs and tell stories. Candles make everything more wonderful."

By 10 p.m. — well past their bedtimes — the tired firebrands smiled when they realized most of the block was still dark even after Earth Hour was history.

They had changed their world, at least for a few hours.

Then, at the prodding of their parents, the kids of High Street headed home to bed, skipping into the balmy night, triumphant in the darkness.

Triumphant in their moonbattery at the age of SIX.

Of course the lefty Post columnist sees nothing wrong with this situation. The children were accompanied by their parents after all, no doubt encouraging them to continue their efforts, and perhaps verbally scolding those on the block who were non-compliant.

These kids have been doubly abused--through the indoctrination they have clearly received from their parents and most likely also from their schools, and because they have been taught that argument, debate, and persuasion are to be avoided in favor of "collective action," guilt, and groupthink. Rather than using logic, they have been taught to "feel" their way through the situation.

They have certainly not been exposed to the other side of the debate, and that is a shame.

But as is usual for the left, feeling and doing outweigh thinking.

Carbon Belch Day--June 12

We'll see if this carbon belch "holiday" will be better observed than the washout of "Earth Hour" back on March 31:

Conservative grassroots group Grassfire.org wants people to waste as much energy as possible on June 12 by "hosting a barbecue, going for a drive, watching television, leaving a few lights on, or even smoking a few cigars."

The point: the group wants to "help Americans break free from the 'carbon footprint guilt' being imposed by Climate Alarmists."

Focus The Nation Climate Change Teach-In Coming To CU Boulder

**Update--A look at some of the Focus the Nation moonbattery taking place on campuses across the country:

At the University of Rhode Island, students placed 300-pound blocks of ice around their campus and let them melt to symbolize how global warming is affecting polar ice caps.

At Missouri State University, students will pile 20 tons of coal on campus to show how much of this air-polluting fossil fuel is needed to power their school for an hour.

At UCSD, young conservationists are preparing a performance-art show that will feature a faux polar bear in an 8-foot-tall “electric” chair. It's a creative riff on the theme of climate change harming the bears.

The activities are part of the inaugural Focus the Nation, a four-day event designed to turn the nation's college students and others into global-warming activists.

Organizers of the grass-roots campaign, which ends tomorrow, bill it as the largest teach-in in U.S. history. They said about 1,700 colleges – including San Diego State and the University of California San Diego – churches, high schools and civic groups are participating.

---

Focus the Nation is unadulterated political advocacy. But my campus forbids me to use my official time, paid for by taxpayers, to advocate for particular campaign issues. But global warming is so important. But my Chancellor forbids me to engage in political advocacy as part of my job. But my Chancellor is the keynote speaker for our Focus the Nation activities. But my job is to teach not indoctrinate. But I actually agree with many of the proposed policies. But it is not my job to use my platform as a professor to tell students what to think; I am supposed to teach them how to think and come to their own conclusions. But if I don't go along I'll be castigated as one of those bad guys, like a Holocaust denier or slave owner. But doing the right thing is so obvious--Roger Pielke, Jr., director of the University of Colorado's Center for Science and Technology Policy Research and an associate professor of environmental studies


Climate change moonbattery at CU

Just received this forwarded missive urging me not to forget to attend CU's Focus the Nation Climate Change Teach-In (more detailed list of events here). No less than Colorado's Governor Bill Ritter will be in attendance to kick things off:

Subject: FW: Focus The Nation: Climate Change Teach-In

Please forward this on to your departments.
**********************
January 31st, 2008, CU Focus the Nation is part of a national teach-in
engaging millions of students about climate change and its solutions. A teach-in
is a day when an entire school turns its attention to a single issue. In this
case, it is an issue that will shape the future of current students. CU
Focus the Nation has a lot of activities planned throughout the day. Planned
events include:

* The 2% Solution Focus the Nation will stream a free, live, interactive webcast with climate scientist Stephen Schneider, sustainability expert Hunter Lovins, green jobs pioneer Van Jones and youth climate leaders, for a discussion of global warming solutions. 6:00 - 7:00 p.m. (Jan 30) / Atlas Auditorium
* Polar Visions World Premier Presented by CU climate scientist Ryan Vachon, polar climate change views from scientists and polar natives. 7:30-9:00 p.m. (Jan 30) / Atlas Auditorium
* Governor Bill Ritter kicks off Focus the Nation with his vision of a new energy economy. 9:00-10:00 a.m. / Old Main Chapel
* Discovery's Planet Earth series shown all day on the ceiling of Fiske Planetarium. 9:00 a.m.-6 p.m. / Fiske Planetarium
* Climate change panel series. Experts speak on climate justice, the difficulty of communicating climate change, and the future energy technologies that will help us fight climate change. 11:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. / Old Main Chapel. Check the website for individual panel times.
* Save Our Snow movie about a fearless duo of eco-minded
snowboarders traveling cross-country in a veggie-oil-fueled Winnebago to inform and
inspire people to save our snow from climate change. Enter to win a pair of HEAD racing team skis. 10:00-10:50 a.m. / Old Main Chapel.
* Ask a Climate Expert all your burning questions about climate
change in our open Q&A forum. 2:00-3:15 p.m. / Old Main Chapel
* Get FREE energy efficient light bulbs to save you money and lower your climate change impact. 9:00 a.m. - 6:00 p.m. in the UMC, Old Main Chapel and Fiske Planetarium
* Latin Hip-Hop by Debajo Del Agua and spoken word by LaNiece Littleton
and Jarvis Fuller. Focusing on the loss of culture due to climate change. 5:00-
8:00 p.m. / UMC cafeteria.
* The 11th Hour movie about global warming solutions followed by a
discussion with local experts. 7:00 and 9:15 p.m. / Muenziner Auditorium
/ $5 gen/$4 w student ID
* The Devil Came on Horseback about the genocide in Darfur. Hunter
Lovins, CU Law Profesor Maxine Burkett, Representative Alice Madden, and House
Speaker Andrew Romanoff and the film's narrator speak about the origins of the crisis, its link to a changing climate and why we should care. 6:00-8:00 / Cristol Chemistry Auditorium 140.

Robert Hall
Energy Program Manager
CU Environmental Center
303-492-3229

Aside from the obvious global warmongering and climate change hysteria, this "activity" appears to breach the prohibition on activism and political advocacy that CU's Chancellor "Bud" Peterson recently outlined quite clearly:

TO: Boulder Campus Teaching & Research Faculty, Staff, Deans, Directors, Dept Chairs

FROM: Office of the Chancellor

SENDER: Chancellor G.P. "Bud" Peterson

DATE: January 18, 2008

SUBJECT: Guidelines on Campaign-Related Activities by Members of the University Community

Dear Colleagues:

In light of the many political campaigns currently, or soon to be, underway at the national, state and local levels, I would like to provide you with a set of guidelines we, as members of the University community, should keep in mind as we consider our own activities and level of involvement. The guidelines were developed by the Office of the University Counsel, and if you have questions, I urge you to contact Counsel's office at 303-492-7481.

GUIDELINES ON CAMPAIGN-RELATED ACTIVITIES BY MEMBERS OF THE UNIVERSITY
COMMUNITY

IN GENERAL, UNIVERSITY EMPLOYEES MAY NOT:

* Engage in any activity during working hours designed to urge electors to vote for or against any campaign issues, which include campaigns for public office, state-wide campaign issues or referred measures, and local campaign issues or levies.

* Employees wishing to participate in a campaign activity should take personal leave.

* Use office supplies or equipment, including computers, telephones, printers or facsimile machines to create materials urging electors to vote for or against a campaign issue.

* Use their University email accounts to urge electors to vote for or against a campaign issue, or to forward materials that urge electors to vote for or against a campaign issue.

* Use University-hosted websites to urge electors to vote for or against a campaign issue.

Focus the Nation touts their endorsements:

To date, Focus the Nation at CU has been endorsed by Chancellor Bud Peterson, the Boulder Faculty Assembly, and the UCSU student government.

How do you spell hypocrisy? Nice to see you enforcing your own prohibition, "Bud".

Perhaps we should, you know, make a few phone calls.

Roger Pielke, Jr., director of the University of Colorado's Center for Science and Technology Policy Research and an associate professor of environmental studies--a self-described "nonskeptical heretic" and no fan of skeptics like Sen. James Inhofe states, "I'm so confused":

I am so confused.

Focus the Nation is unadulterated political advocacy. But my campus forbids me to use my official time, paid for by taxpayers, to advocate for particular campaign issues. But global warming is so important. But my Chancellor forbids me to engage in political advocacy as part of my job. But my Chancellor is the keynote speaker for our Focus the Nation activities. But my job is to teach not indoctrinate. But I actually agree with many of the proposed policies. But it is not my job to use my platform as a professor to tell students what to think; I am supposed to teach them how to think and come to their own conclusions. But if I don't go along I'll be castigated as one of those bad guys, like a Holocaust denier or slave owner. But doing the right thing is so obvious.

Thank goodness I am on sabbatical.

Bush Visits Greeley To Boost Beauprez, Musgrave

Matthew Staver © Bloomberg News
President George W. Bush speaks during a campaign rally at Island Grove Regional Park in Greeley. Bush was in Colorado to campaign for Representative Marilyn Musgrave in the final days leading up to Tuesday's midterm elections.

Complete video of Bush's speech in Greeley this morning.

Bush rallies Colorado GOP, but is it too little, too late?:

GREELEY – President George W. Bush today told several thousand Republican boosters attending a rally here this morning that America’s best defense against terrorism is a strong offense and that the effort should be entrusted to GOP leadership.

Bush’s hour-long appearance at the Island Grove Regional Park Events Center, at which he pushed Republican virtues in an impassioned speech lasting 45 minutes, was primarily intended to boost the chances two-term incumbent U.S. Rep. Marilyn Musgrave and that party’s candidate for Colorado governor, U.S. Rep. Bob Beauprez.

"I like coming to places like Greeley, Colorado, because the people here are down to earth, hard-working people who have a lot of common sense," Bush said. "That’s what we need in Washington, D.C., common sense. And Marilyn Musgrave brings common sense to Washington, D.C."

One protestor did manage to make it into the arena as Bush stressed the difference between GOP and Democratic views on foreign policy:

Bush’s speech was interrupted frequently by roars of approval and applause, but it wasn’t an exclusively adoring crowd.

A man who identified himself as 24-year-old David Mann of Boulder, a veteran of two tours of duty in Iraq with the U.S. Army, was escorted from the room by Secret Service personnel for heckling the president, who hadn’t let Mann affect his delivery.
. . .
But Bush spent far more time making the case for Republicans nationwide. Devoting much of his talk to hammering away at the dangers America faces from terrorists he said preach an ideology of hate, Bush said Democrats aren’t the best ones to combat that threat.

"I’m not saying these people are not patriots," he said of the Democratic party. "I’m just saying they’re wrong."

Appearing in dark slacks and a pale blue, open-necked dress shirt with his sleeves rolled up, Bush hit repeatedly on his charge that the GOP’s rivals have no plan for victory against Islamist extremists determined to hurt America.

"Harsh criticism is not a plan, for victory," said Bush. "Second-guessing is not a strategy."

technorati: Colorado Bush Iraq war Bob Beauprez Marilyn Musgrave election governor Bill Ritter Democrats Republicans

Nothing To Fear But The Climate Change Alarmists

More brilliance from Mark Steyn:

Do you worry? You look like you do. Worrying is the way the responsible citizen of an advanced society demonstrates his virtue: He feels good by feeling bad.

But what to worry about? Iranian nukes? Nah, that's just some racket cooked up by the Christian fundamentalist Bush and his Zionist buddies to give Halliburton a pretext to take over the Persian carpet industry. Worrying about nukes is so '80s. "They make me want to throw up. . . . They make me feel sick to my stomach," wrote the British novelist Martin Amis, who couldn't stop thinking about them 20 years ago. In the intro to a collection of short stories, he worried about the Big One and outlined his own plan for coping with a nuclear winter wonderland:

"Suppose I survive," he fretted. "Suppose my eyes aren't pouring down my face, suppose I am untouched by the hurricane of secondary missiles that all mortar, metal and glass has abruptly become: Suppose all this. I shall be obliged (and it's the last thing I feel like doing) to retrace that long mile home, through the firestorm, the remains of the thousands-miles-an-hour winds, the warped atoms, the groveling dead. Then -- God willing, if I still have the strength, and, of course, if they are still alive -- I must find my wife and children and I must kill them."

But the Big One never fell. And instead of killing his wife Martin Amis had to make do with divorcing her. Back then it was just crazies like Reagan and Thatcher who had nukes, so you can understand why everyone was terrified. But now Kim Jong-Il and the ayatollahs have them, so we're all sophisticated and relaxed about it, like the French hearing that their president's acquired a couple more mistresses. Martin Amis hasn't thrown up a word about the subject in years. To the best of my knowledge, he has no plans to kill the present Mrs. Amis.

So what should we worry about? How about -- stop me if you've heard this one before -- "climate change"? That's the subject of Al Gore's new movie, ''An Inconvenient Truth.'' Like the trailer says: "If you love your planet -- if you love your children -- you have to see this movie." Even if you were planning to kill your children because you don't want them to live in a nuclear wasteland, see this movie. The mullahs won't get a chance to nuke us because, thanks to rising sea levels, Tehran will be under water. The editor of the New Yorker, David Remnick, says the Earth will "likely be an uninhabitable planet." The archbishop of Canterbury, in a desperate attempt to cut the Anglican Communion a slice of the Gaia-worship self-flagellation action, demands government "coercion" on everything from reduced speed limits to ending cheap air travel "if we want the global economy not to collapse and millions, billions of people to die."

Influential Blogger Not Seeking Office In 2010

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE (Embargoed until 2089)
August 6, 2009

Underemployed Smartass Blogger Opts Out of GOP Senate Race

Independent, Maverick Hope’n’Changer Has Better Things To Do

(His Parents' Basement)—Pajama-clad chickenshit People’s Press Collective blogger and itinerant Independence Institute groupie El Presidente has, after careful consideration and extensive consultation, decided NOT to challenge Senator Who? in the 2010 election. He now joins an elite group of only three other individuals who have not tossed their hat into the GOP primary.

“After conducting a comprehensive state-wide listening campaign that consisted of a blue-ribbon panel comprised by his four Facebook fans and a guy named Larry, and a feeling that any multi-cellular organism could defeat an appointed Senator whose speech patterns are less interesting than 1980s animatronics at Disneyland, I have decided to take the decisive and bold path and not enter the race,” declared El Presidente. “Besides, what’s the point of splitting the primary vote 1,013,476 ways?”

Though he believed himself to be a formidable candidate despite having staged a failed 5th grade class coup, he had left the possibility of running for a democratically-elected state-wide office open until today. However, citing extensive familial responsibilities as a reclusive bachelor and noted misanthrope, El Presidente also concluded that he could not stomach the grueling campaign schedule required to build name brand recognition, nor the number of handshakes that were in store for him.

“Campaign events before noon? Yeah, riiiiiiight. Besides, I’d need a whole lot of Purell, and that is dangerous for our climate in this new energy economy,” remarked El Presidente.

Had he launched a formal Senate bid, El Presidente planned an extensive, scorched-earth campaign chock-full of disastrous launch stumblings, calculated missteps, unidentified geography in his ads, inexplicable verbal gaffes, annoying/antiquated/untimely/irrelevant press releases (like this one), a general lack of focus in his messaging, and a complete disregard for anything even remotely resembling a Republican principle.

“Socialism for everyone sounds so socialist itself, so I planned to burden the economy with even more government spending so that I could avoid any real, serious conversation and get down to the business of the people—getting myself reelected, and then surreptitiously switching parties. I believe in the 80-20 principle, 80% for me, 20% for all of you unwashed, gun-toting, God-fearing troglodytes who whine about ‘high taxes’ and ‘liberty.’ It’s not all about you or your liberty, it’s about me, your hypocritical elected official. You people make me sick,” concluded El Presidente.**

During the trial period, he spoke to several egregiously overpaid political hacks, faux-Internet gurus, and old-guard roadblocks who encouraged him to run.

“The superficiality of these GOP insiders is amazing, and I looked forward to their non-sensical advice and thoroughly deplorable backstabbing,” noted El Presidente. In addition, had he actually decided to have it bothways and mount a run before he ultimately decided against it, El Presidente articulated the need for a clear New Media strategy involving Web 2.0 tools that he hopes other GOP candidates will latch on to in their own meretricious efforts.

“The Democrats have the Gang of Four, the Colorado Model, and almost every elected position in the state. But we have Facebook and Twitter and the severely underfunded and generally disregarded conservative blogosphere on our side. Not that I’ve ever visited those or any other websites on that new-fangled “intarwebz” thingy,” argued El Presidente. “My college-aged anarcho-syndicalist commune, which doubled as my campaign war room, told me that multiple sockpuppets and an outrageously obvious and horrendously misspelled astroturfing campaign launched from my own IP using my personal email address would ensure me a grassroots following so far-reaching, that literally billions would join the cause. I crap you negative. After all, I know people, and am a mighty oak.” El Presidente’s entire cadre of earnest but unwitting supporters has subsequently been liquidated, following a judiciously unjust, farcical show trial.

In preparation for what could ultimately prove to be Colorado’s most expensive Senate race since the last most expensive Senate race and assuredly not as expensive as the next one, El Presidente’s fundraising efforts in the exploratory phase had yielded a staggering $0.57 cents, most of which came from a single donation from his parent’s couch.

“No candidate can seek funding from just one source. A great candidate needs resources from a large pool of donors of all political stripes, and I was able to bring both sides of the sofa together, by drawing support from both the right AND the left cushions,” boasted El Presidente. The response was phenomenal the past 45 quarters, and we even saw a generous amount of foreign backing in the form of Confederate war bonds and Zimbabwean currency. “Never too early to get in the race, nor build up a campaign war chest,” asserted El Presidente.

El Presidente’s nascent campaign drew endorsements from a wide variety of public groups, including “People with ‘Don’t Tread on Me’ Bumper Stickers On Their Cars” or PWDTOMBSOTC and the “Society for the Total Usurpation of Public Involvement in Democracy” also known as STUPID. “The STUPID socialists were some of my biggest and earliest supporters, but unfortunately, since they don’t believe in the free market, capitalism, or personal property, none of the STUPID bastards could give me any money,” lamented El Presidente.

While El Presidente has not endorsed any specific candidate in the GOP primary, he has identified a few potential frontrunners and personal favorites in the ridiculously overcrowded field.

“If I can get through 100 candidates an hour, 24/7, for the next 10 months, I might be able to have a grasp of the entire field, and issue my endorsement—or I’ll just withhold support and then note one week before the general election, as the Republican candidate heads for certain defeat, that I could have run a much better race and actually, you know, won the damn thing. Ahhh, the bitter taste of sour grapes, low expectations, and a sense of paid-my-dues entitlement,” quipped El Presidente. “I call on all Republicans running to make a commitment to do everything possible to piss off the base, irrevocably destroy the party, ostracize Libertarians and freedom-oriented independents, and empower Democrats for the next century or two with nasty, hyper-partisan, ad hominem attacks in the primary. Let’s circle the wagons once again and, in a show of party unity, fire in—that’s the ticket!”

El Presidente has scheduled a press non-availability at an undisclosed, undetermined location, as security concerns will only permit a few teleprompters, some stage plants (primarily Ficus), and a Gatorade stand. Only pre-screened softball questions submitted by a sycophantic and propagandistic media will be allowed, and generally ignored. Your cooperation isn’t appreciated, or even all that important to us. After all, you’re probably just a wide-eyed blogger with a covert agenda, and jeebus, why do we even bother . . .

For more information contact:
Yo Momma
c/o State GOP HQ
303-BITE-ME
soyunperdedor@republicanscantgettheirshitstraight.com

**Not actually elected, though you probably didn’t read that far anyway, so what does it matter?
Editing by MIM