Endroit du Désespéré, New Hamphshire — Political pundits who are paid large sums of money to watch, analyze and comment on the 2016 presidential election may not be ready to predict who will represent the two major parties, or if one of the “outsider” candidates will break loose and make a third-party run, but one thing they mostly all agree on is that Sen. Rand Paul’s (R-KY) hopes of getting the Republican nomination, much less winning the general election, are pretty much all but over. Paul’s campaign, however, is saying quite the opposite. “Like John McCain in 2008, Senator Paul’s campaign isn’t showing up in October polling, but will be there when it counts — on Election Day,” a memo from the Paul campaign recently declared, though many pundits simply laughed at that assertion.
“Oh, Paul’s like McCain in 2008 in one very unmistakable way,” one source at the Republican National Committee told reporters recently, “and that was is that he won’t be in the White House come election day either.” The RNC source pointed to Paul’s abysmal polling numbers after lackluster fundraising and tepid debate performances. “He’s good on paper for all the libertarian kids who still live with their parents but want to spout rhetoric about rugged individualism and boot straps and all that jazz,” the RNC source said, “but he’s kooky as hell otherwise. Look at his stupid campaign videos; he’s acting like running for president is like auditioning for a reality TV show, and it’s embarrassing.”
What the anonymous source was referring to is a series of videos Paul’s campaign has made wherein he destroyed the U.S. tax code using various implements, most notably a chainsaw. But with his numbers flagging even further, the Kentucky Republican is reportedly set to release his newest video, and his camp is hoping the establishment of the RNC will like it better than his past attempts.
“Senator Paul is going to take the tax code,” Barbara Lehto, Paul’s Deputy Vice Assistant of Media Relations told the press at after a recent campaign stop in New Hampshire, “barbecue it like a good American patriot, eat it, and then twenty-four hours later he will defecate it out of his body, live on YouTube.” Lehto says the stunt is meant to show “just how much disdain Senator Paul has for taxes.” She said that the previous videos were “extremely successful” if you “don’t look at whether or not they helped the campaign.”
When asked about the stunt later that day, Paul said he’s “absolutely jazzed” about the video. He said that “young people get that cheap stunts are more important than substance.” Senator Paul also made sure to mention “free market” and “audit the Fed” a dozen times apiece in the span of a five minute Q&A session with reporters. “Kids today don’t care if your policy ideas come from the 19th century and were necessarily deemed not quite adequate for making a better society,” Paul said, “they just want to see whacky stunts. I’m thinking of doing parkour in the next video actually. Anything to make me look hip for the youngsters out there, even if it doesn’t remotely help my chances of winning.”
“Wasting time and money is something I’ve gotten quite good at over my tenure in the Senate,” Paul said as he left for the next venue, “and my campaign has been and will continue to be a shining example of the best way to do just that — waste time and money on something that has zero chance of happening in the first place.”
