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Thinking small Bush Is Just Kidding -- But for How LongBy Rick Horowitz Do you think he knows? Do you think anybody's warned him? The thing about juggernauts -- Georgie Dub's, or anyone's -- is that they always look unstoppable. The problem with juggernauts is that sometimes they're not. So: Ready to fret a bit for the Bush campaign? I know what you're thinking. You're thinking that George W. Bush is sky-high in the polls. He's got endorsements out the wazoo. He's got more money than all the other candidates combined, more money than certain continents. What's he got to worry about? Just this: He's running out of kids. I don't mean his own kids. I mean other kids. Kids to pose with -- cute-as-a-button, energetic, photogenic kids. He's running out of them. This could be serious. If you've been watching Georgie Dub on the campaign trail, if you've been paying even a little bit of attention, you know exactly what I'm talking about: Every time you see the guy, he's surrounded by kids. All sizes. All colors. Sometimes he reads to them. Sometimes they sing to him. They hold hands. They snuggle. They smooch. They give great photo-op. As campaign decorations go, kids are even better than balloons. They take less time to inflate, for one thing, and if they happen to pop during the candidate's speech, it's a quieter pop, so the Secret Service doesn't get nervous. Kids drip with excitement (among other things); there's nothing like that high-pitched, pre-pubescent buzz to rouse a room of even the most cynical reporters. Kids also ask easier questions than reporters do, which considering the current state of the Georgie Dub Worldwide Knowledge Base, is a definite plus. And of course, when your candidate's being swarmed by little people day after day, the whole thing just screams, "Family Values!" That can't hurt, right? Right. Unless you overplay your hand. Then you've got problems. Georgie Dub could have problems. He's been posing with kids at such an incredible pace, he could run through his whole supply before the campaign ever gets to crunch time. And what happens to that juggernaut then? See, I've been doing some quick calculations -- nothing too formal, you understand; tot toting is still an inexact science. I'm figuring how many kids Georgie Dub meets-and-greets at a typical school stop, multiplied by the number of schools he manages to drop in on in a typical week, multiplied by the number of weeks till November of 2000, divided into the latest Census Bureau stats for "Cute Kids, aged 0-12," multiplied by the prevailing Coefficient of Fiction from the National Bureau of Standards, and there it is, clear as a clanger: He comes up short. This is just an estimate, of course, but the way I figure it, at his current rate of kiddie contact, George W. Bush will run out of perfectly posable children on Monday morning, January 3. That's even before the New Hampshire primary! Not a crisis? A whole presidential campaign running on moppet power, and at the crucial moment in the election calendar, suddenly the tank is empty? He might have to start answering questions from adults! I know what you're thinking. You're thinking Georgie Dub can use the same kids over again, that a kid is a kid, that no one would ever notice. No chance. The kids would notice. It's one thing to be excited when a presidential candidate they've never laid eyes on before shows up in their very own classroom. Cranking up that wide-eyed, fresh-faced look a second time is something else again. He wouldn't get buzz. He'd get blah. Somebody'd better tell him. Posted 9/11/99. And
speaking of telling: Have you told your friends about "Rick's" yet?
They'll thank you for it.
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Rick Horowitz