Fiddle with their Rubik’s Cubes during debates.
Wear Flashdance sweatshirts, leg warmers, and headbands.
Repeatedly argue that misguided liberal policies have sapped the free market of much of its natural vitality by burdening it with too many government taxes, too much government spending, and too heavy government regulation then promise to restore prosperity by getting the government off the backs of the American people by cutting taxes, slashing spending, and deregulating the economy. Spread this broad and quite compelling vision and maintain deep faith in free-market principles.
Infuse political discourse with Pac-Man noises and talk of personal high scores in Defender, Centipede and Asteroids.
If you’re a male GOP candidate, use Bruce Springsteen’s “Born in the U.S.A.” as your walk-up music.
On the off chance that Reagan’s name does happen to get mentioned in the next two years of campaign discourse, casually genuflect, make the sign of the cross, look heavenward and reverently but nonchalantly say, “all praise be unto him.”
If you’re a female GOP candidate, then use Madonna’s “Material Girl’ as your walk-up music.
Eat jelly beans. Temper this act of sweetness by defiantly washing the jelly downs with a 56 oz. jug of peach wine coolers.
Wear a Swatch watch.
If you’re a man GOP candidate and Bruce Springsteen gets mad at you for using his song as walk-up music as a result of disparate ideologies, use Sting’s “Russians” as your walk-up music.
If you’re a woman GOP candidate and Madonna prohibits you from using her song as walk-up music, then use Cyndi Lauper’s “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun” as your walk-up music.
Cultivate xenophobia.
Choose Mr. T as your running mate. If Mr. T is busy, then choose an MTV veejay as your running mate.
Tell people, apropos of anything, to “win one for the Gipper” wherever they go.
If you are a man GOP candidate, wear the jeans, plaid flannel shirt and orange puffy vest Marty McFly (Michael J. Fox) wore in Back to the Future. While you run the risk of pandering to the youth vote, you also subliminally fulfill the fantasy return to the fifties for which most Reaganites still yearn.
If you are a woman GOP candidate, wear the pink dress Andie Walsh (Molly Ringwald) wore to the prom in Pretty in Pink, which may have ultimately had a populist message but if worn properly, can still subliminally foster reverence for the wealth and rich arrogance of playboy Steff, played by a young James Spader.
Begin every sentence with “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall”
Wear two Swatch watches.
Moonwalk onto speaking platforms.
Foster political hysteria about drugs and advocate for draconian penalties in Congress and state legislatures to rapidly increase the prison population.
If Mr. T and all the MTV veejays are busy and/or inexplicably do not want to be your running mate, make a Michael Landon hologram your running mate. (Conventional wisdom might suggest you just make a Reagan hologram your running mate but even your most ardent supporters would demand the Reagan hologram be first on the ticket thereby rendering you the running mate.)
If you’re a male GOP candidate and both Bruce Springsteen and Sting prohibit you from using their respective songs as walk-up music, then play anything by Kenny Rogers for walk-up music.
If you’re a female GOP candidate and both Madonna and Cyndi Lauper file cease and desist orders demanding you stop using their songs as walk-up music, then play anything by Dolly Parton as your walk-up music.
Repeatedly call for a massive buildup in the American armed forces to deter any potential Soviet attack and allow the United States to prevail in battle if the Cold War should ever turn hot.
Wear three Swatch watches.