At the age of 23, I lit a dozen firecrackers and put them in my ears, nose, and mouth as a goof. When I showed my roommate, Josh, I pointed at the nametag on my chest where I’d written, “Mr. Firecracker Face.” He laughed for quite a while and then told me that he was going to get his camera. “Of course,” I said through my mouthful of novelty explosives, their fuses hissing away, “take your time.” The next thing I knew I was in the emergency room being treated for a condition that I later determined to be firecracker poisoning. And ever since, I’ll be completely honest with you, me occasionally no think so good.

That’s why I often get frustrated when I hear all these slick politicians on television using a bunch of words I don’t understand like “deficit” or “congress” or “law.” But when I see Donald Trump shouting about how he’s going to make America grape again, I turn to the bucket I painted a face onto for companionship, and we both smile, reassured by the knowledge that a fresh wind is blowing in American politics.

For starters, grape is my favorite flavor. I find it purple-y and refreshing. It’s also one of the only flavors I can still taste after my youthful brush with head explosions. But there’s so much more to Donald Trump’s platform than his promise to make everything in the United States taste like grape. He also talks about a lot of things that are very important to me, like his hatred of losers. And man, let me tell you, I hate losers too. When I’m playing Scrabble with my bucket/best friend and it loses, I yell at it until my face turns bright red. I say things like: “What’s the matter with you, you loser!? Don’t you realize that you’re supposed to win games when you play them!?” And when the bucket wins and I lose, do you think I’m any less hard on myself? I am not. Because losing is simply not as good as winning and there is very little anyone could say to convince me otherwise.

I also like how Donald Trump says that he will run America like a business, even though lots of people try to say they don’t know what that means. Well, I might not be the smartest guy to ever shave 30 points off his IQ with seven dollars worth of firecrackers, but it seems pretty simple to me. All he has to do is sell America Units for more money than it costs to produce them. And even if we end up taking a bath on America Units, all we have to do is find some big business loophole so we can write the whole thing off on our taxes. That’s right, if the U.S. government fails we can just stick Uncle Sam with the bill. What’s so hard to understand about that?

Oh! And I haven’t even gotten to the best part yet, which is that Trump really tells it like it is. He has his own money, which means he doesn’t have to pull his punches for any special interest groups. He’s not part of the machine. No way. He’s more like the guy who sells you the machine and then leaves town disguised as an elderly woman before you realize it doesn’t work. That might sound disreputable, but think about it: That’s how he got the money so he didn’t have to be part of the machine. And so now we get to hear him tell it like it is, which, if you remember from earlier on in this paragraph, is the best part.

Another important thing I took into consideration when evaluating Donald Trump as a candidate is what I like to call, “the beer test.” This is where you ask yourself if Donald Trump is a person you would feel comfortable having a beer with. For me the answer is a resounding yes, because the fact of the matter is that I drink beer all the time. In this regard, it helps that my best friend is in many respects still just a bucket, whose ability to hold an impressive 650 fluid ounces helps cut down on trips to the refrigerator. So not only would I be comfortable drinking with Mr. Trump, but depending on what part of the day he decided to show up, I probably wouldn’t even realize he was in the room.

In conclusion, I feel Donald Trump is the clear choice for President of the United States. I look out my window these days and I don’t like what I see. Mainly that’s because my patio furniture is covered in bird poop. But also, no grapes. Listen to me, my fellow Americans: We are so close to making America grape again. This election day, I urge you all to select Hillary Clinton on your ballots, because I have it on good authority that November 8th is opposite day. In the meantime, God bless. Keep your fuses long and your grapevines longer.

Sincerely,
Seth Fried and Bucket the bucket