My name is Prester John and I am running for the state house of Delaware. Some of you might now me as the legendary medival king of an equally legendary medeval kingdom in India/Kazakhstan/Ethiopia. Well, those days are past and for the past 25 years my wife Carol and I have considered ourselves full fledged Delawareans.

Delaware is facing some tough challenges in this modern world. I will put to work my experience defending the universal faith and conquering the barbarian hordes beyond the Gates of Alexander when considering the impact of tax levies on mid-to-small sized businesses in our state.

In 1132 I was able to build a magnificent palace and main street of solid gold through my legendary capital city in Eur-Asian-Africa without raising taxes on the peasantry a single denarius.

This November, vote John for Delaware state house.

Thank you.

***

PRESTER JOHN LIES!

My opponent, Prester John, would like the good people of Delaware to believe he is an actual historical figure. Fortunately, the cameras were rolling when he let it slip that he is entirely fictional.

“I am a product of the fevered imaginations of terrified crusaders looking for a reason to believe they had any chance of victory.” –Prester John, Diabetes Awareness Banquet, 2006

If his existence is a complete fiction, how much else has he made up? Can Delaware trust that his family values really exist? And if he never showed up to liberate the Holy Land with a sword made of fire, how can we trust him to show up for votes on important matters like commemorating state holidays?

No Sales Tax Day is an important cultural event for all of us, and if Prester John won’t commemorate it, then he doesn’t deserve the office.

Vote Psalmanazar in 2010.

***

There have been some pretty outrageous claims made by my opponent George Psalmanazar in recent days, so I’d just like to take a moment to set the record straight.

Psalmanazar has always been against the celebration of No Sales Tax Day. Just listen to the speech he gave at Columbia’s commencement in 2003.

“I’m glad to be in New York, where a Taiwanese immigrant like me can be subjected to such outrageous prices and convenient tax surcharges.”

Also, Psalmanazar has admitted to being a pagan. Can we really trust a pagan in the state house after the Dover Druid Takeover of 1937?

“I am a Japanese pagan.” – George Psalmanazar, Times of London, 1702

Spare us, Psalmanazar, by 1702 I had already observed you leaving home in southern France posing as an Irish pilgrim in order to get to Rome through my magnificent Seer-Orb gifted to me by the Raj of Thule.

This election day, vote John for Delaware state house, and leave the pagans at the door.

Counterpoint: Don’t listen to him, he’s crazy! Don’t do it mister! I know you’re just a visitor here but that man is deranged. He jumped me when I came in to change the pillows then tied me up and stuffed me over here. Don’t let him out whatever you do of the whole city will be at risk. Don’t listen to him about the supposed torture we put him through. The only torture is cleaning up his excrement after he flings it at the nurses.

Counterpoint: Your face is crap! You are a big stupid ass jack with poop in your hat which you wear. You use your hand to clean yourself after crapping and your bedroom has lots of poor people stuff in it. You act all smart but we know you ain’t what you didn’t done did!

Counterpoint: Oh, but dude, Greek life is AWESOME! I mean, I’ve been a Greek for pretty much my whole life and I just love it to death. You get all this good food with grape leaves, filo dough, and feta cheese, and the Parthenon, and Dionysus. And there are gyros and olives everywhere. You should totally become a Greek. Here, hang on, I think I’ve got the citizenship applications on me… Aetoû gêras, korydoû neótēs, brah. Aetoû gêras.

———- This may or may not have been published in readme. Wouldn’t you like to know?

After he woke me up, there was no going back to sleep, so I wandered to my porch, and there you were, happily cannoning streams of urine into my yard.

At first, I was shocked, but the shock quickly gave way to admiration: here was a man with so little regard for the rules of society that he would piss where piss was not meant to go. And that made a statement, the audacity of which I could barely begin to comprehend. Here I was, an RA, whose job it was to reinforcce those very same petty rules, and suddenly, I began questioning what it was that I thought I was doing.

As you cavorted through the lawn wearing only socks on your hands, I reflected on what it was that I was doing: living in a prison of my own creation. I was telling myself that I could not ignore the childish disputes of my hallmates, could not eat a cake in the shower, could not pee willy-nilly with a dangling Free Willy. And the problem with that was… it was a lie. Rules weren’t who I was. They didn’t make me. They restricted me.

When you ran off to take a dump in my neighbor’s recycling bin, I felt like a changed man. I suddenly understood what it meant to live… to let myself be myself, and to neither make rules for others nor follow those made for me.

I stripped down to nothing, put my socks on my hands. I stepped out into my yard. Standing in your piss, I added my own. I laughed as the glory dribbled down my leg.

Freedom.

Freedom was in the pee.