Washington, D.C. (API) Some 14 months after the party was trounced by the 2008 elections and the landslide victory for President Barack Obama, the Grand Old Party has regained its sea legs once again, and a new party leader has emerged in the person of one Private Forrest Gump.

Republicans searching for leadership at a time when their party is out of power have swarmed around this political upstart whose main claim to fame is that he is a developmentally disabled former athlete and entrepreneur who effortlessly comes up with bland, heartfelt aphorisms.

"Life is like a box of chocolates," said Gump, thumping one of his favorite old saws for reporters at a press conference. "You never know what you're going to get."

"The G.O.P. has been looking for a new face for a long time," said party consultant Jack Avers. "Bobby Jindal. Charlie Crist. Mitt Romney. Everybody hoped that one of those guys might come and pick up our fallen Republican party standard. But then along comes this poor fucker Gump. Nobody's got these kinds of bona fides. He makes you feel good about yourself in a way that we haven't felt since George Bush took office."

Promising to pick up every American and bodily remove him from harm's way, Gump launched his political career at a stump speech in Alabama last Thursday amid cheers from conservatives, angry about the direction of the country.

"I am not a smart man, Birmingham. But I know what love is," Gump announced to rapturous applause from conservatives holding up signs such as "Obamanation" and "America for Americas" and "End the Fed."

"We want no more tax increases!" yelled an angry member under the stump.

At that, Gump stood up bolt upright, "Well yes, drill sergeant!"

When asked later by a reporter if perhaps anger about tax increases might be misplaced, since middle-class federal tax margins have barely increased since the 1980s, he said, "Well I don't know anything about that." Once again, the audience responded with cheers and signs of "Drill, baby, drill" and gunfire into the Alabama night air.

Gump's apotheosis as new G.O.P. star and conservative pace-setter has provoked a frantic scramble for response from embattled Democrats, whose large and expensive bills to overhaul health care and finance have been widely unpopular. The hostile atmosphere toward Democrats has led at least two senior Congressional Democrats to signal that they would be retiring at the end of their most recent terms, including Chris Dodd of Connecticut, who has made financial services reform one of his signature issues.

"Am I missing something," said Dodd. "This Gump guy ... I mean. He's kind of not there. Am I smoking crack?"

"Stupid is as stupid does," said Gump, a witty rejoinder that had Republican stalwarts in the crowd jumping up and down, lighting firecrackers and setting trash cans on fire.

When asked what he thought of possibly extending many of the benefits of Medicare and Medicaid to more American citizens, Gump offered, "Momma always said dying was a part of life. I sure wish it wasn't."

"Gump has the right profile," said Republican analyst Mitch Michaelson."He's not your typical elitist East Coast political careerist. He's of the people. He's American through and through from the virtuous innocence to the simple piety to not having any idea how the government works. Whatever he's got, they ought to bottle it. That sort of speaking in non sequiturs and his slack-jawed, sloe-eyed, jittery quality."

"There's a fight for the soul of the Republican Party going on," said Michaelson. "It's the moderates versus the hard-core conservatives. And just when you think we're out of the game, here comes this cretin Mongoloid who just steals your heart and makes you believe."

When asked how he might deal with runaway unemployment, interest rates, huge deficits and two wars being waged at once, Gump was thoughtful.

"Washington. It's like a whole 'nuther country."

Grover Norquist, the famous anti-tax crusader, was confident that Gump could best Barack Obama in the 2012 election.

"Gump has the simple values of Ronald Reagan. The simple communication skills of Ronald Reagan. The simple view of government of Ronald Reagan. Gump and Reagan are both just simple. ... We ought to drown the government in a bathtub. Leave me alone."

Gump's handlers, David Sheffield and Audra Banks, two Alabama political allies, plan to take Gump on a  listening tour through the heartland states.

"People are angry," said Banks. "They've lost their jobs. They think the government wants to get between them and their doctor. They can't afford anything. They don't know why this is happening to them. They don't know who John Maynard Keynes was. They don't know how stuff is paid for. They don't know what infrastructure is. They don't know who sets weights and standards or who builds roads. They're angry.

"And then they look at Forrest and say, 'Wow, that guy's pants just fell down,' and they feel better."

"I don't know if we each have a destiny," said Gump, "or if we're all just floating around accidental-like on a breeze, but I, I think maybe it's both. Maybe both is happening at the same time."

When asked what he would do about recommending Supreme Court investigations into George Bush-era policies on torture, Gump ran away.

Washington, D.C. (API) Shelly McAdams, a 9/12 protester from Barnwell, South Carolina, was marching along with thousands of others last Friday to protest what she saw as the overreach of federal government when suddenly a reporter asked her a question that made her blood boil.

"Don't go there," she said to a reporter who asked her if the health care legislation currently in the Congress might bring affordable health insurance to millions of Americans. "I was a nurse for 20 years. I had people puking on me. There was blood and vomit and brain and skull and kneecaps all over the place. Don't even start talking about that."

McAdams had come exhorted by Glenn Beck to fight the creeping threat of fascism and socialism and communism. When told that many of those political philosophies were incompatible and stemmed from different schools of economic and social thought, she raised a big index finger in the air covered with acrylic nail polish.

"Now you just stop right there," she said, as her nostrils briskly dilated and the hair on her ears stood up, "You don't want to bring up that stuff with me because my step-daughter came from Korea and she ate out of trash cans. You can't even say the word communism to me because I might start spitting blood right now if you ever remotely decide to go there. That is an off-limits topic for me because I know first hand that pain she felt when when she told me about it second hand."

McAdams, who was holding a sign up that said, "Sean Hannetie [sic] for president," was then asked if other government actions by the previous administration, like the invasion of Iraq, codified approval of torture and illegal wiretapping, might have merited more of a protest than a simple change in health care policy.

"Now you just wait one minute!" McAdams said, a yellow-purple phlebitis jumping around from her neck to her face. "I don't know if you know who you're speaking to, but my grandfather was on the beaches of Normandy and he fought for this country. So I hope I'm just deaf and you didn't even dare bring up something army related. If I thought for a minute you were putting down my grandpappy's service on that sandy hell-hole, making the ultimate sacrifice for those Frenchies, well I'd be so angry that I might start sneezing pink-colored phlegm through my eye sockets!"

McAdams went on a stammering tirade about several other things having to do with taking her country back and bailouts and Ted Kennedy.

"Oh boy, you do not want to talk to me about Ted Kennedy. My second cousin Maybell drowned in 1962. I take that very personal that Chappaquiddick business. If you even bring that up, it's like you're hitting me in the genitals with a shovel and I'll have no choice but to fight back."

McAdams was also wearing a shirt that said, "We want a Christian president, not a Muslim."

When asked whether she thought the libertarian message of Beck was possibly at odds with the demand for a Christian president, McAdams' eyes rolled back in her head, and a sap-colored fluid started to come out of her ears.

"You did not just attack the Baby Jesus I hope. Don't deny you did it. Oh my God ... if you were even for two seconds to go near the topic of the Baby Jesus, well I'd be fully justified in pulling out a gun because that's just a personal, off-limits topic. I'd be so angry that I'd go blind and a little alien creature might just start coming out of my stomach with sharp teeth and that creature would eat all of you alive."

When asked if her grandchild was enjoying the nice weather, McAdams dropped down on all fours and said,

"That's it. You elite liberal media types have gone too far when you bring my special needs baby into this. Oh my God I'm having a stroke or an aneurysm. I swallo ma ton....floffle floflle bizzle bozzle mum mum mum mum....."

When asked if maybe she was not understanding the true nature of the debate she was having or what exactly she was protesting, McAdams jumped down in the mud and began rolling and whining and kicking with her 12-year-old dachshund Joe.

Washington, D.C. (API) As President Barack Obama gears up to deliver an address aimed directly at the nation's schoolchildren on Tuesday, critics are already blasting away at the idea, which they say might have the unintended adverse effect of encouraging more black children to run for president.

"This speech to children is just a travesty," said commentator Glenn Beck. "I can't believe he would try to talk directly to our children. Barack Obama is a racist."

Many opponents of the speech, including the chairman of the Republican Party of Florida, Jim Greer, said that Obama's speech was meant to "indoctrinate" students, clearly meaning that young black children might take the wrong example by having a black president speak to them from such a large and impressive pulpit. One of the most powerful positions in the world. One of such considerable prestige, influence and responsibility that it stirs great tremulous fear in every soul.

"I am absolutely appalled that taxpayer dollars are being used to spread President Obama's socialist ideology," said Greer, a thinly veiled but obvious reference to Obama's skin color, which is black.

Many Republican leaders agreed that there could be little positive outcome from such a speech, as there had been in the past when Presidents Reagan, Bush and Clinton spoke directly to children about their liberties and responsibilities as citizens of a free nation. The innocuous text of the speech itself, which opponents forced the White House to publish on the Internet, explains very clearly that children should stay in school and be good citizens, a message that has left no doubt in the mind of detractors: Obama is a black man speaking to children.

"I am just speechless with rage," said Mary Worthington, a shopper in Concord, New Hampshire. "The absolute appalling arrogance of this man to manipulate the media this way and try to bend pliable young minds with his 'I am a black man talking out loud' message--that's just too much for me to bear." Worthington said she was so angry she just couldn't talk about it anymore.

Political analysts, pundits and talking heads were keeping their index fingers to the wind Monday night to gauge how much damage Obama might have done to himself by eliciting such an outpouring of rage.

"It's too soon to say whether Obama has buried himself politically," said Dane Zweibel, an analyst at the American Business Institute. "I know he thought he was doing a positive thing with his message. However, I don't think he realized the unintended affects it would have on black children watching. Now any of them think they can run for president. I think it's important that Americans have stood up this way to show the nation's black children once and for all exactly what they can expect if they try to express themselves in any way, shape or form."