“I would like to officially announce my candidacy for President of these United States of America.”
No matter what your gold hoarding uncles or temporarily-Libertarian college-aged cousins or Donald Trump might tell you, we live in a Democracy. No, it’s true! Anyone (yes, even you!) can run for President if you really wanted to. Sure, the candidates you hear about in the news are all businessmen or politicians, usually independently wealthy, who gather hundreds of millions of dollars to bombard your TVs with negative ads about their opponents that sort of drown out into white noise after a while, but there are dozens, nay, hundreds of Americans right now who are looking for your vote in a completely legimtate and legally recognized manner. No, seriously. As of the posting of this article, there are 600 Americans who have formally announced their candidacy for President of the United States of America.
Holy shit, right?
Now, naturally all of these people have different levels of commitment to their campaigns—some take it very seriously, raising a few thousand dollars even though deep down they know they don’t have a chance, while others just sort of knee jerk send in their candidacy form and ignore it from thereon out (that’s right, we’re calling you out, Thomas Francis Winterbottom—with a name like that, and three Presidential runs under your belt, you should at least have a personal webpage).
Oh, right, and a bunch of the people running are gloriously, impossibly batshit insane. No, stop it, we’ve already made the cheap Trump joke in this article, that’s all we’re allotted. These people are actively nuts. Let’s learn a bit more about their candidacy, shall we?
The Craziest People Running For President in 2016
America Fun Fact of the Day 