Keep up to date on the progress of the Will Rockwood for President campaign by following him in the Rockwood Briefing Room. And help out by letting us know if you've heard of any stories about Rockwood's groundswell of support.

"All of our opponents know that our campaign is being conducted almost entirely on the internet" said Rockwood, "I find it odd that now of all times it would happen to go down."

"Clearly they are all afraid of the truth," said Rockwood campaign manager Al Vanguard. "Will has obviously hit a little too close for comfort on many of the issues and this was the only tool 'the Man' could use to cut him off."

Asked if they had any suspects, Vanguard replied he didn't have any for sure, but "surely someone who created the internet would know how to shut it down, too."

Rockwood himself remained undeterred in his quest for the presidency and said this just represented a bump in the road.

"If we let any of our opponent's negative campaigning tactics slow us down we'd never even make it out of, just to pick a random state, Tennessee," said Rockwood.

Rockwood Suggests Microsoft Settlement Terms

"Clearly Microsoft has used bullying tactics to further their own business causes" said Rockwood, "But just as clearly, a breakup of the company would do nothing but create three or more giant, bullying companies in the future." He proposed a three-step solution that he called the "taste of their own medicine" plan.

First, to counter the finding that Microsoft didn't give competitors any choice in their operating systems, Rockwood would require that all Microsoft employees be forced to replace their current computers with their "choice" of systems running either Amiga, Linux, or Macintosh software.

"Not only will this foster new competition in these lower-selling systems," said the candidate, "But it will also wake up Microsoft's developers to all of the crappy software they've written for other platforms and perhaps encourage them to do better."

Secondly, men with whips would be assigned to both Bill Gates and Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer with instructions to flog them anytime they used the word "innovate."

"Let's be honest," said Rockwood campaign manager Al Vanguard, "Gates bought the operating system he turned into MS-DOS, he stole Apple's Macintosh interface for Windows, and he copied Netscape's success for Internet Explorer. They haven't 'innovated' anything in twenty years. And it's high time a series of welts on Bill's back reminded him of that."

Finally under Rockwood's plan, Microsoft would be required to actually pay $1,000 to everyone who has ever received the "Bill Gates E-Mail Tracking Program" e-mail hoax.

"We know it's a forgery," said Rockwood, "But it's the best way we could think of to reimburse anyone who has ever felt any kind of frustration with Microsoft's way of doing business."

Added Vanguard, "Plus, we could really use the money right about now."

Rockwood Challenges Duke to Debate

"If Duke is serious about restoring honor to the presidency, he should drop his commercialization of the primary races and debate me one-on-one," said Rockwood. "But if, as I believe is the case, he has no intention of restoring honor to anything, he should debate me for no other reason than the pure spectacle of the thing could only raise both of our profiles, and thus, commercial costs."

Rockwood seemed unfazed by the fact that he and Duke were running for different parties.

"He'll drop the Reform Party and come to the Toon Party soon enough," said the candidate. "Once Pat Buchanan beats him like a drum he'll come crawling to us. I mean, wouldn't YOU crawl if you couldn't even beat Pat Buchanan?"

Rockwood campaign manager Al Vanguard said that ideally Duke would do the right thing and agree to a series of debates while restricting his spending on negative campaign ads.

"We're just asking of Duke the same thing Gore is asking of Bush," said Vanguard, "To cut out the risky campaign scheme of negative advertising in favor of a format more beneficial not only to all Americans, but also to money-starved presidential campaigns, a series of one-on-one debates."

In the meantime, Will is rumored to be offering a high cabinet post in exchange for some courtside seats.