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.

"While other candidates shun this easy cash, I openly accept it," said Rockwood. "After all, what kind of idiot gives up free money? Is that the kind of braintrust you want running the country?"

The major party candidates reacted as expected to the news of Rockwood's soft money acceptance.

"Soft money is the evilest of all evils, especially when it comes from Hindu temples," said Vice President Al Gore, "And I challenge all the other candidates to not accept any, because you know I never would."

When reporters pointed out that he had done just such a thing in 1996, Gore responded, "That was then, this is now. And as I like to say, I've learned from my mistakes."

"Well, he certainly had a lot of material to learn from," said Rockwood 2000 campaign manager Al Vanguard. "And we've learned something, too. We've learned that soft money apparently gets you elected. That's why come January, Will will be getting sworn in, while Al will be trying to buy scalped tickets to our inaugural bash starring a David Lee Roth-led Van Halen."

After a short pause, Vanguard recanted. "Actually, Tipper probably wouldn't let Al see Van Halen."

"Every other national holiday set-up to honor some great historical figure has been commercialized into a three-day clothing sale and an opportunity to barbeque," said the Toon Party candidate to a crowd of liquored-up college students, "It's time we just dedicated an entire week to partying-down and got on with it."

Rockwood acknowledged the cheers of approval by diving off the stage and body surfing on top of the crowd.

Texas A&M student Corey Phillips stated that he was impressed by any candidate who was willing to come to Padre and do "body shots."

"Dude," said Phillips, "Like, that is the kind of position I can, you know, get behind. And did you see that chick he licked the salt off of? Oh man! I'm going to run for president, just as soon as I turn 21." Phillips then vomited into a nearby trashcan.

From his floating pool chair, Rockwood emphasized the necessity of a national Spring Break holiday. "Everyone needs some time off, and on other national holidays everyone is spending far too much time being solemn for our fallen veterans or dead American heroes to really enjoy themselves. I just thought everyone should get a break," said the candidate, motioning toward the crowd, "AND WHAT BETTER PLACE TO DO IT THAN PAAAAAAAADDD-REEEEEE!"

The co-ed crowd responded with a resounding "WOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!" then proceeded to fill the pool with Corona bottles, chanting, "VOTE FOR WILL! VOTE FOR WILL!"

"Yeah," said Rockwood, "Let's see party-boy Bush get a crowd going like this!"

In an address given outside of Apple Computer's main headquarters to a group endorsing a yellow, or "lemon," iMac, Rockwood said that the lack of negative Bush advertising directed at his campaign made it nearly impossible to fight a war of words in the media.

"The facts are that no one can expect to win a presidential campaign unless he has the ability to retaliate to obvious untruths, and until Bush directs some my way, he's clearly shutting me out of the media's attention."

Al Vanguard, Rockwood 2000 campaign manager, agreed. "Look at the facts," he said, doffing a "lemon" iMac hat, "Bush is running tons of negative ads on McCain, and they're neck and neck. But he's running nothing about Keyes, and Alan can't win a delegate to save his life! Clearly, this is a discriminatory measure against the poorer candidates."

Neither does it matter, said Rockwood, that Al Gore isn't currently running any negative ads against him. "That's a different matter entirely," said the cartoon character.

"Bush shows a clear pattern of ignoring certain candidates while directing his dirt specifically at others in a biased way. Gore's campaign is so dirty that by November he will have soiled the reputation of every American citizen, but at least he's not discriminatory about it."

Rockwood called for campaign dirty ad reform, saying that all candidates should be able to be equally smeared by each other. "I won't rest until Bush insults my mother," he said.

Meanwhile, spokesmen for Apple Computer said that even if they were to produce a yellow iMac, it might be called "banana," or maybe even "mango," but it definitely would NOT be called "lemon."

"Sure he got almost 70,000 more votes than I did," said Rockwood, "But what good does it really do him? He's still got no chance to beat Gore in the next few weeks. He's gone by April."

Rockwood said that his participation in a minor party would be the key to his survival. "Because we run under the radar of the other candidates, we can afford to keep our campaign on a limited budget," said Al Vanguard, Rockwood 2000 campaign manager. "In fact, we'll spend less between now and November than the president will spend on his next haircut."

"We're looking forward to the general election," said Rockwood. "Once all of the minor candidates like Bradley are eliminated, we think we can hold our own against anyone." Vanguard agreed, saying that Rockwood has been practicing his debate skills for a Bush-Gore showdown later this year.

"Yeah, we've had him debating with a block of wood and a sack of potatoes all week," said Vanguard. "He'll be ready."