‘Help Obama start WWIII’: Mock kickstarter campaign wants your $1.6trn

A mock ad in the style of a saccharine political campaign commercial has brought together the smiling faces of Obama’s America to declare: “Yes, we can start World War Three!”

With crowd funding all the rage and America “dead-ass broke,” “The Americans for Whatever Barack Obama Wants, did you know he’s friends with Jay-Z?” have launched an ambitious Kickstarter campaign to fund World War III… sort of.

The parody video, replete with the soothing voices, faces and xylophone-centric background music which form the staple of so much political advertising in the States, calls on donors to help raise $1.6 trillion on behalf of the US government.

“The $1.6 trillion that we raise will help create a war that truly puts the liberal in neo-liberal. There will be millions of troops, thousands of organic grass-fed bombs, hybrid Prius tanks, rockets controlled by iPads and drones that play The Lumineers while they attack.”

In a nod to the Occupy movement’s “We are the 99 percent” slogan, the campaign promises to fight a war that engulfs the entire globe, not like “those other Republican wars fought on just 1 percent of the world.”

For those willing to pony up cash in the hopes of kickstarting World War III, IV, “and any moon war the president might want to start,” the rewards are certainly befitting of the iHipster generation.

$10 will get donors a shout-out on social media, letting the whole world know #yousupportObamaandWorldWarIII. Cough up $25 and a piece of rubble from a war-torn Middle Eastern country personally kissed by Republican Senator Lindsey Graham is yours. A hundred bucks gets you a day pass out of the Wi-Fi-equipped refugee camp we’ll probably all be living in, while a $10 million donation rents you your own senator for a year. 

The mock ad with the final title page joking that it was paid for by Koch Industries, was actually produced by the Second City Network, a community of comedy writers and performers. With theatres in Chicago and Toronto and a training center in both cities as well as in Hollywood, the Second City calls itself the Birthplace of improve-based sketch comedy.  

The video has already gone viral, collecting almost one and half million YouTube views in less than three days. And if would be donors have any doubts on why they should cough up the cash, the message is crystal clear: because Obama.