One of my strongest held beliefs is that all America needs to do to pull itself out of the abyss is to find a way to grab the film character Dave Kovic out of the 1993 Ivan Reitman comedy film DAVE and make him president. This should be easy enough, considering we have already elevated two failed television hosts, a septuagenarian skeleton, and someone named “Grover” to the highest office in the land. If we are successful in our quest to install Dave as the next leader of the free world, rest assured that a time of peace, prosperity, and punctual budgets will be right around the corner.
A few months after the inauguration of Bill Clinton, Dave took the nation by storm when it crashed into theaters in May of ‘93, releasing at a time in our nation’s history when the so-called budget crisis was a fairly hot button issue. Following the ‘92 election, which elevated Ross Perot and his creative ideas on how to pay off our nation’s allegedly disastrous debt, Americans were clamoring for good financial hygiene like never before. With that in mind, it’s no wonder that everyone tripped over themselves to take in the glorious story of a lowly temp agency manager who becomes the President and balances the budget whilst guaranteeing every American a paid job.
The story is fairly simple: Dave Kovic, when he is not managing a temp agency based in Georgetown, capitalizes on his strange resemblance to President Bill Mitchell and impersonates him at paid events. One day, Kovic is contacted by the Secret Service and asked to play the President at a speech, allegedly for security reasons, when in reality, it is so President Mitchell can meet up with a White House Staffer, Randi, whom he is having an affair with. After suffering from a stroke while having sex with Randi, Mitchell is out of commission, so the White House Chief of Staff, plotting his own rise to power, convinces Dave to stay on in the role.
Soon, Dave finds himself disobeying the orders of Chief Of Staff Bob Alexander (played by Frank Langella at the top of his form) and working to restore funding to a homeless shelter. After calling his accountant friend, who only needs a few hours to look over the accounts and come up with a solution, Kovic calls a cabinet meeting where he orders agency heads to cut spending, and successfully finds the money for the shelter. Cuts include the cancellation of random defense contracts and the pause of multiple consumer spending programs, as well as moving surplus funds into high-yield savings accounts. With just a few random contracts cancelled, Kovic saves the day and gains intense popularity. Soon, though, the pressures of the job gets to him, and he plans his retirement, a big State of the Union speech where he will announce his true identity and hand the reins to the Vice President, who had been idling in the background of the movie but is promised to be a deeply good guy who wants the best for our nation.
Dave is a very silly movie with a simple resolution and charming performances. It is also, I think quite obviously, what the majority of Americans think will happen when a businessman becomes President. Perot was popular because people believed he could actually go in, do some math, and balance the budget. Trump is popular because people sincerely believe his experience in real estate means his deal making prowess is second to none, and continued to be shocked when he rips us all off. And, although Musk has been summarily fired and seems to have gone into some sort of trance state where he posts AI generated anime characters who are suspiciously young looking and wearing little to no clothing1, his efforts at DOGE were a very natural extension of the “businessman can fix it” mantra. DOGE’s entire thing was just, cancelling random contracts and claiming that would balance the budget. It was dumb, likely will cause millions of deaths over the next few years, and politically toxic. But we did it anyways, because everyone is desperate for a President Dave.
The problem, of course, is that Dave Kovic is a fictional character played by Kevin Kline, and we cannot actually make him president. This is unfortunate, because he would almost certainly do a better job than whoever we end up with next. Dave at least cares about homeless shelters. President Trump is fine cancelling grants for cancer research, child suicide prevention, AIDS education, and oddly enough, dementia research, something the President could deeply use. Dave Kovic simply would never.
Right now, with the nation entering week two of a fairly boring shutdown, it is clear that Trump is no Dave We have a businessman President, and he is an idiot. Since the start of his second term, the debt has gone up, the government has shutdown, and Nintendo has started charging 80 dollars for Mario games2. The people who promised they could run the government like a business cannot, it turns out, run the government at all. They just keep blowing everything up and acting surprised when people get mad.
In 2028, pledge to vote for Dave. We can save our nation, help American families, and throw Kevin Kline some work. It’s a win-win-win.
Signing off,
Max Bolen
Fan of the film DAVE.
This is a real thing that is happening, here is an article if you want to learn more for some reason: Elon Musk Gambles on Sexy A.I. Companions
A lot of people are saying this is the most critical issue facing our nation.