Candidates for parody

In times of nonstop election bickering and tit-for-tat attacks over values, forget the "What Would Jesus Do?" bracelets -- what would Woody Guthrie do?

To the Spiridellis brothers of Santa Monica, Calif., who are longtime fans of the political-protest folk singer, the answer was obvious: Take Guthrie's "This Land Is Your Land" and imagine George Bush and John Kerry singing. Switch up the old saccharine lyrics so that "This land was made for you and me" becomes "This land will surely vote for me." Have Kerry dub Bush a "right-wing nut job," and make Bush shoot back, "You're a liberal sissy." Find someone who can imitate their voices. Add computer animation depicting Bush as a cowboy and Kerry as a wiener in a bun. Then post the whole thing on the Web and make it available for download.

The old crooner himself would probably smirk.

The two-minute video, which Evan and Gregg Spiridellis posted on their website JibJab.com on July 9, has reached Internet phenomenon status and has proved the computer animation clip -- long reserved as a forum for raunchy office distractions, baby dances, and obnoxious birthday cards -- can serve as a viable forum for political commentary. In the first week it was available, it was downloaded by more than 5 million people -- more than downloaded the Spiridellises' famous 2000 election rap between Bush and Al Gore. After Fox News aired clips from the video last week, JibJab exceeded its bandwidth for a few hours but got back up and running.

Then came this week's media blitz. Parts of the video have shown up on the "Today" show, "The Early Show," MSNBC, CNBC, and "NBC Nightly News With Tom Brokaw." The attention again overwhelmed JibJab.com. "We had like a core meltdown," said Evan Spiridellis. "Our traffic just shut down our servers." The clip is now also hosted by atomfilms.com.

Evan Spiridellis, who runs a web-animation studio with his brother, says they are awed by the attention -- and they await confirmation to appear Monday on "The Tonight Show With Jay Leno." "The past three days have been insane," he said. "We're just two guys in a warehouse. It's been quite a ride." Evan did the animation, and his brother wrote the script. A friend did all the voices, and Evan's wife performed the music.

Accolades have been pouring in. Although they had been asking for $2.99 to download the clip, the video can now be viewed for free. Yet someone mailed a check for $100, and another made a $300 donation through PayPal. The e-mails have come "in the thousands."

"The best e-mails," Evan Spiridellis said, "are people that have said, `I've sent it to my liberal wacko friends and my right-wing nut-job friends, and we can all laugh about it.' "

Indeed, on Internet message boards, there's the partisan: "I hope this & michael moore's film will put the final bow on Buddy bush's campaign!"

The appreciative: "We need a little humor in our messed up politics . . . why not . . . the rest of our politics is a joke anyway."

And the offended (apparently, also the spelling challenged): "Do you really need the sware words in the song! . . . I would like to be able to watch something and not have to cover my kids' eyes and plug there ears."

True, the jabs sometimes veer toward a PG-13 rating, but the video is an equal-opportunity offender. Kerry sings about Bush: "You can't say `nuclear' -- that really scares me. Sometimes a brain can come in quite handy." Bush retorts: "You have more waffles than a house of pancakes. You offer flip-flops; I offer tax breaks."

Evan Spiridellis wouldn't say which candidate he supports, but that isn't the point. "There's a lot of big issues out there, and it feels like a lot of time is spent talking about insignificant barbs about each other," he said. "This wasn't about taking sides or putting out propaganda. Our goal was to do something that will make people laugh."

So what would Woody Guthrie think of all this?

Michael Smith, the volunteer office manager at the New York-based Woody Guthrie Foundation & Archives, says his office tries to "stay out of the political fray." He did offer that, considering Guthrie's support of the third-party candidate Henry Wallace in the 1948 election, the singer probably would have voted for Nader.