Woody Barlettani owns the hot dog cart at the Truckee River and Sierra Street.

Originally published in the Reno News & Review

I've drafted a platform for my run for office in these big rock candy mountains. I shall not be bound to any theory, ideology or doctrine--nor any office in particular.

We Americans need to re-establish our identities and regain control of our destinies. The time has come to take responsibility for what our government is doing around the world in our names. The people are accountable for the acts of their elected government.

We have thrown bags of varmints over the White House fence. They're in there dancing and a' drinkin', there's cotton candy in their hair and confetti all over the floor. It's time to join the party.

My first action will be to lower the drinking age back to 18 so everyone can start drinking and dancin'. I will raise the smoking age to 27, so potential smokers can learn the responsibility of second-hand smoke before they take up the habit. I will also lower the gambling age to 16; if a person is old enough to make money, he or she is old enough to spend it.

My next action as elected person will be to inaugurate a new national anthem. My first choice: John Lennon's "Imagine." Second: The Eagles' "Desperado."

I stand behind deep tax breaks for those participating in the peyote/mescaline experience. This is meant to stimulate awareness and spiritual enlightenment that has already been burdened by toxic thought processes.

To stimulate education, I encourage the Socratic method of questioning authority, and, at the very least, the scientific method of questioning everything. Conformity is the jailer of freedom and the enemy of growth; education means developing the mind, not stuffing the memory. There will be no road kills on the information highway.

Not one more citizen shall be incarcerated in the name of marijuana. We will also stop imposing fines and sending our citizens to prisons for political outspokenness. Freedom of speech is the greatest safety, for if a person is a fool, the best thing to do is encourage them to advertise the fact by speaking.

John Muir once said that thousands of tired, nerve-shaken, over-civilized people are finding out that going to nature is going home, that the environment is a necessity and a useful fountain of life to all of us.

The last items on this election platform are important to us all. No more dead people in Chicago, Orange County, Calif., or on Indian reservations in South Dakota will be allowed to register and vote, period! Legal casino gambling outside of Nevada will stop now! It only works in Nevada; the rest of the states will corrupt and screw it up, addicting the whole nation.

I'll close with Bob Dylan's immortal words, "Come gather 'round people/Wherever you roam/And admit that the waters/around you have grown.../Then you better start swimmin'/ Or you'll sink like a stone/For the times they are a-changin'."