While youâÄôre recovering from your Halloween hangover this weekend, IâÄôll be harnessing my social deviance for a more important cause. Nov. 2 marks the Day of the Dead, a religious holiday most popularly celebrated in Mexico and by people of Mexican descent living in the United States. On this day, families come together to place offerings at decorative altars known as âÄúofrendasâÄù and hold all-night vigils in cemeteries to honor their deceased loved ones. I am neither Mexican nor dead, but I canâÄôt help but feel an implacable itch to join in the festivities this year. In fact, I invite you all to come help me build my ofrenda to the soon-to-be-deceased Bush administration. We all need a place for the bitterness of the last eight years to go and an ofrenda paying homage to one of the worst presidential legacies in history is not only timely, but immensely therapeutic. Earth, wind, fire and water are the four most crucial elements in the construction of an ofrenda. Typically, these are represented by food offerings, fluttering objects, burning candles, and jugs of water. For my Bush ofrenda, IâÄôd start with a large offering of red herring. Red herring is a particularly foul smelling fish known to throw hounds off a trail, but more importantly, it is a political tactic in which an irrelevant topic is presented in order to distract attention from the original issue. (Hello terrorism, economic turmoil, and every press release that has ever come out of the White House.) To personify wind, IâÄôll send out a call for every ailing person in the area. Their last breaths âÄî slow, gasping, and far too soon âÄî will represent the windfall cuts in health care that the Bush administration repeatedly introduced. To quench the thirst of the dead, IâÄôll line up bottles of imported alcohol along the base of my ofrenda. These will symbolize the agony that the entire world felt on Nov. 4, 2004 when the Bush posse managed to extract another four years from an already demoralized population. We had no choice but to drown our sorrows over our own stupidity. Next to the bottles, small vials of tears will showcase the sadness of everyone affected at home and abroad by our overzealous âÄúwar on terror.âÄù As a final touch, I will drench my ofrenda in oil, light a cigarette, smoke it, and then set the whole thing on fire. Perhaps even Gloria GaynorâÄôs âÄúI Will SurviveâÄù will be playing in the background. I know, youâÄôre right âÄî I canâÄôt blame everything on the Bush administration. Their issues may have been a consequence of the Democratic Senate or the actions of a prior administration. But still. If youâÄôre car is acting funny, you have your dad drive it in for repair âÄînot your two-year-old brother. Traditionally, marigolds are scattered around the completed ofrenda in order to guide the dead home. Instead of marigolds, IâÄôm going to leave money. Our latest economic developments have proven that the last thing the Bush administration is capable of doing is keeping track of that money, but thatâÄôs exactly the point. IâÄôm definitely not keen on guiding another Bush home. Thus, with a trail of money to elude him, John McCain will hopefully stumble into a bingo hall and stay there. Ashley Dresser welcomes comments at [email protected].