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Congress-Obsessed Twitter Bot Is a Gas

Many political observers turn their nose up at all the hot air routinely emanating from Capitol Hill.

The founder of a new oddball Twitter account, on the other hand, finds every peep that escapes from pols strangely intoxicating. “I came up with @FartForCongress on the idea that ‘passing votes’ and ‘passing gas’ was funny. I know, very immature,” FFC’s creator shared via email.

The creator of @FartForCongress didn’t set out with the intention of gleefully twisting lawmakers’ words into potty humor.

The original plan involved repurposing updates from overly-enthusiastic law enforcement officials (via the closely guarded @ExcitedSheriff account). But that program quickly devolved into a total stinker.

“Unfortunately, in trial runs it wasn’t quite so funny with retweets mostly being serious (missing persons) or tragic (all manner of deaths),” FFC’s creator told HOH.

That lesson learned, the social media saboteur elected to marry two boundless sources of personal amusement: flatulence and elected officials.

The automated agent — which follows the 500-odd members of the House and Senate currently on Twitter, systematically replaces any variation of the term “vote” with the corresponding conjugation of “fart” whenever it appears in their respective streams.

The feed, which immediately blasts out the newly doctored missive, began belching out its reconfigured statements in late August.

A few dozen followers — including Rep. Sander M. Levin, D-Mich. — presumably find the irreverent feed somewhat refreshing. (Team Levin did not respond to email inquiries regarding who controls the 16-term House lawmaker’s officially verified Twitter account.)

“Even if it lingered at 0 followers I would be proud at having created it just because it makes me laugh so hard,” FFC’s creator said. “I have no idea if anyone in Congress is aware of it but several Congressmen/women have unfollowed me. I’m guessing they don’t think it’s funny. They’re wrong.”

When pressed about the most satisfying rhetorical hijacking to date, FFC’s creator deferred to the statement that got the whole affair off the ground.

“Perhaps by a stroke of fate — the very first tweet the bot found when activated is probably the best ever, and more or less doubles as my mission statement,” FFC’s creator said of the Zen stance inadvertently taken by Hawaii Democrat Tulsi Gabbard.

Just don’t go searching for too much deeper meaning in this absurdist parroting.

“I guess you could argue that there’s an underlying current of political criticism (equating the democratic right to vote to something so juvenile and base) but that’s not really the point,” FFC’s creator counseled.

With Election Day just around the corner, FFC’s creator can’t wait for pols to smother the Twitterverse with comedy gold.

“Farting season is fast approaching . . .,” FFC’s creator gushed.

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