United through a party in the back

There is a lot of hoopla coming from various places, spaces and faces proclaiming “this country’s more divided than it’s ever been.” It’s a strange statement when one considers what occurred between 1861 and 1865, but nonetheless, division is prevalent – and profitable – in the mass media sphere.

One of the major political parties seems to want to tax and spend the country into oblivion while the other seems to equate policy with holy war.

At the end of the day, those differences are only concerning policy/opinions, and all of the cats making laws and/or issuing commentaries on the cats making the laws put their britches on one leg at a time. They also, well most of them, anyway, spend time styling their hair some sort of way.

To that unifying end, a comedian and web content creator, Cam Harless, combined a certain beloved hairstyle with politics and the end result is nothing short of awe inspiring.

Harless used an AI-based art generator to create renderings of all 46 of our presidents, reimagined with that mack daddy of all timeless hairstyles, yes, you guessed it: the mullet.

Harless’s Twitter dispatches with the presidents, all bedecked in their tonsorial reimaginations, has gone viral, and rightfully so. In an interview with CNN, Harless spoke about the unifying power of the hairstyle synonymous with “business in the front, party in the back.”

“All it takes is a few mullets and a few pair of sunglasses and we’re more united than we’ve ever been,” he said

Short on top and long on the sides, the mullet has been famously sported by icons of music from David Bowie to Billy Ray Cyrus, to athletes, such as Steelers running back James Conner. Superman even sported a mullet in the early ‘90s.

Etymologically, the term “mullet” can be traced to those right-to-party fighters the Beastie Boys, who described the hairstyle in their 1994 song “Mullet Head.” The hairstyle, itself, has been depicted on figurines dating back to the first century AD.

If you’ve ever wondered what our founding fathers might have looked like with mullets – and nifty mirrored liquor store shades – then hop over to Harless’s Twitter, @hamcarless, and prepare to be amazed. The thread goes from present day all the way back to George Washington.

To start off with, Joe Biden looks, with his long blonde mullet, like a slightly less grizzled clone of Dog the Bounty Hunter.

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Donald Trump with a mullet looks like he could tour as a frontman in a Molly Hatchet tribute band, while George W. Bush’s feathered mullet gives him a bit of a Chevy Chase-esque appearance.

Further back on the past presidential timeline is where some of the real treats emerge.

For some of them, it’s not hard to see how feasible it could have been for their heads to be mullet-ed, like Jimmy Carter, for instance, who doesn’t look too different. On others, however, it’s a near-totally different light. Richard Nixon comes off like a sleazy ‘70s-era record producer, while Lyndon B. Johnson looks like someone who’d play second-fiddle to Harry Dean Stanton in some cocaine-and-whiskey-fueled road-trip film about a couple of hitmen.

With Dwight D. Eisenhower’s bald pate, it was likely difficult for the AI apparatus Harless used to do anything, so he wound up with a sort of mohawk-ish ‘do.

As you might imagine, Teddy Roosevelt looks incredibly bad-ace with a mullet. His rendering might bring you mind of your cousin, who cuts the sleeves off all his shirts, has a Hemi under his hood and comes to your rescue with a tow chain when you’re stuck in the mud.

Then there’s Abe Lincoln. Honest Abe, with his tall, rawboned figure, stands out among all our past presidents, to start with, but Harless’s take has the sixteenth Oval Office-holder looking something like the late Cars leader Ric Ocasek – if Ocasek had been GQ cover material.

If Harless’s Twitter showcase I’ve described wasn’t enough, there’s also merch to buy. That’s right, Harless has printed up T-shirts with some of the mullet-ed presidents’ faces and familiar sayings, such as Biden’s “Listen here, Jack” and Trump’s slightly altered mantra of “Make beer cold again.” You can even get a shirt with Teddy Roosevelt shown, as I described above, with the phrase “Big Stick Energy” underneath the photo.

Those are available through his Etsy storefront, along with a poster depicting all of the reinvented presidents as the “Hell Yeah Edition,” for sixteen bucks.

God Bless Cam Harless for his awesome vision, and for reminding me to not forget to use my Rogaine.