Democrats Send Party to Veterinarian After Discovering Colony of Political Parasites
Experts Recommend Deworming, Flea Shampoo, and a Quiet Afternoon With Adam Smith
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Panic swept through Democratic circles this week after one of their own strategists described socialist candidates as "parasites," accidentally triggering the first medical emergency ever diagnosed by a campaign consultant rather than a physician. Veteran operatives reportedly gathered around microscopes, examining voter rolls and donor lists for signs of infestation. Nobody found any voter rolls that helped. They did find seventeen competing email newsletters.
"We initially thought it was allergies," said one exhausted strategist, rubbing his eyes near a printout of the 2024 results. "Then we noticed several candidates had attached themselves to healthy incumbents and were slowly draining their campaign accounts while insisting everyone else pay for lunch."
Scientists explain that parasites survive by attaching themselves to a host, consuming nutrients, reproducing rapidly, and eventually weakening the organism keeping them alive. Political observers noted this description sounded suspiciously like a cable-news panel — specifically one featuring five people with the same opinion arguing about which of them said it first.
For decades, the Democratic Party had considered itself a majestic whale swimming through the oceans of American politics. Marine biologists now believe it more closely resembles an old Labrador covered in ticks arguing about rent control while the cat watches from across the room and says nothing.
The First Symptoms of Political Infestation
According to experts, infestations begin quietly. At first the host notices only mild irritation — a strongly-worded tweet, an unusually long land-acknowledgment before a fundraiser, somebody suggesting the word "campaign" is a colonialist term. Then strange ideas appear. Soon someone is demanding the abolition of prisons, ICE, capitalism, and occasionally arithmetic. Arithmetic resists. It always resists.
"The problem with parasites," explained Dr. Leonard Bugwell of the Institute for Comparative Zoology and Campaign Finance, "is they don't usually announce themselves. Tapeworms don't hold press conferences. They simply move in and begin consuming resources while insisting they're helping."
Dr. Bugwell noted some species are so successful they convince the host body that the parasites themselves are essential organs. "It's rather impressive, biologically speaking. Medically speaking, it's a catastrophe."
The Larval Stage: From College Campus to Congressional Candidate
Political entomologists say the parasite life cycle begins with slogans. Tiny larvae emerge from college campuses where they feed on sociology textbooks, podcasts recorded in somebody's closet, and granola bars from the free pantry they voted to establish. After several molts — punctuated by a semester studying abroad in a country they will later describe as "basically socialist" — they develop colorful posters and eventually migrate into safe blue districts where they mature into full-grown candidates.
Their preferred habitat includes expensive coffee shops, Brooklyn rooftops, and neighborhoods where residents support the working class as long as the working class stays somewhere affordable. Somewhere else. Preferably with good transit access so they don't have to drive there.
"These creatures cannot survive independently," explained Professor Nancy Tickman, who has studied congressional primaries since 2018 and says she is "fine." "If forced to create their own party, many would perish within weeks. Instead, they attach themselves to larger hosts and gradually insist the host was always socialist anyway."
Several historians confirmed this is the ideological equivalent of moving into someone's house, rearranging the furniture, and then arguing that the original owner never really understood what the house was for. A Pew Research analysis of American political identity confirms that the Democratic coalition has grown more ideologically fractured since 2016, with progressives and moderates increasingly in conflict over both policy and messaging.
Parasites Demand Equal Rights, Ecosystems Push Back
Not everyone agreed with the characterization. The National Association of Actual Parasites issued a strongly worded statement condemning comparisons between bloodsucking organisms and politicians.
"We resent these accusations," said Larry the Tapeworm, speaking via press release because he was otherwise occupied. "We contribute to ecosystems. We don't lecture people about carbon footprints while flying first class to a climate conference."
Ticks across North America also complained. One flea from New Jersey declared, with notable dignity: "We merely suck blood. We don't write 900-page manifestos and then complain the working class didn't read them."
A spokesperson for the mosquito community requested that any future satire specify which political party they are affiliated with, as they have been registered independent since 2008 and do not wish to be lumped in.
Veterinarians Called In When Consultants Fail
Moderate Democrats reportedly contacted veterinarians after conventional political consultants proved ineffective. At least three consultants had billed $400 an hour to recommend the party "lean into authenticity," which resulted in one candidate releasing a video of himself making sourdough bread and explaining housing policy simultaneously. The bread did not rise. Neither did the poll numbers.
A veterinarian in Delaware prescribed flea powder and recommended separating infected members from healthy independents before they develop the same symptoms.
"When my office receives calls asking whether democratic socialism can be treated with Frontline Plus," he said, "that's generally a bad sign. When they call back asking for a second opinion, it's worse."
He added that severe infestations may require quarantine. "Or a general election. Whichever comes first." Axios documented the post-2024 Democratic autopsy process, which found similar tensions between progressive and moderate factions dragging the coalition in competing directions.
The Colony Reproduces: Primary Victories Spread the Infestation
Recent primary victories by socialist-backed candidates have encouraged the colony to reproduce. Several successful species have reportedly spread into congressional districts previously occupied by ordinary Democrats who simply wanted to fix the roads and maybe lower drug prices without reorganizing western civilization.
One consultant described the process with the thousand-yard stare of a man who has lived it:
"First they ask for office space. Then they move into your district. Before long they're explaining that your house belongs collectively to the neighborhood, your car is a climate crime, your job title is problematic, and your coffee order reveals your relationship to capital. Then they accuse you of being far-right because you paid the mortgage."
He paused and looked out the window for a long time.
"I paid the mortgage."
Infected Hosts Display Strange Behavior in the Wild
Biologists have observed that infected hosts begin displaying unusual symptoms at recognizable stages. In the early phase, hosts adopt new vocabulary: "late-stage capitalism," "lived experience," "harmful," and the phrase "I hear you" said to people they are not listening to.
Later symptoms include:
- Referring to billionaires as dragons and landlords as nineteenth-century vampires while renting a studio apartment from a landlord who is, statistically, a retired schoolteacher with one property.
- Using phrases such as "late-stage capitalism" while ordering twelve-dollar oat milk lattes from a small business owner who is clearly going to lose money on that location.
- Believing Sweden is a socialist utopia, despite Sweden itself quietly privatizing public services, embracing free-market school vouchers, and wandering away from that argument around 1994.
- Developing the unshakeable conviction that the problem with every failed policy is that it was not tried hard enough by sufficiently committed people, a position that fits neatly alongside a complete absence of accounting experience.
One focus group participant admitted, with what appeared to be genuine surprise: "I supported free stuff until somebody explained I was paying for it. The math was not what I expected."
Parasites Fight Among Themselves: A Natural Check on the Ecosystem
Ironically, parasites often compete viciously over who receives the largest share of the host. Researchers compare the phenomenon to piranhas arguing over a steak — loud, frantic, and ultimately more damaging to each other than to the steak, which has already been eaten.
"The revolutionary left spends almost as much time devouring itself as devouring everyone else," explained historian Gerald Mosquito, who did not choose that surname but has made peace with it. "Trotskyists fight Marxists. Marxists fight anarchists. Anarchists fight everyone, including other anarchists, on principle. Eventually the coffee shop runs out of oat milk and civilization collapses."
He noted that three separate left-wing factions issued competing statements condemning the original strategist's "parasite" remark — each statement also condemning the other two statements for being insufficiently radical or excessively performative or written in a font with colonial origins. Historians are still reconstructing the thread.
Natural Predators Still Roam the Political Landscape
Fortunately, nature provides predators. Economic reality. Voters in swing states who do not live on the internet. Inflation, which is not ideological and does not care about your framework. And math, which remains stubbornly non-negotiable despite forty years of attempts.
These creatures feed aggressively on utopian theories. History has demonstrated that nothing destroys socialist promises faster than a calculator, a working budget, and a journalist who asks a follow-up question. Margaret Thatcher's famous observation — that socialism eventually runs out of other people's money — has long been considered the political equivalent of industrial-strength flea medicine: unfashionable, a little rough on the coat, and thoroughly effective.
The Heritage Foundation's analysis of socialist economic failures traces the pattern through Venezuela, Cuba, and the United Kingdom's postwar nationalization experiment, all of which followed a similar trajectory of enthusiasm, price controls, and eventually a very long queue.
Party Doctors Remain Cautiously Hopeful, Vets Less So
Despite the scale of the infestation, Democratic doctors insist recovery remains possible. Early treatment includes moderation, common sense, and avoiding social media arguments after midnight with people whose profile pictures are anime characters. Severe cases may require extended exposure to swing-state voters — people who drive trucks, care about grocery prices, and do not own a single piece of merch from a podcast.
One weary strategist summarized the situation while examining campaign fundraising charts under a microscope, searching for a trend that would justify optimism.
"Parasites are fascinating creatures. They depend completely on their hosts while simultaneously despising them. They consume the resources that keep them alive while insisting the host is the problem. They reproduce fastest in protected environments. And somehow — somehow — every four years, the host looks around, considers its options, and invites them back inside."
He set down the microscope.
"I need a drink."
Veterinarians nationwide are standing by. 🪱🦟🐜
"Please," said one, who asked not to be named, "administer flea treatment before the midterms. We cannot do this again."
Alan Nafzger and the world's oldest tenured professor — a philosophy major turned dairy farmer — collaborated on this report. The dairy farmer noted that his cows, unlike political parties, do not voluntarily reinfest themselves. He considers this a significant distinction. Bohiney.com is American satirical journalism for people who prefer their absurdity served straight. Auf Wiedersehen, amigo!
British readers who prefer their parasite metaphors with a drier delivery and more disappointment should visit the coverage at The London Prat. https://bohiney.com/democrats-a-colony-of-political-parasites/
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