While this was going on, England and France were at war with Spain. Or perhaps England and Spain were at war with ... No! This is it: France and Spain were at war with England. But only because Germany did not exist at the time. As far as we know.

Anyway, the result was that for some reason France decided to sell a large piece of property in North America. The French government put the following advertisement in The New York Times real estate section:

NICE PIECE OF LAND approx. 34 hillion jillion acres convenient to West perfect for growing nation.

So Jefferson did a little checking and he found that this property was in fact zoned for Westward Expansion, and he made an offer of $12 million. The French countered with $15 million, but they also threw in the appliances, and they had themselves a deal. After the closing ceremony, Jefferson sent Lewis and Clark off to hold the Lewis and Clark Expedition. It was hard going: The land was wild and untamed; there were hostile Americans around; and Clark bitched constantly because he thought it should be called “The Clark and Lewis Expedition.” Nevertheless, they were able to explore the entire region, and when they returned to Washington on October 8 they reported that it contained not just Louisiana; but a whole bunch of other states as well, although some of them, such as South Dakota, needed work.

Meanwhile, in Europe, the situation worsened as England joined France in declaring war against Spain, unaware that France had joined Spain in declaring war against England, and that Spain, acting in haste, had accidentally declared war against itself. The United States tried, by depressing the clutch of diplomacy and downshifting the gearshift lever of rhetoric, to remain neutral, but it became increasingly obvious that the nation was going to get into a war, especially since it was almost 1812. A worried nation turned its eyes anxiously toward Thomas Jefferson, then had a good laugh at its own expense when it realized that he was no longer the president. He had been replaced by President James Something, Monroe or Madison, who immediately placed the country on a war footing (Whatever that means.).

The War of 1812 began very badly, with British troops marching right into Washington and setting fire to it, severely disrupting restaurant operations and forcing hundreds of lobbyists to eat in the suburbs. But soon the tide started to turn the Americans’ way, thanks in no small part to the efforts of the nation’s first defense contractor, Ye Old General Dynamics Corporation, which signed a $23.7 million contract to produce a vital new weapons system, the X-97 laser-controlled “Thunderfire” Musket , an innovative concept that promised to give U.S. soldiers a real technical edge on the field of battle. Unfortunately it was not ready for actual testing until 1957, when it blew up.

This sounds pretty boring to us so we’re just going to skip right over it.

1. Define the following: “dirtbag.”

2. Just who is Kitty Carlisle, anyway?

During the War of 1812, a young poet named Francis “Scott” Key watched the battle for Fort “Mac” Henry, and he was so moved by the sight of the American flag still waving in the dawn’s early light that he wrote the immortal words that Americans still proudly sing today:

Take me out to the ball game Take me out with the croooowwwwd ...

The first major president to be elected after the War of 1812 was President Monroe Doctrine, who became famous by developing the policy, for which he is named. This policy, which is still in effect today, states that:

1. Other nations are not allowed to mess around with the internal affairs of nations in this hemisphere.

2. But we are.

3. Ha-ha-ha.

President Doctrine also purchased Florida from Spain for $5 million. Unfortunately, like many first-time buyers of vast New World territories, he failed to inspect the property first; by the time he found out that Florida mostly consisted of swamps infested with armor-piercing mosquitoes the size of Volvo station wagons, Spain had already deposited the check.

In 1816, a political party called the Federalists nominated for president a man named Rufus King, then ceased to exist. The year 1819 saw the occurrence of the aptly named Panic of 1819 which was caused when the growing nation woke up in the middle of the night thinking it had a term paper due. Fortunately this turned out to be just a dream, and things remained fairly calm until 1825, which saw the election of yet another person named John Adams, who was backed by the Party to Elect Only Presidents Named John Adams.

Meanwhile, hardy settlers continued to move westward and discover new virgin lands, unconquered and unclaimed by anybody, unless you counted the Native Americans, which these hardy settlers did not. And, anyhow, before long there were even fewer to count. Soon they had settled a number of territories—Missouri, Indiana, Illinois, Guam—and they were clamoring to become official states so they could start electing legislatures and having state mottoes and official state insects and stuff. But Congress could not readily agree on a procedure for admitting states to the union. The northern politicians felt it should be a simple ceremony, with maybe a small reception afterward; the southerners felt it should be more of a fraternity-style initiation, with new states being forced to do wacky stunts such as get up and sing “She’ll Be Comin’ Round the Mountain When She Comes” naked. Finally the impasse was broken by means of the Missouri Compromise, under which it was agreed that one half of the people would pronounce it “Missour-EE” and the other half would pronounce it “Missour-UH.”

In 1828 Andrew “Stonewall” Jackson was elected president with the support of the Party to Elect Presidents with Stupid Nicknames. His running mate was South Carolinian John C. “Those Little Flies That Sometimes Get in Your Nose” Calhoun, a bitter rival of Secretary of State Martin “Van” Buren, who, with the backing of the brilliant orator Daniel “The Brilliant Orator” Webster, was able to persuade Jackson to replace Calhoun with Van Buren on the 1832 ticket, little aware that Denise and her periodontist were secretly meeting at the same motel where Rhonda had revealed to Dirk that she was in fact the sex-changed former Green Beret who fathered the half-Vietnamese twins that Lisa left in the O’Hare baggage-claim area the night she left to get her Haitian divorce and wound up as a zombie instead, thus resulting in the formation by Henry Clay of the Whig party. Their slogan was “Tippecanoe and Tyler, Too,” and they meant every word of it.

None of this would have been possible, of course, without the continued contributions of women and minority groups.