Written by Andy Borowitz

NEW YORK – (The Borowitz Report) – Today, presumptive GOP nominee Mitt Romney released the following open letter to the American people:

Dear Friends:

This week, The Washington Postreported an incident from my high school days in which I bullied a gay classmate by pinning him to the ground and cutting his hair off.  This story revealed a side of Mitt Romney that may have been surprising to many of you: the Mitt Romney with an irrepressible and hilarious sense of humor.

Some of you may say, “Hold on, Mitt – isn’t holding a kid down and cutting off his hair going a little far?”  Well, the merry prankster in me tells me you can never go too far when it comes to giving the greatest gift of all: the gift of laughter.  And I certainly remember many of us laughing long and hard about what I did to that Nancy-boy.  Was it cruel?  Perhaps, but it’s not like I tied him to the roof of a car or anything.

The Democrats have already tried to seize on this incident as evidence that I don’t like gays.  That is a lie.  I have nothing against gays.  Except for the poor ones, of course.  And as any of my high school chums can tell you, I did not go out of my way to pick on gay kids.  I was also a total douche to many heterosexuals.

The fact is, boys will be boys.  Who among us hasn’t shoved a crippled kid down a flight of stairs?  That’s something else I did in those mischievous days, but the mainstream media isn’t reporting it because they want to turn this into an anti-gay thing.  The fact is, when I was in high school I played pranks on everyone – blind kids, deaf kids, dwarves and Jews.  Although come to think of it, I don’t think our school accepted Jews.

Now that I’ve put my actions into better context, I hope you’ll see this incident with the gay kid for what it was: innocent good fun.  And I hope when you vote in November, you won’t judge me as the teenager who bullied one gay boy, but rather as the adult who fired thousands of people.

Vote for me,

Mitt Romney