Read How to Fight Presidents: Defending Yourself Against the Badasses Who Ran This Country for Free Online

he was hit with a massive cerebral hemorrhage literally in the middle of answering a question in the House of Representatives. He was about to answer a question from the Speaker of the House when his brain, disappointed that all of the
other
brains get time off occasionally, just gave up and said, “Nope. We’re done here.”
    Let’s hope, for your sake, that his brain is feeling similarly lazy during his fight with you.

Andrew Jackson, the wild-eyed, hard-fighting, hard-partying, cane-wielding, and ball-stomping son of a bitch who ran our country for eight years was a whole lot of things, and all of them were crazy. He wasn’t always a lunatic, of course, he
aged
into it, like a fine wine, fermented with poison and stirred with an ax. If “violence and hatred” were a drink, it would never leave Jackson’s flask, but it’s
not
a drink, so instead he drank whiskey to fuel his rage. Jackson would hate with a “grand passion” and would “resort to petty and vindictive acts to nurture his hatred and keep it bright and strong and ferocious,” much like the man himself. It’s not said but widely believed that we had no use for the word “badass” until the minute Jackson was born.
    Jackson’s measured and practiced hate-lust started when he was very young. Jackson was born without a father and his mother died when he was fourteen. As a result, he anticipated death aroundevery corner and was prepared to fight at any moment, which he did, all throughout school. Often picked on by very misguided bullies, it wasn’t uncommon for Andrew Jackson to come home with bruises, scars, and scrapes. At thirteen years old, having bested every available schoolyard bully in a three-state radius, Jackson decided to fight the British in the Revolutionary War. At the age when most of us were gleefully discovering our genitals for the first time, Jackson was tackling fully grown British soldiers with equal gusto.
    In 1780, the thirteen-year-old Jackson was captured by British soldiers and taken as a prisoner of war, along with his brother. He was ordered to shine the shoes of his captors and, like the tiniest badass ever, refused, which earned him a long gash down his cheek from the sword of his oppressor. He was then forced to march shoeless, wound-undressed, without food or water, and full of bright and shiny hatred for forty miles from one prison camp to another, all while suffering from smallpox. The smallpox killed his brother but was just terrified enough of Jackson to back off quietly. He lost his brother, beat smallpox, fought in a war, marched miles barefoot, and got stabbed in the
fucking face
, and that’s just adolescence.
    Having learned nothing about the evils of war, and because he simply had additional testicles instead of the part of the brain that regulates fear, Jackson went on to fight in the War of 1812 and the First Seminole War and, when he ran out of wars, he just went duel crazy. Jackson’s been in thirteen duels
that we know of
. While some historians dispute this number, everyone agrees that he loved him a duel. Every other day, Jackson was out dueling. Dueling this, dueling that. He was one dueling motherfucker.
    One duel in particular stands out among all the rest. In 1806, Andrew Jackson engaged Charles Dickinson in a duel over gambling debts. Though Dickinson was widely known as a good shot, Jackson allowed him to fire first. It would be irresponsible of me not to repeat that: in a duel with pistols, Jackson
politely volunteered to be shot first
. Dickinson fired, nailed Jackson almost in the heart, and started to reload. Before he could finish, Jackson shot him dead. The man plays “Punch for Punch” with
bullets
.

    Were Jackson to challenge you to a fight, it would most likely be a duel with pistols at either dawn or whenever-the-fuck-Andrew-Jackson-wants o’clock. The man
lived
to duel, and you know there’s only one way you can participate in multiple duels: you’re really,
really
good at