Normally, posts about Taiwan animation sports recaps are pretty straight-forward; Tim Tebow gets literally crucified, a newborn baby flies out of a womb with a handgun or Queen Elizabeth beats a kangaroo to death with a baseball bat. You know, the usual.

With Election Day right around the corner, our pals in Taiwan (and the uncredited nerds and graphic designers in Los Angeles who probably write and actually animate these things on the reg) have gone the extra mile. Instead of simply posting a bunch of videos of Barack Obama riding a tiger into a circus tent and tearing up a bunch of binders full of women, Next Media Animation has crossed over into the video game world and allowed you to control the U.S. Presidential candidates via their grim, violent, barely-drawn avatars.

Not content with showing wacky re-creations of world events, Next Media Animation is now getting viewers into the action.

The “Obama vs Romney Boxing Faceoff” game, released in time for the US election, lets viewers feel the ‘deep affection’ the candidates have for each other. The interactive online experience lets anyone become either President Obama or Governor Romney for a satisfying smackdown of the opponent in a virtual boxing ring. (via NMA.tv)

It’s like that old game where you could beat up Barney the dinosaur, only in 2012 for some reason, featuring people who will control the world. Who cares about the loss of our privacy and freedoms or a rollback on women’s rights when you can get 5-20 seconds of mild enjoyment out of a crudely done, virtual Rock ‘Em Sock ‘Em Robots? THIS IS HOW WE ROLL. And in all honesty, I’m surprised Taiwan didn’t whip out this concept for Hurricane Sandy. That thing got memed to death, and I would’ve enjoyed punching an anthropomorphic New York City subway system in boxing gloves.

Anyway, because I don’t have time to make a photo-realistic Romney and Obama in WWE ’13 before tomorrow morning, you can get more information about the game here, and watch a hype video below. They never touch, but their eyes are connected by lightning! AMERICA!

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As a disclaimer, I hate politics and would like to just be able to bury my money in strategic places around my property and surround those spots with landmines Ron Swanson style, but we can’t really help but ignore politics when our leaders like to use sports as a distraction and our current President is such a huge sports nut. The latest example of Barack Obama’s sports knowledge was on display last night, as he appeared on The Tonight Show with Chin Unfunnyton, who asked the Commander-in-Chief various questions that were submitted by regular people like you or me.

One Average Jaromir submitted a question to Barry O regarding the current NHL lockout, and it was about as meaningless as you’d expect.

Mike from Los Angeles: “Can you pull some strings to end the NHL Lockout?”

Finally, someone is asking a question about solving unemployment. Of course, a better question may have been, “How can the owners and players union reach an agreement?” or “How would you help them find a middle ground?” or “What about the Ice Girls, won’t somebody think of the Ice Girls?” But nevertheless, Obama had an answer ready to go.

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"Let me get the Santorum," said no kid ever.

Back in 2010, a man from a company named Executive Trading called Upper Deck and proposed a partnership for a new series of political-themed trading cards that would be used as inserts in packs of baseball cards. Despite this being a terrible, horrible, awful idea, Upper Deck apparently told Executive’s President Justen VanGrinsven that they were down and the two parties continued to have regular correspondence over the following months, according to The Cardboard Connection.

At some point the deal fell apart and Upper Deck told VanGrinsven that the company was no longer interested in his political trading cards and people probably said, “Good, this was a terrible idea anyway, because nobody wants to collect cards that feature politicians.” Or not. Because Upper Deck turned around and released the “World of Politics” insert series last year, featuring all of the Democrat and Republican candidates who were involved with the 2012 election primaries.

Of course, Executive Trading was none too pleased with that and VanGrinsven and Co. are suing. And Upper Deck is suing them back. Because America.

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File photo.

Last week, Deadspin’s Tommy Craggs wrote a fantastic response to Sports Illustrated’s Thomas Lake, who penned a scathing, fart-sniffing letter to Charlotte Bobcats owner Michael Jordan about what he supposedly owed his former high school basketball coach, Pop Herring, who suffers from a mental illness, among other things. You can read Lake’s humongous pat on the back to himself here, and then I’m sure you can track down the online fundraiser that he started to really stick it to Jordan. If it helps Lake sleep better at night, then good for him, but I’m more curious about what it all represents.

At some point in the last few years, it became a trend to hate Jordan. As I pointed out during the NBA Lockout last summer, players picked him as the bad guy, because – aside from maybe Mark Cuban – Jordan is the most recognizable owner. But they also obviously picked him because he actually played the game, and they felt that he should have had their backs. I wrote that he shouldn’t, because A) he’s already done so much for paving the way to fortune for the league’s stars and B) he’s an owner now, and he has to worry about himself and his team.

Now, if people want to argue that they hate him because he sucks as an owner, I can get on board with that. However, the idea that he owes certain people something because he’s rich is just lazy. And yesterday, our friends at Buzzfeed found something even lazier.

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As I pointed out last week, Jose Canseco, the former baseball player who uses Twitter to beg Major League Baseball teams to consider signing a 48-year old designated hitter, now has a new gig as a columnist for Vice. In his debut at that site last week, Canseco weighed in on the necessity of guns in the wake of the Aurora, CO shooting. Canseco’s ultimate point was that if you’re not a juiced up martial artist, you need guns because you’re not an imposing force of fists like he is.

This week, Canseco is back to discuss something that’s more near and dear to his heart – bankruptcy. Canseco admits that he just filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy last week, and that’s shocking. I thought for sure that the guy who was once evicted from his home and needed pro bono legal representation to get his chandeliers back would have been doing just fine. Shows what I know.

Regardless, please allow the man who now claims to be a victim of the government’s evil ways to dispense his incredible amazing financial advice.

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If you’re having trouble thinking of a whiter, more joyless thing than “Donald Trump and Bill O’Reilly watching a baseball game together”, try adding “and doing the wave during a Yankees loss at Yankee Stadium” to the end of it.

Their reactions are pitch-perfect. Trump watches everyone have fun, then does a terrible version of the wave himself about five seconds too late. O’Reilly keeps time with the wave but only does it with his index finger, rolling his eyes with the rest of his body as it passes.

I can’t really blame Bill for this one. The wave is dumb, and my reaction to it at games isn’t much different. Actually, wait, I can totally blame them for this. After it was done, O’Reilly chastised President Obama for letting the wave happen in what’s SUPPOSED to be a free country, and Trump took credit for starting it. That felt good!

[h/t to Outside The Boxscore]