‘Walken2008’ Web site is a hoax

by Julie Weisberg - August 18, 2005

Could it be that one of Wilton’s most well-known and recognizable residents has thrown his hat into the ring for a run at the White House?

A new Web site, Walken2008.com, claims to be the “The Official Homepage” of longtime Cedar Road resident and Academy Award-winning actor Christopher Walken’s 2008 presidential campaign.

The site claims that Mr. Walken, best known for frequently choosing off-beat and eccentric film roles, announced his intentions to run for the presidency during a private conference at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in New York on Aug. 9. According to “WhoIs,” an Internet research tool, the Web site — along with its sister sites WinWithWalken.com and WalkenForPres.com — was posted on to the Internet Aug. 10.

“Our great country is in a terrible downward spiral. We’re outsourcing jobs, bankrupting Social Security, and losing lives at war. We need to focus on what’s important — paying attention to our children, our citizens, our future,” a statement on the front page of Walken2008.com reads. “We need to think about improving our failing educational system, making better use of our resources, and helping to promote a stable, safe, and tolerant global society. It’s time to be smart about our politics. It’s time to get America back on track.”

But Mara Buxbaum, Mr. Walken’s publicist, told The Bulletin during a Tuesday afternoon phone interview that Mr. Walken does not intend on running as a candidate during the 2008 presidential race. She said the Web site is an elaborate “hoax.”

“Chris has no affiliation with this,” Ms. Buxbaum said of the Web site. “This is one person’s practical joke. It’s ridiculous.”

She added that in his latest film role in the new comedy “Wedding Crashers,” Mr. Walken plays the Secretary of the Treasury, and this may have sparked the Internet pranksters interest in creating the fake 2008 presidential campaign Web sites.

“We are very aware that this is a joke,” she said, “and I hope that other people are aware that it is, too.”

If Mr. Walken were to run for the White House, however, it is unclear what his party affiliation would be. Peggy Reeves, Wilton’s Democratic registrar of voters, said Monday while Mr. Walken’s wife, Georgianne Walken, is registered as an unaffiliated voter in town, the actor is not registered to vote here at all.

The Web site creators appeared to pick up on this ambiguity, as the site does not declare a party affiliation for the faux candidate.

“Mr. Walken believes that voters should vote based on the candidates’ platforms, not their party affiliation,” the fake Web site reads. “At this early stage, we are not affiliated with any political party, nor do we plan to be. Our platform is our message, and that’s what we’re running on. Down the road, if an established party chooses to back Mr. Walken, he may accept.”

Although the Web site fooled few in the blogosphere — the Internet community made up of people who either write for, or frequently read, online diaries, or Web logs — which spread the news of the site’s existence throughout much of the weekend — some members of the mainstream news media did report on Mr. Walken’s supposed candidacy, such as Fox News on cable television.

After researching who registered the site online, some bloggers have theorized that members of the “General [M]ayhem” message boards created the Web site as a prank. General [M]ayhem, or “Genmay,” currently is one of the largest message boards on the Internet, with more than 15 million posts.

So far, however, no one posting on the privately owned Internet forum has publicly admitted to creating the prank Web site, leaving the identity of the creators unknown. E-mails sent by The Bulletin to the Web site’s administrator were not responded to.

Ms. Buxbaum said while she is unsure at this time if Mr. Walken will pursue legal action against the hoax site’s creators, or even to just have Walken2008.com taken down from the Internet (which was still up as of late Wednesday morning), the most important thing, she said, is to “spread the word” that the Web site is a fake.

“This shows us the power of the Internet,” she said. “The story has made it all the way to Wilton.”