The good people of the internet want to make sure Jeb Bush has a good birthday.

Poor Jeb! After patiently waiting his turn to run for president, he was walloped mercilessly by schoolyard bully Donald Trump. The Donald branded him a "low-energy" candidate and gleefully taunted him for deploying his mother in campaign ads ("Jeb - mom can't help you with ISIS, the Chinese or with Putin," Trump tweeted).

But with all of that in the past, Trump having merrily done to the other hundred Republican candidates what he did to Florida's ex-governor, a group of internet do-gooders wants to make sure Jeb! at least has a nice birthday.

Through a campaign called "Operation Red Velvet," the good people of the internet are crowdfunding to buy a cake for Jebruary February 11, when the onetime presidential hopeful will turn 63. The creator of the fundraiser, who did not respond to New Times' requests for comment, alluded to a 2006 GQ story about the then-governor that claimed "it's debatable whether he has any real friends."

"It would break my heart to see someone who brought us so much joy to be left alone on the one day of the year that celebrates his life," the GoFundMe page says.

The organizers are hoping to get a cake with turtles on it — a nod to reports that Jeb! campaigned with toy turtles in his pocket to show that slow and steady wins the race, before we all learned that loud and erratic actually wins the race.

Delve a little deeper into the birthday-cake fundraiser, though, and you'll soon realize that Miami's once-favorite Republican dynastic prince has recently become the center of a truly unexpected movement.

via Jeb 2020 on Facebook and Reddit Meet Comrade Jeb, a new career path for ol' Jebbers.

In a weird twist, Jebbers is being reimagined every day as a communist hero through a series of "Comrade Jeb" memes. In one, he wears a black bandanna over his mouth above the words "Please riot." In another, he smiles and holds a gun. "Capitalism isn't going to overthrow itself," reads the text.

The movement has made its way over to his Facebook page. Under a video of Jeb and Martin O'Malley playing horseshoes with students at Texas A&M University's Bush School of Government & Public Service, someone wrote, "Joining forces to overthrow the capitalist oligarchy through education!!"

It's not clear how that whole thing began, but someone on Reddit pointed to a video of Bush telling the Huffington Post: "Hell, yeah," he would kill baby Hitler.



Anyway, the birthday-cake fundraiser seems to have been started by the same group, hence "Operation Red Velvet."

The fundraiser has more than tripled its initial goal of $60, so "Comrade Jeb" might be in for a pretty special cake.

Alas, he did not respond to a New Times message seeking comment. Happy birthday, Jeb!

