Every once in a while you come across a news story that you swear was written by The Onion, Donald Trump’s newest ad is an example.

First, watch the ad:

You know how the Scream movies opened the door for their satirical counterpart – and never ending franchise – Scary Movie? Or how the science fiction genre had Dr. Hfuhruhurr and The Man with Two Brains? Or how James Bond had Austin Powers? In a similar sort of way, political ads have Donald Trump. Not only does his newest ad sound like it belongs on a website promoting doomsday preparation, it’s loaded with promises Donald can’t keep, as well as a false representation of our issues on the border.

I’m just going to highlight three of the issues I came across.

The Great Wall

Now, I know everyone wants a wall. Call me the dasher of dreams, the killer of hopes, etc., etc., but I just don’t see it happening. Let me explain: In America we believe that property rights are foundational to our democracy. Let’s pretend for a moment that Mexico agreed to build the great wall – as the chosen one has demanded – and we’re fully funded. The current gaps in the fence are on private property, for the most part, and you’ll have to deal with eminent domain battles in order to erect the “yuge wall.”

So, what does that look like?

Fence expansion alone was fought due to the threat it posed to wildlife, and much of South Texas refused to sell their land, hence the gaps in the fence. Eminent Domain takes time, and as a result of property rights, you have court battles, payouts, etc…To give you some perspective, in 2009 it took four months and $170 million to erect a 19-foot 38 mile long fence near El Paso. It took from 2006 to 2009 just to finish 670 miles of border fence, and most of it was single-layer fencing. Now imagine a 1,989 mile wall, countless eminent domain cases, fights with conservationists, etc… There’s a lot more to this idea than what is portrayed in the promos and at the rallies.

We have these battles so as to protect the rights of the American people, they need to exist for the sake of our democracy. It’s not something we can skip over, expedite, or ignore. They exist because our Founders believed that American citizens may not be deprived of property, taken by the government, without due process of law.

Time Stamp: A great wall between Mexico and the United States will never be built. If I’m wrong, I’ll be available for a proper tar and feathering when they bust out the champagne upon its completion.

“Take the oil!” 

“You take the oil. You know, to the victor belongs the spoils. You take the oil. You don’t just leave it.” – Trump

Considering the oil isn’t stored in barrels and can’t be merely loaded up and taken, we have to realize that it is deep under the ground in Syria and Iraq. Such an endeavor would require invasion and occupation of the land, the impact on foreign relations would need to be clearly known and understood. This isn’t a simple task, by any means.

Moroccans & the Southern Border

I saved the best for last, guys.

Below is an excerpt taken from the middle of Trump’s shiny new ad, right around the time that the narrator says, “He’ll stop illegal immigration by building a wall on our southern border that Mexico will pay for.”

One problem… That’s not footage of our Southern border, that’s footage from back in 2014 of Moroccans crossing the border into Melilla, Spain. If we’re worried about Moroccans, I think we’re out of luck. Building a wall in the middle of the Atlantic and forcing the Algerians to pay for it isn’t what one would label a “feasible option.” Unless of course you’re Trump, then maybe it is.

And it will be the biggest and finest wall located in the middle of the ocean the world has ever seen.

But, what I’m wondering is why he didn’t just use footage of our border?

Oh, I forgot, there’s no footage like that from our Southern border. Apparently fear mongering is how you win elections.

Regardless of Trump’s imagery, the Pew Research Center noted last month that “for the first time since the 1940s, more immigrants from Mexico are leaving the U.S. than coming into the country. The shift is due to several reasons, including slow economic recovery after the Great Recession that may have made the U.S. less attractive, as well as stricter enforcement of U.S. immigration laws, particularly at the border.”

Back to the video, here’s an excerpt of PolitiFact’s findings:

The RepubblicaTV video is time-stamped May 1, 2014. According to the description posted by the network (and using Google Translate) the video was released by the Interior Ministry in Madrid, showing an “onslaught of hundreds of migrants to the wall that separates the Spanish enclave of Melilla from Morocco. About 800 tried to cross the border on May 1st. Those who failed to escape the control of the Civil Guard were hanging on the barriers for six hours before being rejected.”

It gets better. Once it was widely known that the footage wasn’t from the Southern Border, Trump’s campaign manager proved that he has just as much class as his candidate of choice.

TRUMP CAMPAIGN MNGR: "No shit its not the Mexican border but thats what our country is going to look like if we don't do anything."

— Katy Tur (@KatyTurNBC) January 4, 2016

It was "intentional". New official statement from the Trump campaign: pic.twitter.com/uPzaG5zL2l

— Katy Tur (@KatyTurNBC) January 4, 2016

The jokes rolled in:

"Illegals, just walking over the bridge built by open-border RINOs" – Trump Campaign pic.twitter.com/ORoicnHior

— Marcus Hawkins (@HawkinsUSA) January 4, 2016

Footage of the border in the new Trump ad seems exaggerated pic.twitter.com/N9OlLf6v89

— Benny (@bennyjohnson) January 4, 2016

We’ve entered the realm of apocalyptic branding. The footage used in Trump’s ad was clearly meant to terrify you, to inject an image into your mind of the United States being invaded. To breed fear, anger, and resentment. We have become quick to act and slow to think, fast to judge and slow to research. Jim Geraghty, with National Review, wrote an incredible opinion piece on “Apocalyptic Conservatism.” Below is an excerpt:

In 2005, 9,891 border-patrol agents worked on the Southwest border with Mexico; by 2014, there were 18,127 agents. Under Operation Secure Texas, the state government will devote $800 million in new resources to securing the border, which is already patrolled by Texas National Guard troops. We have a border, and a lot is being done to secure it. But the Doomsday Conservatives can’t take “yes” for an answer. They’re too emotionally and psychologically invested in the idea of perpetual crisis to acknowledge that real progress has been made on immigration.

He continues:

The best part of this narrative is that if Trump fails to win the nomination or the presidency, the outsiders have a ready-made explanation: the party and/or the country chose to be ostriches, heads buried in the sand as the country fell apart. It just couldn’t be that Trump and his supporters tainted legitimate concerns about border security and assimilation of immigrants with a whiff of lunatic white-nationalism.

Come on, Conservatives, this is not who we are… However, it is exactly who Trump thinks we are; mindless robots fueled by fear and anger, overwhelmed by the refusal to be realistic in the face of his hate driven narrative. We can do better, and if we intend to keep the White House out of Hillary’s bloodstained hands, we need to do better. It’s time to get serious, because while Trump makes it easier to laugh at politics, the truth is that this joke isn’t funny anymore.