Republican elites: I can't believe this dog whistle attracted all these dogs!

— Tim Fernholz (@TimFernholz) February 26, 2016

Looks like Rubio finally grew a pair.

Let me tell you something, last night in the debate, during one of the breaks — two of the breaks — he [Trump] went backstage, he was having a meltdown. First he had this little makeup thing applying, like, makeup around his mustache because he had one of those sweat mustaches. Then, then he asked for a full-length mirror. I don't know why, because the podium goes up to here. But he wanted a full-length mirror. Maybe to make sure his pants weren't wet — I don't know."

Oof.

He's still a child, though.

Rep. Trent Franks (R-AZ) has asked his fellow Republican congressmen to sign onto a letter urging either Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) or Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) to drop out of the presidential race so that one of them can defeat Donald Trump."Through rivalry, disunity, and baseless hatred in our ranks, conservatives are now in danger of splintering our voice and ensuring that the Republican Party’s nominee in the general election is Mr. Trump who is incontrovertibly, the weakest General Election candidate in the Republican field with the strongest probability of allowing Hillary Clinton to become President," Franks wrote in the letter, according to a copy obtained by the Huffington Post.

Game theory must have a name for this situation. It's very close to a game of chicken, but not exactly right. Winning a game of chicken happens as soon as your opponent swerves. In this, if Rubio or Cruz swerves (drops out), the other doesn't get the win; the other gets the chance to go up against Trump for the win. The actual game here isn't between Rubio and Cruz it's between Rubio, Cruz and Trump. Rubio and Cruz each want the other to drop out ASAP because every state Trump wins puts him farther and farther ahead of the both of them. The longer they both stay in, the bigger Trump's lead becomes. But Trump wants Rubio and Cruz both to stay in and split their votes, and will presumably work to see that that happens. And I want them all to drop out and join rival plushophilia gangs.

(found on FB)

Someone should ask Mitch McConnell where the Constitution says that black Presidents only get 3/4ths of a term, when it comes to Supreme Court nominations.

I repeat myself when under stress.
I repeat myself when under stress.
I repeat myself when under stress.

The front page of CBSNews.com has a question!

Tough question!

So hard to answer!

There are 19 mentions of "Trump" on that page, plus eight pictures of him, and a video.

This was extended from an old post of mine.

(for reference, TS Eliot's The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock)

Let them go then, go and lie,
To the people; the press supine with tight shut eyes
Like a patient etherized upon a table;
Let them go, with fatuous half-truths and deceits
The fact-checkers in retreat.
Through the ballrooms and lobbies of Washington hotels
And dim-lit restaurants with oyster-shells:
No one challenges the tedious arguments,
The cynical intent.
Nobody asks a probing question…
Oh, do not ask, “That’s not true, is it?”
Let them go and make their visit.

In the green room the interns come and go
Talking of Marco Rubio.

The yellow hair that curled itself upon the buffoon's head,
The yellow wisp that arched and flexed on the buffoon's head,
Hissed sweetly to the howling fringe of the party,
Called out to myriad fools "Here is someone to hate",
Let slide off its back the concerns of normal candidates,
Slipped by the guardians, made a sudden leap,
And seeing that it had befuddled everyone,
Coiled itself once about the country, and flicked its tongue.

And indeed there will be time
For the simpering hagfish that cruises our dark streets,
Oozes his slime upon our TV screens;
There will be time, there will be time
To shake the hands to meet the faces he must meet;
To mislead and lie about murder, about the state,
And time to piously preen in all the churches in the land
To snidely insinuate about Her mate;
Time for losses and time for wins,
And time yet for a hundred interviews,
And for a hundred speeches from Mr Cruz,
Before the voting even begins

In the green room producers come and go
Talking of Marco Rubio.

And someday there will be time
To wonder, "Pataki? Who?" and, "Santorum? Eew!"
Time to look back and list those not so few,
Who have fallen (or should, already!) to the buffoon —
(They will say: “It's still early, he cannot win!”)
My Morning Joe, their hollers doubting that he is really in,
The hosts rich and modest, all asserting he can not win —
(They will say: “But his hair! It seems so thin!”)
Do I dare
Dispute the punditry?
In a minute there is time
For predictions and revisions which a cycle will unwind.

But we all know them all already, know them all:
We know their speeches, tax plans, all those pols,
We have measured 2015 with endless polls;
We know the voices braying of the coming pall
Above the music that was not approved.
        So what should I assume?

And we have known the lies already, known them all—
The lie delivered in that focus-grouped phrase,
So carefully formulated, massaged to convince,
Or at least confuse, to baffle, or to faze
Then how should we begin
To sort through all the lies and half-truths they have said?
        And which media to consume?

And we have known the faces already, known them all—
Faces that are old and wrinkled and white and bare
(But in the spotlight, bronzed, smoothed and fair!)
Is it boredom or distress
That makes me so digress?
Faces lying about a policy, or lying about a law.
        And should we then assume?
        And when will it all end?

Should he say, "I have walked alone though the common streets,
And seen Mexicans raping, Muslims plotting,
Chinese stealing, Persians refining" ?

He will admire a fine Iowa hog
Grunting in bliss in a pen at the State Fair.

And will it have been worth it, after all,
Will it have been worth while,
After the speaking and the lying, so many unchecked 'facts',
After the polling, after the caucus, after the years of caustic rhetoric—
Yet still, still so much more ? —
Is it possible to just say what they mean?
But no, still the magic lantern throws their lies and slanders on our screens:
Will it have been worth while
If one, shouting into a pillow or turning off the news,
And turning toward the window, should say:
        “That is not it at all!
        That is not what we need, at all!”

I grow old ... it grows old ...
I shall swear at the TV as the days grow cold.

Shall we leave the noise behind? Just put on Eat A Peach?
Can we just order pizza, and renounce this endless screech?
I have heard that other countries get this stuff done in weeks.

I do not think that you will listen to me.

We have heard them lying upon the stage
Seen their strange stiff hair in waves blown back
Felt the ill wind blown from faces white and black.
They have lingered in our living rooms on our TVs
And still ten months until this winds down
Till the new voices wake us, until the next round.

Shorter windbag:
OK, we're terrible people. No argument there. But you made us feel bad about being terrible in public. You're so mean and intolerant! And now Trump has come along and made us feel better about being terrible in public again, and we really like that. So, as you can see, Trump is all your fault.

"We're losing a lot of people because of the internet," Trump said. "We have to see Bill Gates and a lot of different people that really understand what's happening. We have to talk to them about, maybe in certain areas, closing that internet up in some ways. Somebody will say, 'Oh freedom of speech, freedom of speech.' These are foolish people."

Heckofajob, GOP. Stellar.