Jeb! Bush: The Towel Boy at the Orgy

The Deal Goes Down . . . High Stakes in the Silver State . . . South Carolina: The Lost Cause Revixit . . . And Then There Were . . .

Sure Iowa and New Hampshire were fun, dear readers, but one must recall that demographically they were not a good cross-section of the American population. 

Nevada and South Carolina, on the other hand, are more representative, so they're an important proving ground before we stumble into the March Madness. 

No, I'm not talking about the NCAA Basketball Champeenships.  There are a huge ("YOOGE!") number of primaries and caucuses next month, with a massive, swollen nut of delegates just waiting to spew out to the gratification of the candidate who rubs them the right way.

To quote Deadpool, "Time to make the chimi-fucking-changas."

We start out in Nevada, where the Democrats had a caucus to determine who got the most delegates.  The idea here is that whoever wins gets the lion's share, but the loser also gets a few.  Being the state that features Reno, Las Vegas and legal prostitution, a lot of weirdness happened.  That included the appearance of a group calling themselves Hookers for Hillary, which is kind of amusing when you think about it.

When the dust settled, Clinton had received a majority of the vote, and thus a majority of the delegates.  Sanders was gracious in defeat, although some of supporters were so gauche as to shout "English Only!" when someone tried to give a Spanish translation of Clinton's speech.  Stay classy, kids.

The Democrats now take their show to South Carolina, where the Republicans had their primary yesterday.  The GOP will caucus in Nevada next week.

Hoo boy, South Carolina.  The state that started the Civil War has a number of really Interesting People living in it; polls indicated that a number of GOP voters wanted the Treason Flag back up, while others thought that being a bunch of losing losers who lost 151 years ago merited a mulligan.

A lot of overheated rhetoric was thrown about, Pope Francis was yelled at, and various ethnic minorities were denigrated in an effort to advance one agenda or another.

Six little candidates, all quite alive,
South Carolina, and then there were five.

With about one percent (one percent!) of the precincts reporting after the polls closed, the major press outlets called the race for Trump, which was a surprise.  The Conventional Wisdom said that Trump would have trouble in the Palmetto State, because the religious population would be harder to appeal to.

However, Reality told the Conventional Wisdom to go pound sand, as even the religious population (what one GOP staffer helpfully called 'whackos' back in 2008) loved The Donald's anti-immigration stance and his blunt, vulgar style.  Not even Rafael Cruz could match up to him, and Rafael was campaigning as the one candidate who had been anointed by God and chosen personally by Jesus Christ to be President.

But the nut got cut, and it was Trump getting the gold medal, with Marco Rubio coming in at the silver (one hopes they've fixed that glitch he had).  Cruz managed the bronze medal, with only about 0.2% separating him from Rubio; so close, in fact, that you couldn't get a melon between them.

That leaves the guys who missed a podium finish.

John Kasich tried to position himself as the Sane Alternative, but the voters didn't want sane this cycle, they wanted bullshit, lies, and cheap demagoguery, and got it in spades.  Kasich came in at fifth place, with Dr. Ben Carson (who's admitted that it's all about the grift; as long as people send him money, he'll keep running) at sixth.

Which brings me to the most pathetic Loser McLoserton of the 2016 Presidential Campaign, John Ellis Bush.

The GOP Establishment had such high hopes for Bush, but he started to bumble even before the Iowa contest.  By the time he staggered into South Carolina, blood dripping from the thousand cuts inflicted on him by Donald Trump, not even a tweet showing a personalized firearm could help him - in fact, his press office had to tell people that no, Bush was NOT planning on shooting himself if he lost.

Bush came in a sick fourth behind the three tossers who made it to the winner's podium, and finally did what a lot of people thought he'd do before the primary (and I thought he'd do after losing Florida), 'suspending' his campaign.  The signs of rot were there before the voting started, with senior staff sending out resumes and major donors no longer taking his calls. 

He finally learned when to pull the plug, and somewhere Michael Schiavo must have said, "About time, asshole."

So now the GOP go to Nevada, and the Dems to South Carolina. 

The Long March continues.