Christmas in July

It's Christmas in July for Ginger & Slim, and we got so much schadenfreude we're thinking of re-gifting some to our less sassy loved ones. Ensign. Sanford. Palin. FRANKEN COMES ALIVE.

What's next? Will Arnold go ballistic over the CA budget clusterfuck and murder a fourth of the Kennedy clan? Will one of Bobby Jindal's exorcisms go terribly awry in The Exorcism of Emily Rose 2? Where is Mitt Romney's illegal immigrant Hispanic love child? How many dead prostitutes are in Tim Pawlenty's basement?

But enough evil cackling for now. All of this Republican embarrassment has led pundits to their own severely embarrassing conclusion: Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour could be a 2012 contender. Barbour is truly a GOP powerhouse, and he makes no apologies for disenfranchising black voters, denying Medicaid to the poor, encouraging ten-year-olds to smoke, or eating five rare steaks a day for lunch. He is influential, he is likeable, and he is one shrewd dick. Sanford's emo love affair has resulted in Barbour becoming chair of the RGA a year early, and he's been drumming up money for the party in Iowa and New Hampshire recently. But he won't run.

A recent piss poor article talked about Barbour's "murky past," but nothing in the profile would preclude him from running, in part because he's no worse than any other Republican and in part because it's all common knowledge. Barbour won't run because he loves being insider power broker, and he's kind of old, and he's super fat, and he's ready to semi-retire to the farm, play party grandfather behind the scenes, and await the major coronary. 

Barbour doesn't make mistakes. He is well aware of his weaknesses, and he went ahead and took himself out of the race some time ago. Barbour would never pardon murderers-turned-mansion-gardeners if he was looking towards the big prize. By hyping Barbour's chances, pundits and reporters are simply showing their ignorance of American politics by actually considering that the GOP is so fucked that Haley's their last best chance. 

The 2012 GOP presidential nominee isn't even on the radar. So if the media could go ahead and stop trying to find him/her and get me some more scandal, that would be great. 

~Slim