The Republican Party is suddenly full of whining, self-important, entitled, thin-skinned girlyman crybabies.
Presidential candidates and lawmakers alike of late bemoan their horrid plights: I’ve got better things to do, sobs a 62-year-old man who thinks the presidency should be given to him on a silver platter. I hate the Senate and its rules, snivels a first-term lawmaker who misses most of the votes at the world’s greatest deliberative body.
I’ve about had it, says a GOP candidate who is polling so low it’s unclear if his own mother backs him. I’ll be speaker, but I want three-day weekends and will quit if anyone disagrees with me, says a pretty boy who looks like he spends most of his day working out.
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They’re all glum and dour, doom and gloom. Nothing’s right in the world, they whimper.
All but one, that is: Donald Trump. The billionaire reality TV star is having an absolute blast, and it shows in every event he holds.
“I’m sticking with you people,” Trump said, then with a wink added, “Now if I lose Iowa, I will never speak to you people again.” More cheers.
Take Tuesday night, in Iowa, when the day’s news was filled with his sudden demise as the front-runner for the Republican nomination (a new poll showed him trailing neurosurgeon Ben Carson, though the two were tied when factoring in the margin of error and it was just the second of 37 polls to put him behind).
“What the hell are you people doing to me? … Will you get the numbers up? Please, this is ridiculous,†Trump said to raucous laughter from a huge crowd in Sioux City.
“Iowa, will you get your numbers up please? … I refuse to say get your asses in gear, I will not say it.” he said to delighted whoops.
“I’m sticking with you people,” Trump said, then with a wink added, “Now if I lose Iowa, I will never speak to you people again.” More cheers.
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In the 2016 race, perhaps even more than the previous two cycles, candidates are battling for the mantle of Ronald Reagan. Each tries to channel the Great Communicator, harkening back to the glory days of the Republican Party. But most seem to forget that Reagan was, more than anything else, an optimist — and funny.
(Example: A month before Election Day 2008, with critics slamming him at every turn, Reagan responded with this [3].)
Trump is alone in the sheer delight he is taking in running for president (Carson may be enjoying himself, too, but it’s impossible to hear anything he mumbles into the microphone). Out of the blue, at a campaign speech in New Hampshire, Trump killed the crowd with a joke about burkas [4]. Seriously.
Then there are the Debbie Downers.
After telling Mommy and Daddy that everyone’s being mean to him, Jeb Bush — at a public campaign event, mind you — wailed: “I’ve got a lot of really cool things I could do other than sit around, being miserable, listening to people demonize me and me feeling compelled to demonize them. That is a joke. Elect Trump if you want that.” And, “If this election is about how we’re going to fight to get nothing done, then I don’t want any part of it.â€
Boo hoo.
Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, who has missed numerous Senate votes in his quest for the White House, said he doesn’t like the job he’s held for just four of the six years he was elected to serve.
“That’s why I’m missing votes. Because I am leaving the Senate. I am not running for re-election,” he said. “I don’t know that ‘hate’ is the right word. I’m frustrated.â€
Poor baby.
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Then there’s Wisconsin Rep. Paul Ryan, not running for president but begrudgingly taking the position of speaker to the House, third in line to the presidency. But only if his fellow Republicans agreed to his terms. He’d only serve if he has near-unanimous support from the party — and they agree not to change House rules to make it harder to oust him from the post. Plus, he wants three-day weekends.
“Hey, look, I’m here four days a week as it is,†he told The Hill. “I’m not going to spend the other three days a week running around America.â€
Wah.
Meanwhile, a guy so low in the polls he barely registers is lamenting the sad state of American politics today. “Do you know how crazy this election is?” Ohio Gov. John Kasich yelled on Tuesday. “I’ve about had it with these people.”
We got one guy who says we ought to take 10 or 11 million people … we’re gonna pick them up and we’re gonna take them to the border and scream at them to get out of our country? That’s just crazy.
“What has happened to our party? What has happened to the conservative movement?” he said, adding that he’s “sick and tired of listening to this nonsense.”
Someone needs a nap.
Only Trump is loving the battle, the day-to-day mash that is non-beanbag politics. For the others, it might just be time to draw a warm bath, make a nice cup of herbal tea, and call it a day.