Actually, he was only marginally better.
I'll substitute "significantly different" for "marginally better" and I think your statement stands. Of course, then the whole original meaning is destroyed and it's harder to mock Senator Thompson's positions by equating them to candidates which you don't like when they're no longer equal. But you know...
If Duncan Hunter was honest (and I have no reason to think he wouldn't be), he would probably admit he didn't have more than a Hail Mary's chance of winning the Republican nomination from the get-go. He simply wanted to bring Conservative ideals to the table of the Republican race for the nomination. Now that he's done that quite effectively with immigration (along with at least one other candidate), it's not really that instructive to say "Oh Fred's copying now." It was probably part of the plan all along for someone to "copy" his (Hunter's) immigration positions.
May I quote you: “[Thompson] was . . better”. A truly magnanimous endorsement!