Missed last night's debate like I'm going to miss them all until a candidate is chosen for the general.

People, people, people.

What did we learn last night that we didn't already know?

The RINOs are still RINOs.  The leftist lamestream media is still the leftist lamestream media.

Candidates acted like they act.  The media, fully in the tank for Billary, acted like they act.

What changes?

Nothing.

State democrats have arranged to keep Washington State out of the decision making by refusing to consider moving up our primary.

Swell.  Meanwhile, we have no say or power in determining who represents the GOP in the general.  We won't GET a say until May, and this thing is likely long over by then.

So why get involved in any of this now?

Look, I'm not voting for anyone because of their label.

Locally, the fake claim to being Republican has led to political creatures like Marc Boldt, Greg Kimsey, Carolyn Crain, Scott Weber and most recently, Ann "Gas Tax" Rivers.

Nationally, we have Jaime Herrera; a RINO-led Senate and a RINO-led House.

It becomes increasingly unimportant to vote when those you vote for, from the local level on up, view their elections as a key to personal anarchy, where those elected stop representing us the moment the vote is finalized.  Like Marc Boldt's hero, Steve Stuart:



Our choices, then, are clear: we continue to vote for a label without bothering to look at a record, like the situation with the on-again, off-again democrat Marc Boldt, or we look at the record and chose based on what HAS happened as opposed to what MIGHT happen if Marc has a good day.

Meanwhile, I skip the waste of time known as the debates, where leftists with spears are allowed to beat on GOP candidates like they're piñatas and do so with impunity because the show is never about the issues, but instead, will always be about efforts to destroy the candidacies in front of us.

No one, I believe, should make up their minds based on the sound-byte snippets of these dog and pony shows.

For me, the equation is simple.

There is now no democrat running that I'd vote for if you put a gun to my head.

Those that I would consider voting for to this point are 1.  Those who have a shot and 2.  those who aren't RINO's.

Of those running, then, that leaves me with a choice of Trump, Carson or Cruz.

When the presidential election rolls around a year from now, if any of those 3 are on the ballot, I'm going to vote for them in the presidential election.

If they're not, it's kinda like Paul Ryan becoming Speaker: it won't be markedly different from what we've got now... so I ask you, again: what's the point of wasting your time watching this nonsense?

Is the RINO Establishment finally getting it about Trump? RINO betrayal generally, at both the national and local level.

I freely admit I was among the talking heads who couldn't take Trump seriously when he started out: he'd taken the beginning of this path before, only to act like a 3 year old with ADHD ("Oh, look!  A kitty!") but in a short time, it became clear to me that he was actually serious.. and once he became serious, the fur began to fly.

And it also became clear, shortly after his announcement, that he was going to be the guy talking about the issues that NEEDED to be talked about.  And, as I have opined, the only chance for the Establishment was to begin the process of hauling itself into Trump's general direction and co-opting his positions.

This is not a great time to be a RINO.  This is not a great time to be an Establishment Republican.

Instead, they run away like little girls in horror at the thought of taking the high road because you know what?

They'd sell their own mothers to win... the "right thing to do" be damned.  because, God Help Us, they might lose... and it's all about keeping their butts in government.

The reasons for that are, on the whole, obvious: of the Senators running, only Cruz speaks to the issues the way the base wants them spoken to... but Cruz is hamstrung with the mark of the anti-Christ Senate, a GOP group that makes Judas look like an all-star when the obvious comparison between those elected to the US Senate and their betrayal to their voters and the betrayer of Jesus takes place.  Paul is hamstrung by both that and some of his old man's idiocy.

For years, the base sat and fumed at the lack of courage and vision of the GOP Speaker of the House.

I knew we were in trouble when Cathy McMorris took a prominent role in leadership: after all, she threw Jaime Herrera together out of spare parts laying around the office and we know how worthless McMorris's former coffee gofer has been since McMorris parachuted her back in here after an 11 year absence.

This is another reason Boldt is not someone to be trusted... or elected.

Boldt's old crush asked him to support Herrera, and Boldt made the deal with the two male Cowlitz County commissioners in office at the time... and it was done weeks before the actual appointment was made to the legislature back in that fateful day in 2007.

Boldt also went on to hire one of those two clowns for the county, when that guy, Axel Swanson, a democrat, was tossed out of office in the next election... giving him a big bucks job down here in Clark County as something of a quid-pro-quo... as part of the mutual back-scratching that's just a normal day of business for Boldt.

Meanwhile, Trump has begun his run for president.  I'm sure that the RINO/Establishment felt the same way I and many others did, that this would be entertaining for awhile and then, he would fade and then quit.

Hasn't quite worked out that way, has it?

Trump discovered the thing that the RINO Establishment had long since blocked:

The Pulse of the Base.

That's right, ladies and gents... by accident or by design, Trump... and now Carson... have their fingertips on the pulse of the base and they can feel the hatred for those who've betrayed us, those who've ignored us, those who lie to us at all levels (Right, "Gas Tax?") to get elected and get power... only to forget all about that once they get the gig.

I'm sure the GOP, like most in politics, count on the stupidity and short memories of the voting public... except this time, that ain't happening.

Thanks to the debacle that has been the US Senate since the GOP took control and made NONE of the changes they promised to get elected in the first place, the base... the party bedrock is betrayed and disillusioned.

The result?

Unfiltered voices owing nothing to the Establishment RINOs are the ones getting the support.

I would be comfortable, at this point, with a Trump presidency or a Carson presidency.  I will remain comfortable with that for the most part until such time as either of those two are shown to be something they're not.

I believed, for example, with the entirety of my heart and soul in Sen. Ann "Gas Tax" Rivers.  I believed she was different.  I believed she was the exception to the rule... her other issues notwithstanding.

But when it mattered, she was the same as any other political opportunist, selling out Clark County and saddling us with a $700 million debt, while supporting the millionaires behind the pot initiative with her effort to cut the promised pot tax in half... instead of holding the liars accountable.

They promised us $582 million per year.  You remember the lie, don't you?

"Just legalize it, tax the hell out of it and all our budget problems will be solved!"

Yeah.

Right.

Gee.  Did that show them, or what?

That was a betrayal to me personally and to the entirety of her district.

In one of the last conversations I had with her husband and my formerly close friend last March, Fred, he opined when I asked him that the 18th District would likely have voted 65% "no" on the gas tax increase, had his wife given us the opportunity TO vote... which she made damned sure did not happen.

And yet, she voted for the increase... and the emergency clause in the bill... that went with it while refusing to even try to put a referendum clause on the tax bill so we COULD have a say in the largest gas tax increase in this state's history.

As for her district?

Well, she apparently knows better than the idiots who voted for her, at least in her mind, and that includes me.

Meanwhile, the base continues a pattern of rejection of the usual RINO excuses.  I'm not even remotely interested in what the Establishment types whine about when it comes to what they CAN'T do.

Local RINO's like Brent Boger kept telling us there wasn't a thing the House could do until we got the Senate, so we had to hold our collective noses and vote THOSE RINOs in before anything could happen.

So, the people of several states followed that fraudulent advice.

And what do they have to show for it?

On EVERY MAJOR PIECE OF LEGISLATION... THE GOP SENATE HAS CAVED.

EVERY, SINGLE, ONE.

So, what's the takeaway from that?

No matter which RINO is elected to the presidency, if a Bush, or Rubio, or Christie or that ilk gets the gig... there would be no changes made beyond the superficial.

The base knows this.  They intuit this.

And that's why the RINOs are stuck in dead, low, gear.

The entire planet knows what we won't do, which is anything we NEED to do.

At this point, for the most part, Trump and Carson are the wildcards when we need one.

The only problem I'm having with this crop of GOP'ers is that none of them ever bothered to wear the uniform.

Only those who have served have a clue what it's like to be in the military responding to the orders from the White House.

But we don't.  And with Sen. Jim Webb dropping out on the d-side, we have absolutely zero military experience in or wanting to be in the White House.

I will never vote for a RINO.  I will never set myself up for betrayal again.

I see my life in politics coming to an end because I freely admit that what Battle Ground Deputy Mayor Phil Johnson belittled as merely a "lofty ideal" is the basis for my political realm.

I'm an anachronism.  Those in politics today, from the aforementioned Washougal City Councilman Boger, who strongly supports "Gas Tax" Rivers' lies and who also was instrumental in the political career of one of the biggest liars in politics here locally, County Clerk Scott "I'll get rid of my job as an elected position" Weber and people like Battle Ground Deputy Mayor Phil Johnson... thrive on the politics of lying.

Because we've let them.

That, ladies and gentlemen, is why the RINOs are having such a hard time of it.  That's why the ordination of Jebbie Bush was bit premature.

And that's why I will never vote for a fake Republican, like my brother-in-law Marc Boldt, ever again.

Yuk fest: Herrera has "no interest" in the Speaker job? As if.

Perhaps the most vacuous, self-important and utterly worthless member of Congress in our country today is Jaime Herrera.

Herrera has the singular RINO focus of remaining in office first, her fatally ill daughter's public relations second (which she uses to help continue the first) and carrying her master's water (McMorris) like Gunga Din, third.

Note, no where in that litany is "representing us."

So, imagine my surprise when, as a joke, someone sent me the article where the Camas Manikin, who goes out of her way to remain silent on most of the issues confronting this country, suddenly comes up on the net to tell us she's "not interested in the Speaker's job."

Wait.... what?

She might as well tell us she's not interested in levitating, or not interested in walking through walls, or shape-shifting or any other physically impossible feat.

She has as much chance of growing a brain as she does of ever becoming Speaker.

Herrera is the pent-ultimate back-bencher.  On the issues confronting this country and her district, she has accomplished absolutely nothing.  On the CRC Scam, for example, an agony she could have ended within days of taking office in Congress, she absolutely disappeared, save for getting her political face kicked in by Tim "The Liar" Leavitt.

Except for selling out on closing down government and voting to raise the debt ceiling while teetering on the brink of getting thrown out of the local Republican party (a failure to accomplish that I will rue until I die) you rarely hear a thing about this waste of skin.

A true conservative, such as, for example, Raul Labrador of Idaho; frequently communicates with his constituency on a wide variety of issues... while holding open town hall meetings.  Further, when you contact his office, you get answers that actually show where he's taken a position.

Not so our Ridgefield Barbie, who thinks so little of this district that she doesn't even own a house in it.

Herrera, who's intellectual cowardice is the stuff of legends, is, perhaps, best known for her cowardly failure to hold open town hall meetings; an exercise in democracy her democrat predecessor whom she so admires, was known for.

While claiming the Speaker issue is an embarrassment, she naturally refuses to explain the fact that SHE is, and has been, an embarrassment since she got back here after McMorris parachuted her in after a 12 year absence to take on Brian Baird for Congress, starting with Marc Boldt selling out to McMorris and getting her a legislative appointment.  Nor does she happen to mention HER role and responsibility in this "embarrassment."

No, she has no problem ignoring the actual Republicans of her district while she whines "I'm giving the best years of my life to travel back and forth to that place... (DC)" well, here's a clue:

Feel free to quit. All you've done to date is to achieve footnote status any way.

You no more "fight for us" than you work out in a gym.

As the penultimate back-bencher, you follow the "less-is-more" edict of politics, mainly, keeping your mouth shut so that you don't have to discuss the issues you SHOULD be working on (So, Herrera: what are you doing to end this "women-in-combat" idiocy?  What are you doing about the VA?  Why hasn't your office addressed the disparity of drugs, for example, costing some 170% more at the VA than many of them do at, say, Fred Meyers?

What are you, personally, doing about the debt ceiling, or cutting spending, or our idiotic foreign policy?

What are you doing to restore funding to the military, having voted to cut retirement and disability?

I get that you don't "want" to be Speaker.  I also get that you'd have a better chance of appearing in a Mike's Hard Lemonade commercial after you grew a second head. so it's easy for you to say that you don't "want" a job you have a less than zero chance of ever getting.

The mystery to me is why the democratian believed that a lightweight like Herrera's obvious decision to not seek a job she could no more get than she could gain 100 yards rushing against the Steelers somehow equates to news.

Of COURSE she "has no interest" in a job she can't get.

I have no interest in the job of chief of staff for the Mayo Clinic, or to be an astronaut, or the blind side tackle for Russell Wilson (And God knows they apparently really need one) because as much as my ascension to any of those things is far more likely than Herrera ever getting any kind of leadership position in the House, even I know those outcomes are impossible.

Oddly, however, none of that is "news."

Just like our light weight congresswoman has a far smaller than zero chance of ever being confused with a congressional leader.

Don't think so?

When was the last time any of us saw her being interviewed over her thoughts... on anything?  Leaders get asked questions, usually in front of a camera.  And that means you're out.

And Barbie... there's nothing going on in the House that's a bigger "embarrassment" than your membership in it.