Primarily Speaking

The Democrats now have their third candidate—which is only 33% the number of Republican candidates—as former governor of Maryland Martin O'Malley officially announced his candidacy this weekend. And he did it with quite a flourish! He side-swiped Hillary Clinton using the old dynasty chestnut [CN: video may autoplay at link], embedding it in an ostensible populist message—"Recently, the CEO of Goldman Sachs let his employees know that he'd be just fine with either Bush or Clinton. Well, I've got news for the bullies of Wall Street—the presidency is not a crown to be passed back and forth by you between two royal families."—and went after Bernie Sanders by answering why progressive voters should pick him over Sanders with this: "Because I have a track record of actually getting things done, not just talking about things."

Wowwwwwwee. O'Malley's assertion that Sanders hasn't done anything and is just a lot of talk is complete bullshit. Here is Senator Sanders highly accomplished progressive record. The fact that Sanders is such a credible progressive legislator is exactly why I want and expect more from him.

I am keenly aware that O'Malley is playing on the whole "executives (governors) are doers and legislators (senators) are talkers" garbage that Republican presidential candidates seem to think is super genius (but isn't), but considering that our last two presidents have been a governor (Bush) and a senator (Obama), and I'm guessing O'Malley has an opinion on which one was better, maybe he could just throw that whole line of nonsense into the bin where it belongs.

And, honestly, if O'Malley can't differentiate himself any better than "vote for me because Hillary Clinton is entitled and Bernie Sanders is all talk," he might as well not bother wasting his donors' money.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the aisle, let's see what all the Official Candidates in the Bozo Brigade are up to today!

Senator Rand Paul says that detractors who don't support his fight against government surveillance "secretly want there to be an attack on the United States so they can blame it on me." That sounds reasonable.

Senator Marco Rubio might not be praying for a terror attack just to make Rand Paul look bad, but he's definitely willing to preemptively blame Paul as passive-aggressively as possible: "The national security laws and programs implemented after the 9/11 terrorist attacks have been the cornerstone of our country's protection since that infamous day. ...Our country is now poised to be less safe and Americans at greater risk from growing terrorist threats." That sounds reasonable.

Senator Lindsey Graham is the toughest toughy who ever toughed or something: "I want to be president to defeat the enemies trying to kill us, not just penalize them or criticize them or contain them, but defeat them." That sounds reasonable.

Senator Ted Cruz makes funny ha-ha joke about how Hillary Clinton is really to blame for DeflateGate, then does an unfathomably terrible impression of JFK, before declaring that JFK would have been a Republican WHUT WHUT WHUT. That all sounds very reasonable.

Former Senator Rick Santorum says that if the US Supreme Court legalizes same-sex marriage, he'll fight the decision: "Of course I'd fight it. Roe vs. Wade was decided 30 some years ago, and I continue to fight that, because I think the court got it wrong." He seems nice and that sounds reasonable.

Former New York Governor George "Who?" Pataki also blames Rand Paul and his Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Pseudobuster for making America less safe: "This is probably the most dangerous time for Americans here since September 11th, and to now have this void where the NSA cannot track lone wolves, they cannot use roving wiretaps against people they understand, probably are looking to engage in terrorist acts is completely wrong. It's dangerous and I fear for our safety." That certainly sounds just as reasonable as when Marco Rubio said it.

Professor of Bible Bigotry Mike Huckabee has built his campaign strategy around exploiting feelings of victimhood among conservative Christians, and, as such, continues to say shit like: "I think it's fair to say that Christian convictions are under attack as never before, not just in our lifetime, but never before in the history of this great republic." That sounds reasonable.

Dr. Ben Carson says about his chances for winning the Republican primary and then the general election: "I certainly believe that that is a possibility." That sounds reasonable.

[CN: Racism] Corporate power-failure Carly Fiorina said these actual words out loud: "I have been doing business in China for decades, and I will tell you that, yeah, the Chinese can take a test, but what they can't do is innovate. They are not terribly imaginative. They're not entrepreneurial; they don't innovate—that is why they are stealing our intellectual property." That sounds like a totally reasonable thing that a decent person would definitely say.

In case I wasn't laying it on think enough, that was sarcasm. None of this is reasonable. All of it is terrible. The Republican primary is like a reality television show where rich people compete to see who can be the ABSOLUTE FUCKING WORST.

Talk about these things! Or don't. Whatever makes you happy. Life is short.