Clown Car Crowd

Do you know how hard it was to not do the KKK joke? Especially with a
Mr. Fish banner waiting in the wings?
At any rate, the swelling GOP candidate potential has
Steve Benen pretty hot and bothered:
This wasn’t supposed to happen. About a month ago, former Gov. Jeb Bush’s (R) fundraising operation – widely characterized as a “shock and awe” campaign – was seen as so imposing that it was likely to help winnow the Republican field before it even took shape. “Don’t bother running,” Team Bush signaled to would-be candidates. “We’ve already cornered the market on campaign finances.”
And for a brief while, it may have even had some effect – prominent Republicans like Mitt Romney, Paul Ryan, Bob Corker, Rob Portman, and John Thune considered national campaigns, but ultimately decided against it.
In recent weeks, however, we’ve learned that the 2016 field is likely to swell to unprecedented numbers. Next week, over the course of about 24 hours, three more GOP candidates – Carly Fiorina, Ben Carson, and Mike Huckabee – are expected to launch their presidential bids. Ohio Gov. John Kasich (R) was coy for a while, but he’s starting to sound more and more like someone preparing a national campaign. Even Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder (R), who was expected to stand aside in 2016, is suddenly moving closer to the 2016 race.
The idea that the Republican field could soon hold a football scrimmage, with 11 candidates on offense and 11 candidates on defense, no longer seems ridiculous.
At this point, we’re really not that far off. Last weekend in New Hampshire, the FITN Republican Leadership Summit featured 16 folks who’ve expressed at least some interest in running for president: Marco Rubio, Ted Cruz, Bobby Jindal, Rand Paul, Carly Fiorina, Jeb Bush, Scott Walker, Peter King, James Gilmore, John Bolton, Rick Perry, Lindsey Graham, Donald Trump, Mike Huckabee, Chris Christie, and John Kasich. Add in a few lesser-known vanity candidates, and some reports said there were 19 White House aspirants on hand.
A little historical context is in order: there is no precedent for fields this large. In the modern primary/caucus era, a group of 10 legitimate candidates is considered enormous. The idea of a 20- or 25-candidate field is simply unheard of, at least in the United States.
It's not that I don't get it. This really
is shaping up to be a GOP primary fight of extraordinary absurdity, but there are also some aspects of reality worth attending.
In the first place, the extraordinary absurdity
does not generally lead to, nor explicitly indicate, extraordinary diversity; these candidates will be fighting over a limited share of voters, according to a limited spectrum of issues with limited avenues for presentation. A massive candidate field won't hold even until Ames, though we might imagine any number of reasons Republicans might hope it would; the appearance of diversity is hardly a debit on the political ledger.
And to the other, it doesn't really matter. Who cares how many pizzas Republicans want to spin through the early season? In the end, only one will run, and while Benen might make a point about debates―both interesting and inevitable, though the interest really does come from the idea that we generally don't do things this way, and therefore a number of variables we don't ordinarily recognize exist and function within the marketplace―most of us were already expecting some sort of farce from the primary contest, and in the end we're all expected to ignore that stuff, anyway, when The One is selected for the general campaign. Perhaps the only downside to this broad-spectrum primary will be if it really does turn out to Jeb Bush's benefit, such that we end up with the Clinton-Bush rematch.
And perhaps the upside to a Clinton-Bush rematch will be entrenched emotions; maybe we can work out twenty years worth of increasing partisan hostility and segregation.
But why should we gasp in astonishment? So many will be struggling to catch their breath between heaves of laughter. The GOP is about to put on a Show of Shows, a Mother of All Preseasons, so we might as well sit back and enjoy the spectacle.
And who knows, perhaps one of them will become so desperate as to start making sense.
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Notes:
Image note: Since I didn't run with the KKK joke, I needed a substitute banner, and why not Rock Briefers? (Detail of frame from Panty and Stocking with Garterbelt.)
Benen, Steve. "Just how big will the 2016 field get?" msnbc. 27 April 2015. msnbc.com. 27 April 2015. http://on.msnbc.com/1bvNgLb