MMMMMMMmmmmmmm-hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

Just a couple of items:

• Paul Bibeau, Goblinbooks, on the logical conclusion of Outsiders are Better syndrome.
• Karoli Kuns, Crooks and Liars:  In the tradition of tin-pot (and cast-iron pot, because this stuff is last century) would-be dictators, tomato-phobia begets planned response.  (Yes, that sounds like a cryptic crossword clue.)  

  We are seriously entering territory here where we should not go. When a leading candidate for his party's nomination starts calling for the crowd to "knock the crap" out of someone, well, I think you get the idea.

  Guess who.
• ETA: Jesse Curtis, walk on, dovetailing with Driftglass:

  Many conservative pundits and politicians are acting as though they are not complicit in Trump's rise. But the party has been playing with fire for years. Look at the last two presidential election cycles. The jovial ignorance of Herman Cain. The routinized lying of Michele Bachmann. The cultural resentment and white identity politics of Sarah Palin. All of these unqualified figures were beloved by evangelicals in their moment, and tolerated by party elites. Trump launches a campaign of their greatest hits, and now the party suddenly realizes the downside?
  
  [...]
  
  I believe Trump's demagoguery will pass and there will be a better and more responsible conservatism in the nation's future. But that might not begin until we face the fact that Trump is not a weed in the garden of contemporary conservatism. He is its fruit.

  Drifty:

  My point being, it was all there from the very beginning. The eliminationist rhetoric and loathing of uppity women (and minorities.) The unswerving certainty that nearly-omnipotent Damn Dirty Hippie Commies were tirelessly plotting to enslave and destroy us all. Faith in a potato bug named Frank Luntz. Eternal hostility to the idea of moderation and compromise. Unshakable, dogmatic belief in an Imaginary Librul Media Conspiracy. Absolute conviction that every word they heard vomiting out of Hate Radio was the unvarnished truth.

• In memoriam:  Signe Toly Anderson, singer (Jefferson Airplane, died on the same day as Paul Kantner.  See Marty Balin's quote).