via TED

Feel the McMullinmentum.

The big noise on tout les 'Toobz Monday morning was that this guy, Evan McMullin, a career spook who lives in Utah, announced that he would be running for president specifically as an anti-He, Trump candidate. This came at the same time as He, Trump was preparing to reset his campaign for the 400th time, this time before the Detroit Economic Club, selling out every sucker who thought of him even for a moment as a "populist," as we will see later in the day.

Anyway, McMullin got some nice run on the morning cable news shows. As Tiger Beat On The Potomac informs us, his current gig is directing policy for the denizens of the monkeyhouse that prevails on one side of the Capitol.

"In a year where Americans have lost faith in the candidates of both major parties, it's time for a generation of new leadership to step up," McMullin said in a statement to ABC News. "It's never too late to do the right thing, and America deserves much better than either Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton can offer us. I humbly offer myself as a leader who can give millions of disaffected Americans a conservative choice for President."

"Humbly" is a nice touch, I have to admit. Would it be overly cynical to wonder if behind this sudden emergence of his caucus' policy director as an anti-Trump independent candidate we would find the fine hand of Speaker Paul Ryan, the zombie-eyed granny-starver from the state of Wisconsin? Surely that nice boy from Janesville who used to flip burgers for a living wouldn't think of such a thing? Anyway:

McMullin, who has never held elected office, was an operations officer for the CIA for 11 years from 1999 to 2010, according to his LinkedIn page. He earned an MBA in 2011 from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, the alma mater of GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump. He has also worked at Goldman Sachs, as a volunteer refugee resettlement officer for the United Nations and as a deckhand on a commercial fishing boat in Alaska.

Wait. Excuse me?

He has also worked at Goldman Sachs…

That's what I thought you said.

The folks at Barbarian Capital caught the screen cap, though.

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Prez candidate @Evan_McMullin has deleted Goldman Sachs from his bio... I thought it was essential for public office pic.twitter.com/PZXm83hzsK — Barbarian Capital (@BarbarianCap) August 8, 2016

Give him credit. He already barbers his resume like a pro.

I don't have any problem with anybody's attempt to ratfck the campaign of El Caudillo de Mar-A-Lago, which, after all, takes advice from Roger Stone and Alex Jones. I wish candidate McMullin well. I suspect he will attain a kind of instant credibility and it's possible he won't lack for money. The conservatives who have not yet been assimilated are floundering and they're desperate enough to latch onto anyone. And if Ryan really is behind this, I will have to give him credit for a kind of political animal cunning I didn't think he had in him.

But, dear god, Republicans. You nominated He, Trump. Take your beating and regroup.

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Charles P. Pierce Charles P Pierce is the author of four books, most recently Idiot America, and has been a working journalist since 1976.

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