ST. LOUIS—What's the latest news from the world's greatest democracy? Andrew Kaczynski has moved on over to CNN and he is on the case.

TRUMP: "My daughter is beautiful, Ivanka."

STERN: "By the way, your daughter."

TRUMP: "She's beautiful."

STERN: "Can I say this? A piece of ass."

TRUMP: "Yeah."

Must be a quote from Federalist 69.

The campaign of El Caudillo del Mar-A-Lago always has been a ridiculous campaign run by a ridiculous man who hijacked a ridiculous political party and now has rendered the entire American political system as ridiculous as the ferret he wears on his head. The ridiculous campaign, the ridiculous man, and the ridiculous political party cannot be considered separately. The ridiculousness of the political party, energized for decades by hayshakers, Bible-bangers, voodoo economists, jackleg preachers and the altogether crazy-assed elements of almost every political phylum, made it inevitable that a ridiculous man would run a ridiculous campaign one day. What very few people counted on was that the man and the campaign and the party would become so ridiculous that they would make everyone else ridiculous, too. Lord save us, he even managed to get the word "fuck" into the New York Fucking Times. Horseman, pass by!

Let's begin by sympathizing with poor Senator Kelly Ayotte, Republican of New Hampshire. She was just getting partly past the gaffe in which she called Donald Trump a "role model." But then came the electronic Reynolds Letter courtesy of Billy Bush and NBC, and now the Metternich of Manchester has to back and fill like she's digging the Erie Canal. On Saturday, while the wildfire was still raging, Ayotte decided that she can't…stands…no…more. Tiger Beat On The Potomac plumbs her political psyche for vestigial signs of sense.

"I wanted to be able to support my party's nominee, chosen by the people, because I feel strongly that we need a change in direction for our country," Ayotte said in a statement Saturday. "However, I'm a mom and an American first, and I cannot and will not support a candidate for president who brags about degrading and assaulting women."

(Left Unsaid: "And gets caught on camera doing it.")

So, disgusted by the presidential nominee of her party, Senator Ayotte—she of the soft-focus ads in which she talks earnestly about protecting women's health and birth control—will write in the name of a man who once insisted on adding "forcible" to the word "rape" in a bill, who signed a bill mandating that women who have miscarriages hold funerals for their lost children, and who was the original guiding force behind the spurious campaign to defund Planned Parenthood. This makes Kelly Ayotte look ridiculous.

Or, let's spare a kind thought for Joe Heck, who's running for the Senate out in Nevada. He, too, finally came to the conclusion that crude and stupid had gotten out of balance in the Republican Party and disavowed his party's presidential candidate. He announced this publicly, and he got booed, as Business Insider reports. This made Joe Heck look ridiculous.

"I believe that any candidate for president should follow an ethical and moral and decent campaign as they go about the trail," he told supporters at a rally with 2012 GOP nominee Mitt Romney. "And I accept that none of us are perfect." "However, I can no longer look past the pattern of behavior and comments that have been made by Donald Trump," he continued. "Therefore I cannot in good conscience ... continue to support Donald Trump, nor can I vote for Hillary Clinton." One woman in particular within the crowd expressed her dismay loudly, being the lone person to drown out his words with booing and heckling. Some initially cheered.

Getty Images

Or, let's look softly on Speaker Paul Ryan, who has had some harsh words for the nominee he thus far has failed to disavow, but he did un-invite him to an event in Elkhorn, offering the gig to Pence instead. However, Pence is said to be beside himself over the whole business, and that's at least one too many of him. He bailed on the event, leaving the zombie-eyed granny-starver to face the wrath of The Base alone, as CBS Minnesota recounts to our immeasurable delight.

Ryan announced Friday that Trump was no longer welcome at the rally after a recording was released featuring the former reality TVstar making vulgar comments about women. Trump's running mate Mike Pence was to fill in for Trump, but the Indiana governor canceled hours before the annual "Fall Fest" event began. Defiant Trump supporters voiced their frustration at Ryan and other Republicans who spoke at the county fairgrounds in front of two large American flags, rows of pumpkins and stacks of straw. Ryan — who said Friday he was "sickened" by Trump's words — was heckled with shouts of "Shame on you!" and "You turned your backs on us!"

It got better.

Wisconsin Attorney General Brad Schimel, the only speaker to directly address Trump's crude remarks, was heckled when he said "I know Donald Trump has said some things that are bad." "Get over it!" someone shouted…Many in the crowd made clear they were standing by the candidate. "Trump is a great man," said Scott Reese, a 40-year-old plumber wearing a red "Make America Great Again" hat. "We all make mistakes." Jean Stanley, a 50-year-old woman from New Berlin, Wisconsin, came to the rally wearing a pink T-shirt with bold, black lettering that said "Wisconsin Women Love Trump." "He's a real human," Stanley said. "It was a long time ago. We all have something in our past. He was a Hollywood icon then." Julie Marso, from Milwaukee, said she still supports Trump. "You should vote according to the issues facing this country, not the kind of dirt you can dig up on people," she said.

You bet, folks. Don't let those RINO bastards stab a genuine Hollywood icon—and real human—in the back.

Do I mock? Of course, I do. The Republican Party has been edging toward this catastrophe for 40 years, ever since it let goons like the late Terry Dolan help run its senatorial campaigns in the late 1970s. Dolan led to Lee Atwater, who led to Karl Rove and, altogether, they made Donald Trump not an aberration, but a culmination. It took into itself the debris of American apartheid. It allied itself with radicalized American Protestantism. It adopted a basic political philosophy of vandalism and nihilism. When confronted with an opportunity for human decency, such as in the case of Terri Schiavo, the party opted for cruelty. When presented an opportunity for political unity, such as in the aftermath of the attacks of September 11, the party opted for the despicable in domestic politics and for the barbaric overseas. When handed an opportunity to change course, such as when the deregulated casino economy nearly destroyed the world in 2008, it doubled down on the basic economic philosophy that caused the wreckage in the first place. And when it became plain that the party was on the wrong side of history, such as the movement for marriage equality, it chose to work in the states through pestiferous god-botherers like Mike Pence, whose name Kelly Ayotte will write in for president.

The Republican Party has been edging toward this catastrophe for 40 years.

When it won, the party opted for triumphalism. When it lost, it opted for obstruction. It has blown through democratic norms in every branch of the government. In the executive, it lied and tortured and worked almost exclusively to shove as much of the country's wealth upwards. As a legislative majority, it has consistently refused to do even the most fundamental tasks of governing the country. In the judiciary, the judges so carefully nurtured in the think-tank terrariums of the organized Right have let loose a flood of money into our politics and have worked assiduously to carve away the franchise from the people who might most inconvenience the party on Election Day. They have come dangerously close to completing the project of creating a new Jim Crow to ensure a new Gilded Age. And now, there are not sufficient roosts for all the chickens. If you have a party dedicated to vandalism and nihilism, how can you possibly be surprised when your presidential nomination is spirited away by a career vandal and a superior nihilist?

It doesn't matter now if he drops out or not. He has shown the world what the black heart of modern Republicanism—and of the modern form of conservatism that drives it—really looks like. He has become its beau ideal. He will stand for it until the party commits itself to real change and genuine outreach to those people it now only employs as targets for its timorous angry base to aim at. Whether he stays or whether he goes—and, god, I hope he stays—Donald Trump has burned down all the camouflage. He is what they are.

Donald Trump has burned down all the camouflage. He is what they are.

So, yes, I mock. I mock out of pure schadenfreude, thinking of what happened to good people like George McGovern and Frank Church when the NCPAC wolves came to the door. I mock almost reflexively, when I think of that idiot with the Purple Heart Band-Aid at the 2004 Republican National Convention, and of the Swift Boat mendacity aimed at John Kerry's undeniable heroism. I mock angrily, when I think of the atrocities carried out in my name, and when I think about the abandonment of the political commonwealth for private gain. Donald Trump was inevitable, and one way you can tell he was inevitable is that, on every major issue, Mike Pence is just as bad.

TRUMP: "She's beautiful."

STERN: "Can I say this? A piece of ass."

TRUMP: "Yeah."

Of course, I mock. To paraphrase Lenin, what else is to be done?

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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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