It's almost curtains for Speaker Paul Ryan, the zombie-eyed granny starver from the state of Wisconsin. It's nearly time for him to go spend some time with the clients for whom he'll get even richer lobbying. But he's taking advantage of being a gimpy Anatidae by giving us a farewell look at why he is the. biggest. fake. ever. From The Hill:

The California election system “just defies logic to me,” Ryan said during a Washington Post event. “We were only down 26 seats the night of the election and three weeks later, we lost basically every California race. This election system they have — I can’t begin to understand what ‘ballot harvesting’ is.” It was a remarkable comment from the retiring Speaker of the House, who until now had not joined President Trump and other Republicans who have complained about what they believed were election irregularities in places like Florida and California.

Usually, Ryan confines his innumeracy to the federal budget, but he seems to be branching out now that he's headed fully into the private sector for the first time in his adult life.

“In Wisconsin, we knew the next day. Scott Walker, my friend, I was sad to see him lose, but we accepted the results on Wednesday," Ryan said. In California, “their system is bizarre; I still don’t completely understand it. There are a lot of races there we should have won.”

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When pressed about his California comments, Ryan said it seemed “bizarre” and “strange” that Democrats would win all seven competitive House races in California. Democrats ousted GOP Reps. Mimi Walters, Dana Rohrabacher, Jeff Denham and Steve Knight and won seats held by retiring GOP Reps. Ed Royce and Darrell Issa. GOP Rep. David Valadao is trailing Democrat TJ Cox, but the race is too close to call.

“The way the absentee-ballot program used to work, and the way it works now, it seems pretty loosey goose,” Ryan said. “When you have candidates who win the absentee ballot vote and then lose three weeks later because of provisionals, that’s really bizarre. I just think that’s a very, very strange outcome.”

Gee, ZEGS, let's try to parcel this out, shall we? You fronted for an administration* that was xenophobic to the point of ripping families apart, apparently for sport, and for taking a brutally hard line on all immigrants, legal and otherwise. A somewhat gentler version of that was enough to end Pete Wilson's political career in California 20 years ago. And Wilson was reasonably popular at the time and not a maniac.

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Then, Ryan had a chat with the AP.

As for his regrets, Ryan cited not paying off the national debt and failing to pass an immigration overhaul. If those can be solved, Ryan said, “we will have a great 21st century.” Still, Ryan said he thought “history is going to be very good to this majority” because of the tax overhaul passed under his leadership and increased funding for the military. Critics have said the tax changes benefit the wealthy at the expense of the middle class.

As Ron Klain pointed out on the electric Twitter machine, Ryan, as Speaker, had a chance at bipartisan agreement on both these issues but, because the lunatic Freedom Caucus placed a lien on his balls, he squandered them both.

Remember when people thought this guy was smart?

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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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