I spent most of the morning in the Apple store getting my electric Apple phone repaired, so we're a little late to our now daily summary of the activities down at Camp Runamuck. But it seems that, prior to his trip out to West Allis, Wisconsin, El Caudillo del Mar-A-Lago met not only with the newly discharged Kanye West, but also with two retired football players, Ray Lewis and Jim Brown, both of whom have had run-ins with the law.

"Two great guys!" the president-elect tweeted. So that happened.

So then the president-elect went out to Wisconsin and made both Paul Ryan and Scott Walker put on an entertaining puppet show in front of an appreciative crowd. From The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel:

President-elect Trump praised Ryan during their first joint appearance. "He's like a fine wine," President-elect Trump said of Ryan at his West Allis, Wisconsin rally. "Every day that goes by, I get to appreciate his genius more and more." Ryan has had an at-times tumultuous relationship with President-elect Trump during the 2016 election. Two previous times the men were set to campaign together were scuttled, including one in the wake of the release of the "Access Hollywood" tape where President-elect Trump described sexually assaulting women. In the wake of the tape, Ryan told House Republicans in October that he would no longer defend the nominee and would devote the remainder of the campaign season to helping Republicans in down ballot races. "It was before I had my driver's license the last time Wisconsin went Republican. This is amazing," Ryan said Tuesday in West Allis. "I want to thank Donald Trump. I want to thank Mike Pence."

Trump was preceded to the podium by, among other people, the deranged Sheriff David Clarke of Milwaukee County, who has not had someone [link href='http://www.jsonline.com/story/news/investigations/2016/09/15/death-county-jail-ruled-homicide-inmate-had-no-water-days/89960362/' target='_blank' 0='data-tracking-id="recirc-text-link"' link_updater_label='external']die of thirst in his county jail

During his speech, Milwaukee County Sheriff David A. Clarke Jr. mocked reports of Russian interference in the presidential election, calling it "the Russian conspiracy," and said the United States intelligence should instead investigate George Soros and liberal threats against conservatives.

in a couple of months, nor has a newborn infant expired on a cell floor in almost as long. Clarke did not disappoint, per the Journal-Sentinel:

Oh, OK. Wisconsin has turned into a real political chronic ward.

Meanwhile, back in Manhattan, the Team of Rascals was filling out nicely. The prospective Secretary of the Interior is a Congressman from Montana named Ryan Zinke. He is what will pass for a "moderate" on the Trump environmental team, since he believes in exploiting the public lands rather than selling them off wholesale. The essential Montana Cowgirl blog has been tracking Zinke for a while. It pointed out that Zinke, a former SEAL, may have inflated his military derring-do. It also points us to an old story in The Washington Times.

You may recall that, a while back, American conservatives developed an ensemble crush on Vladimir Putin, who rode horses bareback. (Rrrrrowrrrrr!). The president-elect was quite loose with unflattering comparisons between the incumbent president and the Russian autocrat. Zinke, who'd clambered onboard the Trump Train early in the game, agreed, and nobody was made quite as tingly by the Muscovite muscleman as was Congressman Zinke. From [link href='http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2016/sep/9/trump-praise-putin-thumbs-up-navy-seal-congressman/' target='_blank' 0='data-tracking-id="recirc-text-link"' link_updater_label='external']The Washington Times

"There is no doubt that for the Russian people Vladimir Putin is a more effective leader than our president is for the American people," said Rep. Ryan Zinke, Montana Republican and the first Navy SEAL to serve in the House of Representatives. Mr. Zinke said that was how he interpreted Mr. Trump's remarks, which have been sharply criticized by Democrat nominee Hillary Clinton and her allies. The former SEAL Team Six team leader cited Mr. Putin's successes annexing Crimea, spreading Russian influence in Ukraine and planting the Russian flag at the North Pole, claiming sovereignty over a large portion of the Arctic Ocean. [Emphasis mine] On the other hand, Mr. Zinke said, America's president sent $1.7 billion in cash to Iran, the world's largest state sponsor of terrorism.

No mention of Syria in there among Putin's foreign policy triumphs. Must've been an oversight.

Nonetheless, Secretary Zinke is going to be another Putin fanboy in the executive branch. Some of the leftier-than-thou folks who keep calling me a McCarthyite will have to tell me how many of these people have to get hired before I stop believing in coincidence. And then there's Michael Flynn, who apparently takes national security material to swap meets and tries to get a load of magic beans for his trouble.

What fresh hell awaits us on Thursday, only god or Kanye can tell.

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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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