Back in 2014, I spent a day in Iowa following Joni Ernst around toward the end of her successful campaign for the Senate. We had one memorable encounter at a small manufacturing plant in Newton that kicked up a little fuss, and that embedded in me a curiosity as to what Ernst might do after she was elected. Frankly, it was a little disappointing. She largely kept her head down, did the workhorse stuff of a rookie senator, and she worked through a very rough patch in her personal life. Where was the woman whose trolley had so thoroughly left the track that day in Newton, I wondered. There is no entertainment value here. She didn't even mention castrating hogs any more, and that was her most famous stage routine back before she got elected.

I was just coming to grips with my disappointment when she announced her candidacy for re-election the other day and, boy howdy, that trolley went freaking airborne. From the estimable Iowa Starting Line, which was in the house:

Today as I kick off this campaign, I ask you to join me on this mission to stamp out socialism and protect the important balance between government responsibility and individual liberty. It is that liberty that makes our democracy the greatest nation mankind has ever known...Make no mistake, the forces of the radical, socialist left are on the march all across our state and across our nation. We must, we must do our part to defeat them. Our freedoms are quite literally under attack, because the radical left will stop at nothing until socialism has spread from coast to coast.

This fight isn’t over and there’s more work to be done to push back on the coastal liberal insanity, to stand up for Iowans, to stand up for our farms, to stand up for our very way of life in the face of socialism. To defend our country by strengthening our military and supporting our fighting men and women around the world. And lastly, to make them squeal!

Ernst is considered one of the Senate's marginally vulnerable Republican incumbents this time around, so it was all hands on deck for the bikers-and-beef hootenanny at which she announced she was running again. Mike Pence showed up, as did Nikki Haley. In this, we got a preview of what the general Republican line of attack will be for the next year-and-a-half for all elective offices, large and small: Socialism, socialism, socialism.

Nobody will define it, of course. For example, back in May, for the second time, the president* backed up the Brink's truck and piled $16 billion into the hands of American farmers who are getting murdered by his trade war with China. Ernst was not opposed to this obvious outbreak of rank socialism. Oh, no, not a bit. From the Des Moines Register:

“The farmers are thankful that they are getting supplemental assistance from the federal government, but we have to remember our farmers, they would much rather grow their goods and get them off to market,” Ernst said.

And they would, if the president* wasn't engaged in his stupid trade war.

Nice to have you back again, Senator. Shine on, you crazy diamond.

Respond to this post on the Esquire Politics Facebook page here.

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

This content is created and maintained by a third party, and imported onto this page to help users provide their email addresses. You may be able to find more information about this and similar content at piano.io