by Primo Encarnación y Hachecristo

My cousin, Jesus Hachecristo, and I were fishing up at Lake Sam last weekend. Jesus is a fishing guide up there, under the nom-de-angler of “Caddo Joe.” His clients are convinced he is the last in a long line of Caddo Indian shamans, whose spirit guide is a largemouth bass. Jesus’ spirit guide is actually pulque, but all this is another story.

While drowning our leeches, Jesus was asking me, the former political professional, what was up with Donald Trump. How does it end? It does end, doesn’t it? Surely to god he will not be….

Well, he won’t be President, but he could well be the nominee. So far, the Trump bubble has stayed aloft with equal parts hot air from corporate media and balloon juice from the candidate. For it not to burst, Trump is going to have to build a ground game to supplement the air game he’s already winning.   Without the campaign staff and volunteers to identify support, persuade voters and get them to the polls or caucuses, there’s going to be a lot of Trumpers wondering what the hell happened to their lead. Butts are attracted to warm, comfy chairs. Telling a pollster who conveniently called you in that chair that you support the guy from The Apprentice, which you watched from that chair, is one thing.

Getting your butt out of that chair, warming up the truck and driving to the Elks Club to stand for hours on end in a roped-off square labeled “Donald J Trump” in the middle of an Iowa winter? That’s something else entirely.

So what kind of moves has the Donald made to build his organization? Some rather surprising ones, it turns out.

First, in Iowa, he hired Chuck Laudner as State Director. This was a canny move: Laudner engineered Santorum’s win last time, albeit a win so narrow that no one knew about it until weeks later. He also engineered Steve King’s ascent to Congress, where Laudner was his Chief of Staff. Not a bad get.

But he also has some weird talent out there. Consider State Co-Chair Tana Goertz, a former Apprentice contestant who ran an Apprentice-style contest to recruit caucus leaders. Laudner’s Deputy Directors include Ryan Keller, whose only experience at this level was engineering Rick Perry to a 6^th-place finish in the last Ames Straw Poll; Brad Nagel, a retired Navy SEAL working for a “values-based” micro-lender; and Chris Hupke, whose 20-year political resume includes batshit-bible-crazy gigs at places like Focus on the Family, and the SD Family Policy Council.

Elsewhere, both his national chair and his New Hampshire chair are refugees from the Koch-fueled dink-tank, Americans for Prosperity, as are his national strategy advisors, Alan Cobb and Associates, whom he hired out of Topeka, KS.  Cobb, in fact, was once the public affairs director for Koch Industries.  The pollsters, Cole Hargrave, out of OKC, worked for right wing nutjob Gov. Mary Fallin. His team in South Carolina includes prominent Tea Partiers.

Overall, then, the Donald’s organization looks like a crazy quilt of wannabe-Trumpers, bible thumpers, and pump-and-dumpers. This Rube Goldberg contraption looks like it should fly, on paper, but it lacks overall thematic cohesiveness and direction from the top. It is here that I think he is vulnerable in the GOP primary: he can keep this spit-and-baling-wire contraption aloft, for now. But at some point, the Trump Flying Circus and Crop Dusting Company is going to have to bring this sucker in for a landing.

Alert the NTSB: it’s gonna be a helluva crash.

I’m not even real sure what it is and I damn sure don’t know why it is.

I can’t describe it.  You’ll just have to go there.  It safe for work and children.

Thanks to Sissy for the heads up.

… to see President Jimmy Carter on the Kiss Cam at last night’s Braves game.  They report he stayed the whole nine innings.  The least the Braves could have done is win.

Randy Neugebauer, the man of hollering Baby Killer! fame and buying a yacht with his campaign funds, is stepping down.

Best we can figure, he paid off the yacht and gets to take it with him.

He was also the idiot guy who chew out the nice park ranger at the WWII Memorial in Washington, DeeCee, like it was her fault the government got shut down.

He was not Texas’ worst congressman, but he was just such a jerk.

Remember that time Ted Cruz’s SuperPAC gave Carly Fiorina’s SuperPAC half a million dollars?

Ya think maybe Ted Cruz wants his money back?

I swear that Ted Cruz borrowed Michelle Bachman’s crazy eyes last night.

But he sure is a romantic sumbitch, ain’t he?

Thanks to Fred for the heads up.

Okay, Alfredo over at the Dairy Queen found us a new one.

Bishop Anthony A. Allen of Texas City, Texas, has himself a SuperPAC called “America We Can Do This.”

Now before you go all church and state on me, listen up about Bishop Allen.

Bishop Anthony A. Allen is an apostolic leader who also serves the community at large as a businessman, entrepreneur, investor, author, and entertainer. He is the founder and president of Anthony Allen Ministries, a ministry called to serve the urban community.

So basically, he’s the Texas version of Donald Trump now that he’s entered politics.  He’s 45 years old, has voted in every election since at least 2010 but has never voted in either party’s primary.

The Bishop’s church is located in a strip center in LaMarque, Texas, which isn’t exactly urban in any sense of the word, and his house is listed as the “Home Office” of his church.  Cute, huh?

His church is pure prosperity gospel – you give to the church and God gives back ten fold.

The one scam he didn’t have is a SuperPAC.  So, check that off the list.

Thanks to Alfredo over at the Dairy Queen for the heads up.