This year we are seeing the most embarrassingly inept, nasty, dishonest, extreme (read: batty) bunch of GOP candidates ever, agreed? Even John McCain balanced out his then-running mate’s lunacy… somewhat… sort of.

But the unstable nature of this race is jaw-dropping, and so is what these mean-spirited hypocrites stand for.

I keep hearing how the White House is hoping for a Gingrich win, but then I get mixed reactions from various pundits and my politically savvy friends, including Democratic consultants and strategists. I never speculate, and most of the time these people end up being wrong anyway; I don’t yet have a preference about who will eventually pull off a win.

And then there’s that whole brokered convention thing…

…in which there are not enough delegates ‘won’ during the presidential primary and caucus elections for a single candidate to have a pre-existing majority, during the first official vote for a political party’s presidential-candidate at its nominating convention.

Once the first ballot, or vote, has occurred, and no candidate has a majority of the delegates’ votes, the convention is then considered brokered; thereafter, the nomination is decided through a process of alternating political horse-trading, and additional re-votes.^[1][2][3][4] In this circumstance, all regular delegates (who, previously, were pledged to the candidate who had won their respective state’s primary or caucus election) are “released,” and are able to switch their allegiance to a different candidate before the next round of balloting. It is hoped that this ‘freedom’ will result in a re-vote resulting in a clear majority of delegates for one candidate. [...]

The last winning U.S. presidential nominee produced by a brokered convention was Franklin D. Roosevelt, in 1932.

All that said, it is entertaining to watch them rip each other to shreds, and in some cases, do that to themselves with no assistance from their opponents.

Via Taegan:

James Carville: “Memo to Republican Establishment: Let me break it to you gently — you’ve got a first-class disaster on your hands. I know you boys thought this thing would work out and you would be able to whip the Republicans in line to fall in behind Mitt (I assume you are all males but if there is a female in the establishment, I apologize.) Not going too good, is it fellows?“

Andrew Sullivan: “This is the Republican crack-up people have been predicting for years. Gingrich is on a roll. I think he can win this – and then lose this in a way that could change America history. That is a brief impression in one moment of time. But I cannot see Romney winning this at this point. They are just not into him, and he’s an awful candidate.”

There’s more where those came from.