OPINION:
Political cartoonists from Virginia to California gorged themselves last week on caricatures of President Trump as a fat, orange-haired gobbler in need himself of a pardon. But the truth is the only turkey in Washington these days is Chuck Schumer, still the lowly Senate minority leader after the much-ballyhooed Great Blue Wave of 2018.
That would be the second Great Blue Wave of recent years, after the Great Blue Wave of 2016. Too many more of these Great Blue Waves and Mr. Schumer is going to find himself out of a job entirely.
But the New York Democrat’s seemingly permanent fixture as minority leader is not what makes him such a turkey on the political scene.
Having fewer members in his caucus, one might think, could make Mr. Schumer’s job a little easier to juggle. If being Senate majority leader is something akin to herding cats, then being Senate minority leader is like leading a guerrilla warfare campaign from mountaintops armed only with weapons that fire Jell-O shots on the enemy below.
Sure, Mr. Schumer is lucky to have such a mobile force. But they are hardly a stealth crew: Just about every single one of them is running for president.
You have Spartacus, still tweaking from his performance as Caligula during the Brett Kavanaugh hearings. Also known as Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey, Spartacus has been running for president since even before he ran the city of Newark into the ground.
Spartacus’ main competition for the spotlight during the Kavanaugh hearings was Sen. Kamala Harris of California. She, too, is running for president. Sadly, as of deadline for this column, Ms. Harris loses out to Spartacus simply because she is not sufficiently famous and ridiculous to be known by a one-word name.
Spartacus, The One and Madonna have all proved that global fame is not achieved until you are known by just one name. Something tells me, however, that if Ms. Harris stays in the game long enough, President Trump will assign her that one-word name she so desperately needs.
Just ask Pocahontas. She is known by only one name. And she too is running for president.
Also known as Sen. Elizabeth Warren, Pocahontas is also known in some parts as Pinocchio after genetic testing revealed she is less Indian than the average American whiteface.
Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand of New York, perhaps the only U.S. senator paler than Pocahontas herself, is also running for president. Once a sensible centrist serving in the U.S. House, Ms. Gillibrand has had to really put her freak on in the U.S. Senate to get attention.
Which is the whole problem for her New York seatmate, Mr. Schumer. With all these crazy loons in his caucus running for president from the Senate floor, Mr. Schumer will have a devil of a time just keeping enough of them in town and out of Iowa and New Hampshire to hold a vote.
Even more troubling is that since they are all running for the Democratic nomination, each and every one of them will be competing with the entire field of candidates to get noticed by coming up with the craziest, most left-wing, most stridently anti-Trump crackpot politics.
Before it is all over with, Sen. Bernie Sanders, the Vermont socialist, will sound like the level-headed, sane one.
• Contact Charles Hurt at churt@washingtontimes.com or on Twitter @charleshurt.
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