So, Frothy goes down.  (Which, truth be told, is not usually how he rolls.)

And thus we have the last joke about Rick Santorum and certain sexual practices which some people might find offensive.  Until, of course, he does something else that drives us all bonkers.  Or signs a book deal.  Or becomes a paid consultant for Fox News.  (Good God — the man is going to make BANK after this winter of GOP activist discontent.)

Seriously, nobody should shed a tear for Rick here.  The dude kept the torch alive for the hard-right wingnuts for three months longer than, by the merits, he should have.  I mean, the man was absolutely nowhere at Thanksgiving.  Disappointing Iowa performance, non-factor in New Hampshire, blow-out at hands of Gingrich in South Carolina, and… scene.  That was the prevailing theory.  But Tea Party types latched onto him like a raft after the previous torchbearers — Bachmann, Cain, Perry — flamed out spectacularly.

Trouble was, however, that he was never meant to be a Tea Party fave — as fully explained post-jump, which also includes a proper sendoff to our dear, departed nutcase, Rick Santorum.

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People have been trying to figure out who would be the Anti-Romney in the Republican field since forever.  Yet, there was one guy who was the undisputed Anti-Nutjob. There was one guy who stood up and, without saying it explicitly, declared what we all knew to be true: “you people are insane.”

It’s a weird tag on the guy. By most observations, Jon Huntsman, who according to reports is dropping out and set to endorse Mittens, was as conservative on most things as the others.  But the fact that committed several cardinal sins — serving the Obama administration, suggesting that climate change might actually have some science behind it, etc. — doomed his run, almost from the start.

The fact that Huntsman’s Ticket To Ride from New Hampshaah was to a political hospice surprises absolutely nobody.  But the departure is somewhat sad, nonetheless.  Some people thought that his dog of a campaign was cute — acting like it was people and everything.  They’ll be disappointed, surely.  Meanwhile, us dirty hippies are left with Mittens, Frothy, Newtie, the leader of the rEVOLution, and (at least for the next week) Ranger Rick as the only real possible opponents for Black Eagle.  If we were forced to choose between any of those clowns (should The Worst happen), we would take Huntsman over any of them, in a heartbeat.  Thus, the last chance for somebody with at least a tenuous grip on reality taking the GOP nod has come and gone.

And so: good night, sweet prince.  Let sane, rational angels sing thee to thy mansion.

Interesting.  You’d think that Shelly Bachmann would give it up, losing badly in her backyard and all.

It still says here — I insist — that Bachmann is done.  Anybody donating money to her at this point would do better at a slot machine.

But someone who doubled her up in the vote total has been strapped to the gurney.  Yes, fans: Ranger Rick Perry is going to spend more time cutting his family’s budget.  (Officially, he’s going to pray about the best way forward.  Given the results when he prayed for rain, you’d think that the Big Fella has heard enough from Rick for one lifetime.)

You have to admit, though, he was kind of responsible for the crystallizing moment of the race so far, when he drew applause for killing more prisoners than anybody else.  That, I must say, was a genuinely shocking moment, which you don’t usually get from a presidential debate nowadays.

For that, Rick, we say thank you. And fuck you.

Well, we lost a few guys before the election season properly started.  Seeing as The Donald, Sarah Plain and Dumb, Timothy the Dull, and Herman Cain were late scratches, we cannot really say that they were felled by the electorate.

Ah, but we can say hail, and farewell, to Michelle Bachmann tonight.  Born in Iowa, she was the only one from a state which touches the Hawkeye State, and somebody who was banking on the tea partiers and thumpers and disheartened Mama Grizzlies to bring her across the line.  And she looks like that she has converted her straw poll win into… sixth place.  Thud.  (Noted: the votes are still coming in, but it looks uniformly awful.)

And so, the Stinque Decision Desk is prepared to call it.  Shelly’s torch — lighting, incandescently, her bid to make Black Eagle a ONE! TERM! PRESIDENT! — will have to be carried by another sucker.  And thus she can go back to not sleeping with her husband, and to railing against energy-saving lightbulbs and HPV vaccinations from the august halls of the House of Representatives.

We come not to praise Bachmann, but to bury her.  So let’s do it.  And anything worth doing is worth doing right.

[UPDATE (2345 ET): Bachmann, channeling her inner zombie, vows to fight on.  No idea when the money runs out, but I don’t think she makes it to South Carolina.  Book it.]