When the bent roadshow that is this 2016 presidential election season kicked off months ago — comprised of 17 gremlins, a Republican Democrat and a democratic socialist from the woods all running for the prize like the ingredients for the worst fruitcake you’ve ever heard of — I said to myself, “Yeah, OK, get ready, because this one is going to be really, really weird.” I bought a helmet, a mouth guard, and installed four-point NASCAR-approved restraints in my office chair. I thought I was ready. Just another campaign season, right? Stomp the gas, let’s do this.
My safety precautions served me well through those ridiculous GOP debates, through primary and caucus and absurdity after absurdity, but none of it helped after I crashed into the Indiana primary. When Donald Trump on Tuesday accused Ted Cruz’s father of involvement in the John F. Kennedy assassination based on a “report” by the National Enquirer, my finely tuned race car hit the wall at speed, rolled over twelve times and burst into flames. I was thankfully thrown free and landed softly in a hedgerow, but a part of me will always be in that burning car wondering how in the blue hell I got there.