Just a catch-up post for a couple of things that have lingered on my desktop for several days…

The first via Instapundit:

The Never Trump Grift Goes On, but It Has a Shelf Life Now

The low-T doyens of the Never Trump movement who’ve been turning vitriolic obsession into cash since 2016 are still cashing checks, which may surprise a lot of people. Sadly, there’s still a lot of money to be made when any Republican wants to stab other Republicans in the back. That’s been true for a long time, but, as with so many things, it’s gotten more intense since President Trump’s first White House tenancy.

The standard sales pitch from the Never Trump Circus of Mental Unwellness is that all involved are motivated by the deepest, truest principles in the history of principles. They lie a lot for such principled people, though. They spent all last year insisting that Trump was too dangerous to be near power again and that they were working hard to prevent his return to the Oval Office. …

Watch an interview with any of the “principled” major players in the Never Trump movement, and they don’t even sound like they’re buying their own spiel anymore. They believed last year was their big shot to be movers and shakers in the GOP once again.. That gravy train has run off the rails, and the turncoats are crestfallen.

Fake principles don’t bring many smiles to faces.

[Emphasis added]

The flow down dynamics of such a depressed (and depressing) industry – from the big money makers to the small money makers and finally to the volunteers (or, more accurately, the useful idiots of spreading laughable anti-intellectualism via MSNBC Talking Points) – will be an interesting phenomenon to watch. The latter two categories are much visible in sort-of-center-right-ish comment sections everywhere and I have mentioned on more than one occasion recently the palpable aggressive frustration among that crowd in the days just before and after the official start of Trump 2.0. I cannot resist once again thinking back to those long ago condescending beratements by those more heroic and essential than me:

You want to invest it one man with 4,000 lawsuits, 2 impeachments and 92 indictments shackled to his ankles. And you can think that it’s bull, and you can think that your fellow Americans are stupid for caring about it. Good luck with that. It’s a bold strategy, Cotton. Hope it works out for you.

Still giggling.

A related item:

Principles First? More Like Relevance Last As ‘Never Trump’ Summit Crashes and Burns

There was a massive train wreck in Washington, DC, this weekend, and it had nothing at all to do with locomotives and everything to do with a crowd of Never Trumpers assembling to shout into the dark void that has come to symbolize their movement…

As you know from RedState’s extensive coverage, CPAC also took place in DC over the past few days, drawing in a dazzling array of speakers…

Across town, however, the vanquished remnants of the Never Trump movement gathered to collectively lick their wounds under the guise of a “Principles First” summit. The agenda included speeches from relics like John Bolton, Adam Kinzinger, George Conway and Chris Christie, and the audience seemed to be made up of establishment Republicans who were distraught that the party passed them by and was given new life by Trump and his supporters. Sounds fun, right? …

The only “principle” the Never Trump crowd seems to be standing for these days is losing—and they do it loudly, embarrassingly, and oh-so-publicly.

[Emphasis added]

One month into Trump 2.0 and this stuff still makes it into the “news” I choose to read…rest assured I will keep watching for such references as this insidious form of anti-intellectualism (and the sites that enable it) fade further and further into irrelevancy. Choosing the “Never Trump” side was always the exact opposite of a bold strategy. It worked for a while. Having suffered through the peak of the un-Serious Era in America and the condescending arrogance from these fools, I will enjoy watching this demise.

Have a nice day.