He was very old and in the way, until he got to the hit list. The hit list energized him. It turned on all his lights. It was the pure, uncut evil juju that had been missing from his life for months and, generous demon from the depths of hell that he is, he shared it with all the minions gathered at CPAC in Florida, and it made all their lights shine.

He dropped little jujubes of it amid the torrent of exhausted bigotry that seemed to bore even himself. There was a long stretch of threadbare immigrant-bashing during which he looked like a tired cabaret performer flogging his way through his Cole Porter Medley at a roadside Holiday Inn lounge.

Read the rest of Charlie Pierce’s piece at Esquire Politics