ANNALS OF THE AGE OF TRUMP.

The long sad march of rightwing writers through the Slough of Donald continues. At National Review Jim Geraghty takes offense at something Bill O'Reilly said:

Last night, Bill O’Reilly offered an odd defense of the GOP frontrunner: “The reason I think Trump won in Florida is because he comes across as more authoritarian. Not authoritative, authoritarian"... 

There is nothing less American than authoritarianism. This nation was not founded on blind submission to authority. If we wanted a “concentration of power in a leader or an elite not constitutionally responsible to the people” we would have remained a colony of the British crown.

The people do not get to elect an authoritarian who will ignore the Constitution. An authoritarian is never the right solution.

Somewhere in hell, Jeane Kirkpatrick is laughing her ass off.

Meanwhile at the Washington Post Alyssa Rosenberg interviews sad sack Matt K. Lewis. He has a whither-conservatism book out, and seems even under friendly prompting to grope blindly for a solution. Inevitably he comes to that last refuge of a scoundrel, The Culchah:

I think, as I wrote in the book, I would really encourage conservative donors to take the money they’re giving politicians and find a way to sponsor talented people who have a conservative worldview who want to engage in the arts. And maybe that’s sending them to college, maybe that’s sending them to art school, whatever.

You know, whatever those artsy types do -- put on a leotard, paint their faces white, go to the park and pretend to walk against the wind, whatever. Come on, Koch Brothers, pretend you have a thousand sons who don't want to go into the family business and own a '57 Strat they don't know how to play! Eventually Lewis has to come up with a more concrete idea of what these artsy conservatives would get into:

If you follow food blogging or the sports world, all of these sorts of niche audiences — I say niche, there are millions of people who are foodies, who follow it very closely. And they’re really dominated by liberals, like heavily so. And of course, thankfully, they don’t spend all their time on politics, but it has an impact.

Countering Commie sportswriters does not seem an urgent task -- National Review's "Right Field" went down swinging after four years, probably because no one could tell the difference between that and a thousand other sports blogs. But food bloggers, that's a different story -- they were the thin end of the wedge on immigration, weakening our resolve against Aztlan by addicting Americans to chipotle and chorizos, and if they get us on garmi and sardi, thus falls the Republic!

Finally, over at Commentary, Matthew Continetti has a new argument with which to woo wingnut readers away from Trump:

What would Donald Trump’s most devoted supporters do if they learned that ultra-rich liberals living in New York City are behind his campaign?

Continetti buried the lede -- what if they find out Trump's a rich New Yorker himself? Then the scales will really fall from their eyes.

...It’s a virtuous cycle for Trump and the press barons. Trump benefits from earned media. The networks benefit from high ratings, which allow them to charge more for advertising. And all of the campaign ads and Super PAC and issue-advocacy spots desperately trying to stop Trump guarantee additional revenue...

Here’s the good liberal [CBS chairman Les] Moonves boosting the candidacy of a man whose politics and character repulse him, even as he acknowledges that what he is doing is bad for the country. And why? Profit.

That's capitalism, comrade. Maybe you'd like to phonebank for Bernie?