Pun Salad

As expected, Rand Paul's multi-million phony hit count has come crashing back to earth this week.

But (slightly unexpected), Betfair odds on Chris Christie being elected in 2016 have gone to 48, longer than our arbitrary cutoff of 30. So, at least for now, Governor Christie is outta here.

And (totally unexpected), Joe Biden's odds have improved to 30, which has us include him in our standings. Phonywise, he's edging out Rand Paul for a respectable third place:

• Biden's improved odds perhaps show that there's no such thing as bad publicity. As a WaPo blogger summarizes:

  First, he's getting heat for placing his hands on the shoulders of Stephanie Carter, wife of new Defense Secretary Ash Carter. Then, Biden said he has great relations with the Somali community in Wilmington, Del., "because an awful lot of them are driving cabs." (Fox News, Huffington Post) Worse, or not as bad, as the 7-Eleven crack about Indian Americans?

  It's easy to be depressed about the future of our nation when Biden's odds of becoming President are better than those of Rick Perry, Ted Cruz, or Bobby Jindal.

• Another significant phony news story was: Pinterest took down Rand Paul's fake "Hillary Clinton" page. So, alas, we won't be able to see:

  Among the pinned items on the parody page were photos of Clinton posing with Muslims, as well as quotes poking fun at the former secretary of state's statements on the killing of Americans in the terrorist attack on the U.S. diplomatic compound in Benghazi, Libya.

  Hillary's supporters deemed it "sexist". I get the feeling we're going to hear that a lot over the next (at least) 624 days or so.

• While the candidates are certainly phony enough, let's give some extra attention to the good old MSM, which did its best this week to live up to the "Democratic operatives with bylines" insult. As former Governor Tommy Thompson tweeted:

  The national media has now asked 2016 GOP presidential candidates more about Obama's background than they asked Obama in 2008

  — Tommy G. Thompson (@TommyForHealth) February 22, 2015

• I am not a huge fan of Jennifer Rubin, but she had some wicked fun with a competing journalist covering Jeb Bush's foreign policy speech/Q&A;

  There is a decided lack of seriousness among the press in the substance of foreign policy, typified by an unintentionally hilarious tweet from a Huffington Post reporter: “Ok. Tuning out now. I think Jeb’s pretty good at this Q+A thing. Real approachable. And obviously has knowledge/data points.” So whatever. Nothing remotely suggesting a gaffe so let’s tune out.

  It's sweet of Jen to classify the HuffPo as "the press", instead of "Democrat propaganda site". Although there's certainly overlap there.