Apparently Marco Rubio was a winner in last night’s orangatango. Ted Cruz a close second. Rubio is okay — you know, almost safe enough to let out of a cage just not off-leash and not for four whole years. But Cruz. OMG.

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The only candidate among the many is John Kasich. He stands out as a solid grey rock in a field of flickering, translucent mauves, puces, and magentas. And he knew it:

“You don’t just make promises like this,” said Gov. John Kasich of Ohio. “Folks, we’ve got to wake up.”

Mr. Kasich opened Wednesday night’s Republican presidential debate by warning that Americans are in danger of electing “somebody who doesn’t know how to do the job,” whose promises are the stuff of “fantasy.”

Unfortunately, we didn’t hear enough of that from Mr. Kasich, who was virtually the only one among the 10 top-tier candidates who seemed interested in reviewing his or her record in detail. ...NYT

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Rubio isn’t just a youthful purveyor of upbeat bromides and echoes of Ronald Reagan. If he were, Jeb Bush would have less to worry about, and so would Hillary Clinton. Beneath his bland exterior lurks a shrewd and feline political operator, with an instinctive sense of balance and a set of claws capable of drawing blood. …JohnCassidy,NewYorker

A stratum of irony lay beneath the debate last night: Jeb Bush was, for a long time, a friend (competitive friend, but friend and mentor) of Rubio in the political mires of their home state of Florida. Much of Rubio’s perceived shrewdness was nourished by his current rival.

I spent a good (read frustrating) half hour trying to find the wonderful New Yorker profile of the Bush-Rubio relationship in the context of Florida’s ripe-to-the-point-of-rotting political scene. But running a search in that magazine’s archives is about as fruitful as looking for a …you don’t want to know the simile I had in mind… Sorry. Onward and upward.
Cross-posted from Prairie Weather