Time for a GOP presidential round-robin tourney?

AS I WITNESS one potential Republican presidential candidate after another making a vacuous Tea Party-inspired statement in front of a TV camera, I confess my bewilderment over why the job should be so appealing to people who would be a lot better off managing traveling circuses. We are now hearing, for example, a lot of talk about impeaching President Obama, an intrusion that wistful Republicans haven't tried since 1998. The Democrats had a good opportunity to corner George Bush with much graver charges than sexual trysts, but, as is often their brand, they lacked the will to stir up trouble.

Anyway, I think I now know why so many Republicans are running for president: Truth be told, each one has such a low opinion of all of the others that they are convinced that this is their moment to run the table. That will become more obvious when, say, Newt Gingrich officially declares his candidacy. What other reasons can a retread in his late '60s with a thoroughly troubled past possibly have? And Rick Santorum? A religious zealot who was trampled when he ran for reelection to the Senate in Pennsylvania? So far, Newt is ahead in that matchup, but not by much. Mike Huckabee might edge Gingrich if he wasn't in the news each night for one more assault on Obama's legitimacy as a native-born American. He seems to be trailing the entire field in style points. Mitt Romney, a Mormon whose health care reforms in Massachusetts were ever so much like the new Federal law?

We are now past the point of no return, but you can see how this is going down.

I invite you to play this game as well as a sort of vapid round-robin competition that could end up with nobody left standing. In that deferral to democracy, you can at least fill in a blank to the end of the season. So I ask you: Wouldn't it be smart for the GOP to take a cue from the Miami Heat or New York Knicks and rent a name player to pose as a presidential candidate to relieve the party 's dearth of credible standard-bearers?

As of now, my choice would be, oh....Sen. Frank LaRose?