Sometimes, figuratively speaking, all the money in the world can't change a political outcome. This very idea runs counter to all the dire warnings about money's corruptive influence on American politics, of course, but it makes it no less true -- at least in certain situations. For all those that decry politicians who "buy" elections, sometimes outright attempts to do so are met with nothing more than sheer indifference from the voters. I have no idea what this means in the grand scheme of things, but when it happens it's certainly worth noting.

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[ Updated To Fix Major Brain Fart: Somehow, while writing this column, I started thinking this year was 2016. Maybe it's because I've been so focused on the 2016 election cycle, maybe it is because this column was 27 pages long (in Word format) and took two days to write, and maybe it was just due to lack of sleep due to a very exuberant kitten joining our houshold right before I sat down to write it. For whatever reason, I've gone back and taken out all the "2016" instances I could find and corrected them to read "2015." I'll do a better pass later, with a search-and-replace, but for now it should be at least mostly correct. I apologize for the errors, and will be getting some sleep soon, hopefully. Mea culpa maxima.]

Welcome back to our annual year-end awards column!

[Part 1 of this column ran last week, just in case you missed it.]

Before we begin with this week's awards, we have a few odds and ends to get out of the way first. Last week's list had the "Best Photo Op" category, and we missed a few that deserve mentioning. There was the image of South Carolina's official flag being flown at half-staff after the Charleston shooting, with the Confederate flag in the foreground, flying at the top of its pole.

In a more positive light was the photo of the White House lit up in the colors of the rainbow flag, after the Supreme Court decision was announced which guaranteed marriage equality. That was a pretty good photo op, and deserves mention.

On purely amusing grounds, Ted Cruz pretending to audition for The Simpsons deserves some sort of mention, especially him quoting (while twirling, of course) Kang and Kodos: "Forwards, not backwards! Upwards not downwards! And always twirling, twirling for freedom!"

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[Program Note: Due to the foreshortening caused by the calendar, I wasn't able to write a new column today. Instead, I've been working all day to get tomorrow's column ready, which will be the "Part 2" of our year-end awards columns. That will be it for this week, I might add, so here's wishing everyone a happy holiday weekend. In any case, check back tomorrow for the final 2015 awards, and for now, here's a fun Christmas column I wrote in my second year of blogging.]

Originally Published December 24, 2007

When is Christmas? And why?

These are questions guaranteed to get you funny looks when you pop them, especially in a gathering of wassail-soaked relatives. But if you're tired of hearing the seemingly-eternal "this is what Uncle Fred did when he was twelve" stories, and you're leery of bringing up politics with your kin from Outer Podunk, then it's at least a conversation-starter that's somewhat neutral. Plus, you can reaffirm your nearest-and-dearests' image of you as a latte-sipping fruitcake who moved away from the glory of the heartland and now lives on (say it with an embarrassed whisper) the coast.

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Today's article has two separate and unrelated parts, I should begin by saying. The first looks at the Republican presidential nomination race, and the second concerns Hillary Clinton and foreign policy. It's impossible to provide any smooth linkage or segue between the two (as the strange headline to this article pretty much proves), so I thought I'd point this out before I begin.

First, let's take a look at the Republicans. The big news today was that Senator Lindsey Graham has decided to drop out of the presidential nomination race. This leaves only (!) thirteen candidates remaining (Donald Trump, Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, Ben Carson, Jeb Bush, Chris Christie, Carly Fiorina, Rand Paul, John Kasich, Rick Santorum, Mike Huckabee, George Pataki, and Jim Gilmore).

It's hard to understand why Lindsey Graham hasn't gotten at least a minimal bounce in the polling in the past few weeks, since his entire political persona is to be the most belligerent advocate for the use of American military force around. What with all the attention on the Republican side on terrorism and the Islamic State, it's somewhat surprising that Graham didn't pick up at least a few supporters, but this has not actually happened. Graham still regularly polls at zero percent (or one percent, on a really good day), and he continued to do so even after the focus shifted.

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Welcome to our year-end awards columns!

As we do every year, we are pre-empting our regular "Friday Talking Points" column, in order to bring you our "best and worst of 2015" list. In homage to our regular Friday columns, we will continue to gleefully abuse the privilege of using the editorial "we" throughout, so get used to that.

Speaking of homage-ing, our very title is, as always, a nod to The McLaughlin Group, who came up with these awards categories for their own year-end shows. We say "homage" with every degree of courtesy and respect, in the hopes that this column won't ever get sued for copyright infringement (to which we would reply: "Fair use!" and "Satire!"... heh).

Just to warn everyone, this is going to be a long column, but it's broken up into smaller chunks for each of the awards. Even regular readers of "Friday Talking Points" may not make it to the end, where we bestow the Person of the Year award, so if you hang in there for the whole thing, our hats are off to you for your stamina!

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Program Note: I'm busily putting together the first installment of our year-end "best/worst" lists, and so am unable to write an original column today. Tune in tomorrow to see the result. For now, please enjoy the following, where I uncover a worldwide conspiracy that each and every one of you has participated in at one point or another in your lives. Yes, you! You're a co-conspirator just like all the others....

The Biggest Conspiracy Of All
[Originally published December 23, 2009]

Speaking as someone who generally enjoys a good conspiracy theory just for the "creative writing" aspect alone, in all good conscience I simply must report this shocking news: I have uncovered a big, fat conspiracy that is no mere theory. We're either being lied to, or we're joining in the propagation of the lie ourselves, with merriment. In actual fact, it would not be hyperbole to call this the father of all conspiracies.

And almost every single one of us has participated in this gigantic hoax, in one form or another, at least once in our lives. For many, it happens like clockwork on a regular basis. And it seems to prove Hitler's point about the "Big Lie" -- if you repeat it often enough, sooner or later a certain segment of the populace will accept it as being true.

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It's that time of year when Congress actually gets things done, so they don't have to work through the holidays. This is always a powerful incentive, and this year is no different. Paul Ryan actually bargained with Democrats instead of following the hotheads in his party into another government shutdown, which bodes well for the future of the House of Representatives (and America at large). But, as with all big omnibus budget bills, this means all kinds of unrelated issues -- from health care for 9/11 first responders to whether we export oil or not -- are tossed into the giant, must-pass bill. And along with the wave of other single-issue items came some good news for marijuana legal reformers.

Two riders to the big budget bill will continue to prevent the Department of Justice (which includes the Drug Enforcement Agency) from spending one thin dime to interfere with the implementation of state marijuana laws -- even though all of those laws run counter to federal drug law. This is Congress using its famous "power of the purse" to zero out the federal budget for fighting against medical marijuana state laws and hemp cultivation state laws. The medical marijuana provision is already law, having been passed as part of the previous federal budget. It means the Drug Enforcement Agency cannot spend any money on harassing medical marijuana providers, as long as they're faithfully following their state's laws.

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Once again, welcome to a post-debate column. As always, these are my own snap reactions, uninfluenced by what others are thinking or saying. Also as always, any of the quotes below were hastily jotted down, and may not be word-for-word accurate. That's enough of an introduction, at this point, so let's just dive right in.

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The fifth Republican presidential debate of the 2016 election cycle will take place tomorrow night. With less than two months to go before the voters finally get their chance to weigh in, this may be the last chance any of the other Republican contenders have of knocking Donald Trump out of first place. For many of the candidates on stage, Tuesday may be their last chance at remaining even slightly relevant to the race. There will also be a fierce battle for second place between Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz. All of this adds up to a fairly important night, and with Donald Trump at center stage once again, also likely an entertaining one.

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Hillary Clinton is right. Last night, on Seth Meyers's late-night show, Clinton had this to say about Donald Trump's candidacy: "I no longer think he is funny." Earlier in the week, the Huffington Post announced that it was un-banishing Trump from the "Entertainment" section and would now properly cover him under "Politics." Arianna and Hillary are correct -- what started out as a hilarious joke is no longer even the slightest bit funny anymore.

Donald Trump has the best chance of becoming the Republican nominee for the highest office in the land. Actual voting begins in two months. So far, nothing he's said -- no matter how outlandish or outrageous -- has had any negative impact on his support. His poll numbers defy political gravity. So far, no attacks against him have worked, and the GOP candidates attacking him have actually gone down in the polls as a result.

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