I challenged Donald Trump for the Republican nomination, and all I got was this stupid nickname

 Meatball Ron.  Actually, if we're honest, it has a nice ring to it, doesn't it?  If anyone remembered All In The Family, one could even give a half-nod to the notion of Trump as Archie Bunker, but either way, he did get the nickname, and I'm sticking with it.  Most Trump nicknames are silly and childish, but "Meatball Ron" actually works.  Yet Meatball never had a chance, and he finally admitted it.  Consider, if you will, my feeble attempt at a sport analogy, keeping in mind that anyone who drops the final -s is both pretentious and ostentatiously ignorant of all things "sport."  Nevertheless, I shall brave my own ignorance.  I am a professor, after all, and it is my job to claim knowledge regardless of qualification.

Suppose you are entering a combat sporting match against a competitor who has the favor of the judges.  The fight will be decided by the judges.  There are no knock-out or submission rules.  The judges pick the winner.  If your opponent strikes you, the judges will award him points because it is a combat sport.  However, if you attack him, in any way, the judges will penalize you because they are, like, totally in love with him.  [Well, why don't they marry him?!  They would if they could.]

Whether your opponent paid them, blackmailed them, or just mesmerized them with all of his orange-y oranginess is immaterial.  If you harm one combed-over hair on his orange, spray-tanned head, or even try, they will penalize you.

Got that?  He hits you, he wins.  You hit him, or try, he wins.

To quote Joshua, "the only winning move is not to play."  (See, Claudine?  Attribution.  Although, according to the new ideology of DEI, attribution and not plagiarizing is white supremacy.  Welcome to academia, 2024.)

This is not a game you can win.  All that can happen is that you can be savaged.  That's it.  So why bother?

Obviously, this is a 100% perfect analog for the Republican base and any contest involving Donald Trump, peace and blessings be upon him.

Oh, you didn't like that?  What, are you a Republican-o-phobe?

Once we make a politicized "-phobia" about it, you have to declare them oppressed, and defend their right to do anything they want.  See, that's leftist morality.  Now that there's a -phobia, you have to defend Trump's right to rape E. Jean Carroll.  In fact, he should have raped her to death, and you have to defend him or you're a Trump-o-phobe!  Republican-o-phobe!

You're a blank-o-phobe, and that's the worst thing imaginable!  Even worse than raping a woman to death!

Or, are leftists pretending to care about rape today?  So hard to keep track.  It's much easier on the Kantian side, where we just oppose rape, and never excuse it.  Campus leftists and Trump cultists disappoint us equally at this point, but cognitive consistency and moral clarity make for peace of mind.

Back on track, point being, no Republican candidate could attack Trump, and they knew it.  DeSantis couldn't attack Trump, knowing that it would alienate the base, which he needed.  Trump, however, could attack DeSantis or anyone he liked, the attacks being precisely why the GOP base worships him as their god.  How do you challenge a distant frontrunner when any negative thing you say about said frontrunner will turn the base against you because they are so in thrall to said frontrunner?

You don't.  There is no winning strategy.  This has been the stupidest "campaign" in history, complete with "debates" in which the distant frontrunner and inevitable nominee did not even bother to participate because there was no point, he was the inevitable victor anyway.

Dumbest campaign ever.  But at least DeSantis got a nickname out of the deal.

Someone could write a story in the spirit of Greek mythology in which Meatball's personal hell is forever running in a primary against Donald Trump.

Just eat me now, Cronus.

How about some '90s alterna-music?  Morphine, "Mary Won't You Call My Name?" from Cure For Pain.  Yes, this album was overplayed by every post-goth, faux-deep, pseudo-intellectual art school type and proto-hipster, and in fact, I did not buy a copy until many years later because I heard it so fucking many times in college from everyone else's dorm rooms, but honestly, it is a good album.  I admit it.