These go to 11

The New York Times had a piece up yesterday (here, if you can get past their paywall) about the congressional race up in the 'Couve. Joe Kent, the Trump "patriot" who wants to end the political career of Jaime Herrera Beutler, is under attack – no surprise there. But the brickbats are flying in, get this, from the right!

Kent insists the 2020 election was rigged, and has rationalized the violence on Jan. 6, 2021, by claiming that an otherwise peaceful crowd was infiltrated by Deep State agents provocateurs. In September, he spoke at a rally in Washington, D.C., in support of people accused of storming the Capitol, urging the release of what he called “political prisoners.”

But in recent weeks, far-right figures led by Nick Fuentes, a white nationalist who has spoken admiringly of Adolf Hitler, have started an online drumbeat claiming that Kent, a retired Green Beret and C.I.A. paramilitary officer who has a fistful of Bronze Stars, is actually a deep-state denizen himself.

The Democrat in the mix up there is Marie Gluesenkamp Perez. The top two vote-getters among all candidates, from whatever party, run off in November. With a big handful of Republicans scraping votes away from Herrera Beutler, one would think that Gluesenkamp Perez will get all the blue votes and make it to the November ballot. The other Democrat who was running for a while, Brent Hennrich, dropped out to make that possible.

But you never know. Perez's main problem is that she has no money, and the Republicans are spending like sailors. The ballots are already in voters' hands. Election Day is a week from today.