Posted with many LOLs: "The decline of Rand Paul" by Dana Milbank [View all]

[FSogol]

Rand Paul took a left turn on his journey to the Republican nomination, and now his hopes seem to be headed south.

SNIP

The most recent national poll, by Fox News, has Paul in sixth place, with 7 percent, trailing Jeb Bush, Ben Carson, Scott Walker, Mike Huckabee and Marco Rubio. Paul averages only about half the support he had late in 2013. Paul doesn’t appear to be winning over young voters — perhaps the most important justification for his candidacy — and does not do better than other Republicans, according to a survey released last month by Harvard University’s Institute of Politics. Even in his home state, a media consortium poll this month found that Paul had lost his lead in a theoretical matchup with Clinton.

Paul’s declining standing can be felt in Washington. Last week, he attempted to reprise his wildly successful 2013 filibuster, which caught fire on social media and forced party leaders to take notice. But this time Paul found indifference as he fought to limit government surveillance. As The Post’s Philip Bump reported, it got only about one-tenth of the Twitter attention that his first effort did. Television footage from the chamber caught Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) rolling his eyes as Paul spoke last week, and Senate GOP leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.), who joined Paul’s previous filibuster, openly opposed him this time.

On CBS’s morning show Tuesday, Paul was asked to answer his Republican colleagues’ complaint that his 11-hour speech was really a performance aimed at selling his new book; “Fox & Friends” minutes later asked him to respond to the charge that he is a “misguided ideologue.”

Whole popcorn-worthy article here:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-decline-of-rand-paul/2015/05/26/10a7b932-03e5-11e5-a428-c984eb077d4e_story.html?wprss=rss_dana-milbank