At this point Virginians are longing for the decorum and sobriety of a Trump-driven news cycle.

As it is, we’re like a day away from Trump making Seb Gorka military governor of Virginia.

In the statement, [Attorney General Mark] Herring said he and two friends dressed up to look like rappers they listened to, including Kurtis Blow [for a campus party in 1980.]…

“It sounds ridiculous even now writing it. But because of our ignorance and glib attitudes – and because we did not have an appreciation for the experiences and perspectives of others – we dressed up and put on wigs and brown makeup,” he said.

“That conduct clearly shows that, as a young man, I had a callous and inexcusable lack of awareness and insensitivity to the pain my behavior could inflict on others. It was really a minimization of both people of color, and a minimization of a horrific history I knew well even then.”

“On the other hand,” he added, “you can see that my appreciation for hip-hop dates back to the beginning of the genre.”

No, no, kidding. He didn’t say that. He’ll wait for his press conference to make that point.

Here’s Herring’s full statement. Congratulations to New Jersey and Illinois on no longer having the worst political leadership in America, I guess. Right now you’re asking yourself, “If Northam and Herring both resign over their blackface scandals and Fairfax ends up being pushed out over a sexual assault allegation, who becomes governor then?” Well, that would be the speaker of Virginia’s House of Delegates, Kirk Cox — a Republican. Funny thing too about how Cox came to be speaker:

Next in line is the speaker of the House of Delegates, who is a Republican because a tied delegate race crucial to chamber control was broken by the Republican candidate drawing his name out of a hat.

So. https://t.co/s6Y6ELI9rr

— Eric Geller (@ericgeller) February 6, 2019

We’re literally down to random chance in deciding who governs Virginia. Although if Republican opposition research teams weren’t so incompetent, we might have both a Republican governor right now in Ed Gillespie *and* a Republican AG in place of Herring:

Also, Mark Herring won his original election for Attorney General in 2013 over Republican Mark Obenshain by a mere 165 votes. Think a better oppo team could have changed that outcome?

— Jeff B., who on earth is this guy?? (@EsotericCD) February 6, 2019

Herring, by the way, called on Northam to resign a few days ago over his own blackface scandal, which seems completely surreal now that we know he had the same skeleton in his own closet. How Herring justifies staying on now after deeming blackface a de facto firing offense literally within the past week, I have no idea.

Maybe he thought his little blackface secret was in fact a secret — only to learn to his horror that it wasn’t:

https://twitter.com/jneeley78/status/1093190828229578756

That’s the only question I have left: Who’s pulling the strings on all of these oppo dumps? Is Kirk Cox in a dark room somewhere, orchestrating a “Godfather meets House of Cards” hit on all of his rivals?

Meh. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: Lincoln should have nuked these people when he had the chance.