Jayne: Benton endorsing Trump: Blowhards of a feather …

Yet, while there is no word on whether Trump will accept Benton’s endorsement or whether any voters could conceivably be swayed by it, the occasion allows for an examination of the unavoidable parallels between the two. (Well, aside from the fact that much of Trump’s appeal is that he is the ultimate political outsider while Benton has been slurping from the public trough for decades). You see, Trump is a bully disguised as a would-be politician, while Benton is a bully who makes little effort to hide it.

Consider 2000, when Benton was selected as state chairman of the Republican Party. That led columnist Joni Balter of The Seattle Times to write that Benton was a “bombastic blowhard,” that he was “three parts bluster, one part bad manners,” and that others “describe him as an ill-mannered man who threatens people when he doesn’t get his way.” It led the Associated Press to write, “Diplomat, he ain’t.” It led the party to oust him when the position came up for a vote again nine months later.

OK, OK, that was a long time ago. People can change.

So let us consider 2013, when Benton filed a complaint accusing fellow Sen. Ann Rivers, R-La Center, of profanity-laced attacks against him. That led an investigative board to determine that both senators were at fault. It led Rivers to say Benton has a tendency to “blow up emotionally when faced with adversity.” It led former Republican Sen. Cheryl Pflug to reveal an event in which “he came to the front side of my desk and leaned forward. He put his face up against mine and yelled, ‘F&%* you! F&%* you!’ And there was a threat after that, something about making sure I didn’t come back.” The Columbian quoted a lobbyist who witnessed the scene as saying Benton used the F-word “as a verb, and as a noun, and an adverb, and an adjective.”

Support inevitable

All of this has little to do with Don Benton endorsing Donald Trump for the Republican nomination. And yet it has everything to do with it. Peas in a pod, and all that.

Benton’s support for Trump is three parts farcical, one part disturbing. Republicans are on the verge of handing their nomination to a man who conflates insults with discourse, who has no visible beliefs that can’t be changed depending upon the direction of the wind, and who is eminently unqualified for the job.

It is these traits that make Benton’s support inevitable — one small man endorsing another. Cut from the same cloth, and all that.