The thing that you notice about lazy and incompetent people is that nothing that ever happens is their fault. Either someone else cheated them or lied to them or something. Their own fecklessness and stupidity are never to blame. Case in point, Maine Governor and Donald Trump supporter, Paul LePage. LaPage has some good qualities such as being pro-gun and pro-school-voucher but he also has the kind of racial insensitivity… or borderline racism, if you will… and an adherence to Cruz birtherism that makes him particularly appealing to a type of Donald Trump supporter. Critically, though, he is a weak governor and unpopular governor who could not make the candidate he endorsed competitive.

A flashback to March 5 and the Maine GOP Caucus

Now the mewling:

Maine Gov. Paul LePage is accusing the Ted Cruz campaign of going back on a promise to back a “unity slate” of the state’s delegates, a move that the Donald Trump supporter is portraying as “stabbing us in the back.”

 

It looks like small hands are a universal symptom of Trump supporters. This is LePage’s full statement, I hope you enjoy it as much as I did:

Was a deal reached? LePage and Kasich people say yes. Cruz people say no. In fact, it seems like this “unity slate” was more of a figment of LePage’s imagination than having any basis in fact. Until this childish outburst, there was no evidence, whatsoever, that anyone outside the Cruz team in Maine was invovled in the discussion.

…But now, Cruz supporters say that insiders are mulling a proposed slate of delegates from Gov. Paul LePage, a Trump supporter who is running to be a delegate alongside his wife, Ann LePage.

Earl Bierman, a Cruz delegate candidate and chief of staff to Maine House Republicans, said his camp has discussed a “unity slate” with LePage’s team to be apportioned according to the March nominating caucuses.

Rep. Joel Stetkis, R-Canaan, another Cruz supporter, called LePage’s proposed slate “an option,” expecting “a fairly coordinated effort to inform the convention as to who supports whom.”

and this:

There was considerable behind-the-scenes wrangling on Friday night as LePage and Trump’s campaign attempted to win support for a “unity slate” or ticket that would preserve the delegate breakdown that emerged from Maine’s March caucuses. After that potential deal did not come to fruition, LePage lashed out at Cruz’s campaign on conservative talk radio and in social media.

What seems to have happened is that LePage’s fantasy was not accepted and he decided to try to back the Cruz campaign into a corner by publishing a false “unity slate.” When the Cruz campaign did not go along with the sham, it was LePage’s duplicity that led to his public humiliation:

Here are the dueling slates at @MaineGOP convention: @tedcruz vs. @Governor_LePage. #mepolitics pic.twitter.com/y63hNPzxaz

— Michael Shepherd (@mikeshepherdME) April 23, 2016

What really has LePage’s mammary in a wringer is that the Cruz delegation played for blood. They tried to block LePage from being a delegate, they succeeded in preventing his wife from being made a delegate and they destroyed the “unity slate”:

Despite opposition from the Cruz team, Gov. LePage was elected on Saturday as a delegate to the national convention from the first congressional district. But the other five congressional district delegate slots were won by individuals listed on the Cruz slate, portending trouble for the unity ticket in the voting for at-large delegates.

LePage had said Friday that the Cruz team was working to remove the governor himself from Maine’s delegation to the national convention, according to a report in the Lewiston Sun-Journal. LePage, who along with his wife is running for a slot as a Trump delegate, would normally have been awarded the slot as a courtesy to the governor.

The fact is that if the will of the people is going to be honored then the “unity ticket” was a sham. Ted Cruz got more votes than Trump and Kasich combined in the caucuses. Why would he make a deal that disadvantages himself and locks in delegates to a couple of minor candidates?

Voting tallies haven’t been announced but, if the delegates present at the convention vote according to the will of the people of Maine, Ted Cruz will have twenty-one votes on the second ballot and they will have the pleasure of watching LePage, curled up in a fetal position, screaming.

UPDATED. Cruz loyalists swept all 14 at-large delegate positions.