As you look at the . . . (sigh) 17 Republicans competing for the 2016 nomination, do you feel like all of them have been fully engaged in the ideological and political battle with the Obama administration since the beginning?

I mentioned this in yesterday’s Jolt in relation to Jim Gilmore, but some conservatives might ask if other candidates — George Pataki? Jeb Bush? — were a little too quiet, and a little too disengaged, during the great political battles of the past seven years.

Where the heck have you been, Jim Gilmore?
In the minds of Republicans, President Obama and his team have been fervently at work in their task of “fundamentally transforming the United States of America.” Passing Obamacare. Wrecking our relationships with our allies while bending over backward to accommodate our enemies. Dismissing ISIS as a “JV team.” Trading five Taliban for a guy who deserted. Lying to the country about Benghazi. Running up the debt. Wasting stimulus funds. Politicizing the IRS. Making an abominable mess at the VA. Issuing an executive order imposing quasi-amnesty.
Where’s Gilmore been for the past seven years? Tea-party activists or grassroots conservatives, as you look back at the past seven years or so, do you feel like Jim Gilmore had your back?
I remember somebody asked a question like this, perhaps unfairly, of Ben Carson, something in the vein of, “I love what he said at that national prayer-breakfast speech. I loved the courage he showed, speaking his mind on sensitive topics like Obamacare with a disapproving president sitting up on that stage with him. That took real courage. But that was 2013. Where was he when the Tea Party was fighting Obamacare? Where was he when Obama was rising in 2007 and 2008? Where was he when Romney was trying to make Obama a one-term president in 2012?”

Of course, Carson could offer a pretty good reply, “I was busy performing life-saving brain surgeries on children.”