The Birth and Death of an Overnight Conservative Sensation

How fast can a Republican Great Black Hope burn out?

Pretty fast I suppose. Here's Rush Limbaugh drooling over the guy:

Now, fine. Limbaugh wants his black man as fast as he can, since Barack Obama is the anti-Christ a successful Democrat. Rush wants him some electable minority, fine. I get it, he got it. Only he might have been wrong about Dr. Ben Carson's ability to avoid being labeled.

Remember Herman Cain? He had something special until oops, he did it again, and again, and again apparently, so it's back to pizza mogul or not with his, shall we say, aspirations not totally intact.

But African-American Dr. Ben Carson, neurosurgeon and academic and all at Johns Hopkins, maybe he's got game good enough for a conservative to take back the White House. It's like conservatives would have -- oh my god, say it!! -- their own [African-American candidate].

So Our Hero opens his mouth and says on Hannity:

Well, my thoughts are that marriage is between a man and a woman. It's a well-established, fundamental pillar of society and no group, be they gays, be they NAMBLA, be they people who believe in bestiality. It doesn't matter what they are. They don't get to change the definition. So he, it's not something that is against gays, it's against anybody who wants to come along and change the fundamental definitions of pillars of society. It has significant ramifications.

That my Ben, my Doctor, my brain surgeon, is a mouthful. How soon will you have to walk back that comment? TPM reports:

Dr. Ben Carson, the neurosurgeon who's emerged as a star on the right, said Friday that he wants to restore civility to American political discourse and acknowledged that he is prepared to step down as commencement speaker at Johns Hopkins University.

Dr. Ben might have undertaken his civility quest, oh I don't know, starting just before he compared homosexuality to pedophilia and bestiality, don't you think?

Your political career lasted, what, ten minutes?

Found the videos. On Hannity:

...and then walking it back:

I guess Carson hasn't made up his mind whether to join Reince Priebus's Reformed Republican Party or Bobby Jindal's Unreformed Stupid Party. Good luck deciding that.

Brain surgeon. Wow.

Addendum. Something from TPM's Josh Marshall too cool not to add:

Over the last few days, as the emerging national marriage equality consensus has become more clear, a number of social conservatives have begun suggesting they are now in a new and oppressive climate in which they’re no longer able to speak their minds about the immorality of homosexuality or why laws should discriminate against gays.

Or, to put it more bluntly, they say they’re losing their right to calls gays gross and weird.

Yep. When the icky factor slips through the fingers of the culture warriors, you know the battle is nearing the end. On this front, anyway.

Sore Loser Update. Rush Limbaugh was early to declare Dr. Ben Carson a wunderkind, so now he must decry that "we're losing the country." Josh Marshall was right on the money, turns out:

Culture warrior running out of the icky. As Atrios would say, ruh roh.