If the candidates were your family, here's who they would be . . . Drink up

If the current flock of candidates were family members, here’s who’d they’d be . . . (Fortunately, I don’t have any family like this, but I just know you do.) Gather ‘round the table for a family feast.

Donald Trump is that loud obnoxious uncle who arrives at parties 15 minutes late, wants a Scotch and soda, but only if you have J&B. “Four cubes,.”

Bernie Sanders always arrives early, asks for a sherry and then sits on the couch telling your kids stories of his wild days at Berkley, “When everyone was a hippie.”

Cousin Jeb Bush quietly sits in that corner chair talking to your college-age kid and encouraging him to study business because, “That’s where it is today. Not like when I was a kid and political science was the thing.” He’s a professor now at a small liberal arts college nestled in the hills of upstate New York.

Hillary Clinton is the aunt who never got married, never had a boyfriend or a girlfriend and you used to wonder why, until one day a couple of Thanksgivings ago she laid into your Dad for “Caring more about your old dog when you got married in 1976 than you cared about me.” She holds a grudge and is scary, so now you guess why you never met a boyfriend or a girlfriend.

Nephew Marco Rubio sips his Cosmo and brags about how he just “told off” the local selectman at a local planning and zoning hearing for complaining about a company he consulted with for wanted to building a plant in wetlands. He’s kind of the snot-nose kid who was always whining through junior high and then wondered in college why none of “his old buddies” invited him to join a frat house.

Uncle Ted Cruz says he wishes he fought in Iraq, but had to take a deferment because he had allergies. “But if I was there I sure would have set those Iraqi bastards straight.” He later served two years as a clerk for a judge and decided he’d go to law school “because then that would set the stage for my political career and look good on my resume.” “I’ll take a rye on the rocks.”

Poor aunt Carla Fiorina lost her husband 20 years ago and hasn’t forgiven him for that.

Then there’s Martin O'Malley, the friendly uncle who lets the party swirl around him, talking to your Dad and others quietly as the cocktail hour goes on, touching base with each guest and asking them how they’re doing without too much talk about himself. His second wife is 20 years younger than he is, so you figure he says all the right things.

I guess most every family has a Chris Christie . . . a boisterous first cousin who wants you to know exactly what he’s doing this week and why it’s very important. He runs an auto reclamation business and “has never let anyone get away with giving him any crap. I let them know just how stupid they are.”

You’re not sure, but you think your wife’s cousin Ben Carson may have taken a few too many drugs while in college. He’s very quiet, but makes sure to tell you the movie Predator was actually a documentary based on a book he wrote about the hottest summer ever in South America.

Mike Huckabee, Rick Santorum and Rand Paul are brothers (your Mom's second cousins) who always sit at a side table drinking Merlot while they complain nobody pays any attention to them.

Your wife's uncle John Kasich wears a slightly rumpled grey jacket over a crisply pressed white Oxford tucked into well-worn jeans and seems happy drinking gin and tonics any time of year (“Could I have a little extra lime, please?”), though you have had a single malt or two with him over the years. He loves any part of the turkey that's left after everyone else has called out white or dark meat, bathes his mashed potatoes in gravy and lives near his old neighborhood in a multi-million-dollar house he had built after he sold his tech company 10 years ago. He never brags and spends every Sunday morning at a local soup kitchen feeding those who never had a tech company or live in expensive houses.

Jim Gilmore is your Dad’s half-brother, runs a construction business and can’t figure out why there are any government regulations at all. “Damn government does nothing but screw everything up.” He doesn’t know any gay people but doesn’t like them, and your Dad threw him out of the July 4 party last year because he started ranting about gay marriage. They still don’t talk much.

It sure is a gathering when they’re all here . . . Wives, husbands, kids and a bunch of friends. Mom always calls it a free-for-all, and I guess that’s pretty accurate. Personally, I love the gatherings, but I do try to spend a bit more time making sure we have plenty of booze before they all arrive . . .