In an article aptly titled,  Why some Republicans are feeling shame,  The Washington Post s Sean Sullivan describes a party sinking into despair at the ridiculous spectacle of Donald Trump bickering with Ted Cruz:[Carlos] Gimenez is watching with disgust, as are many Republicans across the country, as his party s presidential race turns into a tabloid talk show. After a winter that featured anatomical insults, violent clashes at rallies, and fierce accusations of lying and dirty tricks, Republicans say the past week has been particularly dispiriting.Under normal circumstances, I would be cringing right along with them. In decades past, any presidential candidate that acted with such reckless disregard for civility would be shamed out of the public square. Even Karl Rove, the scummiest political operative in Washington D.C., always did his smears from a distance by using proxies that could not be directly linked to the Republican candidate.Those days are long gone as the two frontrunners really are just one thrown chair and a paternity test away from turning the Republican primaries into a full-blown Jerry Springer episode:The luridness has weighed not only on Republican elected officials but on voters as well. In a recent CBS News-New York Times poll, 60 percent of Republican primary voters said the campaign has made them mostly embarrassed for the party rather than mostly proud. The survey was conducted before the Cruz-Trump fight involving their spouses erupted.I imagine that number is closer to 70% by now and instead of cringing along with Republican voters, I can only point my finger and laugh. A lot.By the way, that was 60% of REPUBLICAN primary voters, the most faithful of the faithful. How do you think Republican moderates view the whole thing? Independents? Democrats? Yeah, when Trump wins the nomination, he s going to be utterly crushed in the general election no matter WHO the Democratic nominee is. How can I NOT laugh?It s even funnier to point out,  You built that.  And they did. So very very much. They fully embraced the incoherent rage and hate of the Tea Party because it won them elections. It didn t matter that your average Tea Partier was completely detached from reality and common decency as long as they voted Republican, attacked Obama and did it loudly. The conservative movement let the fringe take over because it was easier than admitting that the Bush years were a total disaster of their own making.And so the Tea Party dragged the level of discourse into the mud and buried it. They set the bar so low that it s now allowed Donald Trump to run the kind of campaign that used to be unthinkable, filled with vulgarity, violence and idiocy that is an international embarrassment. Even worse, the Democratic primary has been a model of civility between the candidates (if not their followers). It s like watching a family with two well-behaved children and then looking down at your two screaming neurotypical brats throwing temper tantrums. You want to be mad at that other family but all you feel is a burning shame that you failed as a parent somehow. Featured image via Getty Images