Anybody remember who else was on Paul von Hindenburg’s shortlist to be named chancellor of Germany in January 1933?

Could’ve been Baron Hoodat von Votsizface for all we know.

In most competitions, political, sporting, or otherwise, the runner-up doesn’t get a lot of press, the main reason being that s/he is the First Loser.

The winner gets the trophy, a parade, the keys to the Republic; the First Loser gets a polite interview or two — “Them’s the breaks, hah?” — and then toddles on home to gnaw on his or her liver before hitting the rubber-chicken circuit.

And even this shabby treatment is predicated on there being an actual competition taking place.

So why is the goat rodeo the GOP is trying to pass off as a horse race to nominate its pestilential candidate still on the nation’s front pages?

“Hope is not a strategy,” Chris Christie, one of the aspirants for the First Loser’s tinfoil tiara with bottle-cap medallion, told Faux News on Monday. Especially when one has none. (He’s sticking around anyway.)

Exactly why remains a mystery. The Joisey Jagoff and his fellow aspirants for the glue factory are still whinnying at each other in the paddock while Multiple Felonies lumbers around turn three, farting and wheezing old Nazi marching arias.

Face it, Chris, Nikki, Ron, and Vivek. The only horse’s ass in this race that matters is the one you haven’t even seen since before the starter’s pistol fired. You’re racing for second against a fat Nazi.

Even Hindenburg beat Adolf Hitler, f’fucksake. Only once, and not for good. But still.