He wins. Steve Stockman wins.

First we get him defeated at the voting booth. Then we indict him. But, bygawd, this is one libertarian/conservative who wins the prize.

Stockman spent his congressional career stomping and yelling about the damn government. He wanted the government out of everything. No government means good government.

Uh, until now. He appeared in court yesterday and told the judge he only has $17 in his bank account so he can’t afford a lawyer. He can’t work either since his job requires him to travel out of the country but he can’t do that while he’s out on bond.

The guy stole close to $1.2 million of charitable contributions. He’s a scam artist. But, he’s a master at scam artistry because he told the judge ….

Stockman told the judge he needed to dismiss his hand-picked lawyers from the elite firm of Smyser Kaplan & Veselka and ideally he wanted the court to re-appoint them to the case at the government’s expense. She said she’d consider the request.

She’d consider it? Wait, wait, every other defendant in the courtroom gets what they get from the public defender system, but this guy wants us to pay for his fancy-pants hand-picked white collar crime law firm? Oh hell, no.

So overnight this guy goes from wanting to destroy the government to wanting to buy lobster with food stamps, something he used to accuse others of doing?

Stockman admits that he owns a house, rental property, two vans and his wife makes $72 grand a year. He can pay his lawyer.

I hate Republicans. I really do.