Frantic updates on the debt-limit squabble bringing you down? Let’s focus on something less immediate, but perhaps equally depressing: the race for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination.

Alas, so far, the GOP field resembles a “Hollywood-for-the-ugly” version of the mid-2000s VH1 reality show “The Surreal Life,” which brought together “a select group of past-their-prime celebrities,” like Corey Feldman and Vanilla Ice, and made them jockey for attention.