The Conservative Mistress Part II: The Main Card

Continuing this trade review of cards sent to me by Adam of My Cardboard Mistress.  See Part I here.

John Kasich

I really wanted spend this time saying how much Kasich annoys the heck out of me... and it's pretty hard to do that, but I couldn't find a card that I could relate to Ohio (the only subject he ever talks about).  Instead, Kasich gets a really neat picture of a couple narwhals...undeserving.

Everywhere I've looked on the trusty internet, no one really seems to have a definitive answer as to why Narwhals have these tusks.  They are actually extremely elongated left incisors and some of them even grow two such long teeth on occasions... yes, very much like a vampire.  These "teeth" are also hollow which is even more perfect for blood sucking!  Some experts say these teeth are for communication, while others say they are used during mating rituals.  I personally like my vampire theory, but I don't plan on publishing it.

This is essentially what I'm getting at with Kasich as well.  No one really knows why he's running.  He's very much a wildcard and doesn't really have much of a chance at the nomination.  I don't think he was going for the public acclaim either (similar to Fiorina or even Trump), because if that's what he was planning on, he's not really making a good impression on the American public.

Rand Paul

Rand Paul gets the Stephen Harper card.  I had to give this card to somebody, and Senator Paul is the person I can most easily relate Mr. Harper to.  Stephen Harper, former Prime Minister of Canada, was a famed economist whose ideals catapulted him into a leadership role in the Canadian Parliament.

Rand Paul is a very polarizing figure and turns many heads when he speaks (in both a good and bad way).  He is extreme and very adamant about his ideas regarding budgeting a foreign policy.  I wouldn't say that these two persons have similar ideology (I don't have the knowledge or background to say such things), but I do think both of them have gotten to their current position through a focus on the economy.

Carly Fiorina

Carly Fiorina constantly talks about her time as CEO of HP.  She's also been fairly high up on the totem poll in some other companies.  In any case, she gets the "working man" set.  This set was one of the two case hits in 2013 Allen & Ginter and featured 10 different subjects performing everyday jobs.  It was a bit of a bore of a set in my opinion, but I appreciate getting this rare card nontheless!

Chris Christie

I'm going to preface this paragraph by first stating that I enjoy Chris Christie.  Quite a lot.  He makes me laugh and he seems like a down to Earth guy.

Okay, now story time.

When Chris Christie took office in New Jersey, it was first of all, a surprise to many.  New Jersey has been a historically blue state and Christie represented the Republican Party.  Christie has since been making drastic changes to many of the ways in which New Jersey operates.  One of the more famous ones is his significant cut to pensions across the state.  New Jersey had no money to pay their retired people, so Christie chose to not pay them instead of raising taxes.  This policy decision got him tabbed as a pirate for essentially "stealing" money.

Just like our friend Hornigold.  I love this mini set from this year's Allen & Ginter and I'm greatly looking forward to reviewing it.  I know a lot of people that think the same because getting my hands on the individual cards I'm missing has been quite difficult!

Marco Rubio

I first must explain these two cards.  These cards are Ginter Code parallels from 2009 and 2011.  They are identical to their base card counterpart except for their border.  Pedroia's card features an actual code along the outside of the card that had to be cracked to win the Ginter Code prize.  On the other hand, Chipper's card contains black print "flowers" in the corners.  It was discovered that if you obtained all of these parallels from 2011 and laid them out just so, the shapes would match up and form a coded message.  That message ended up being a complete red herring, but I suppose its interesting nonetheless.  I recently decided that I'd try my hand at trying to put together these parallel sets simply because I thought it'd be a difficult challenge, so I greatly appreciate Adam's generous start (I got far more than just these two).

As far as Marco Rubio is concerned, it always seems like he's wearing a mask.  He always seems to be hiding his true self behind pretty words.  Granted, that's part of politics, and this year is the first in a very long time where candidates actually seem to be striving for truth and blunt honesty.  While I don't believe Rubio is a crook or a complete weasel, he certainly isn't Trump, Cruz, or Christie, who seem to revel in jamming truth down our throats.

Rubio masks the real thing with pretty borders.  He prefers that his poop doesn't stink.

Jeb Bush

Jeb Bush reminds me very little of his presidential family members.  Granted, I wasn't really old enough to know what the senior George Bush was like, but I certainly remember the younger of the two.  Jeb seems only to want to springboard off their past "success" and family money.  When he speaks during a debate, he is clearly passionate about certain issues, but I don't see or hear any drive in his words.  It's almost as if he has no desire to lead this nation.  Either that, or Jeb Bush is too proper and formal in his debate style.

Hence the absolutely beautiful cabinet card from the Pride of the People set featuring one of the prime tourist destinations of one of the world's most stereo-typically "proper" nations.  Every single card (if you still consider 4 X 6 pieces of cardboard cards) that I've seen so far in this set is stunning.  They remind me of postcards that you might find in a souvenir shop, which I think is brilliant.  I don't usually actively chase these oversized boxloaders down, but this is definitely a set I plan to complete sooner rather than later.

Ben Carson

Ben Carson has gotten a lot of heat for a commencement speech that he during which he claimed that he believed that the Egyptian pyramids were not built as tombs and shrines for ancient pharaohs and queens.  Instead, he claimed that they were instead possible built to store food (especially grain) in accordance with the story of Joseph and the Egyptian famine from the Bible.

This claim was quickly scoffed at for a number of reasons including ancients documents, complexity of the pyramids, and items found within the pyramids themselves.

Carson gets assigned the Easter Bunny... another very strange conjuration of the mind that apparently is derived from 13th century pagan Germanic beliefs.  This doesn't make me like the card less.  I won't get around to talking about this particular set, because it is quite rare and EXTREMELY hard to complete.

Ted Cruz

I don't really have much to say about Ted Cruz.  He seems extremely straightforward and to-the-point which has apparently rubbed most of his party-mates the wrong way.

He gets the world's biggest mammal simply because if you forced me right now to try and attempt to predict who would win the GOP nomination, Ted Cruz would probably be my pick.  I just see him as having the least baggage (at least at the moment) and probably has the highest floor of all the candidates.

Donald Trump

This is the card that gave me the initial idea to write this trade post in the this fashion.  If Topps had the chance to reprint this set in 2016, Donald Trump's roller coaster ride this year would simply HAVE to be one of the card subjects.  Every week that we get deeper into the primaries and debates, I have to marvel at the show that Donald Trump is putting on for us.  At this point, his name has been so ingrained into the news and media that I wouldn't be surprised if more people in America knew his name over President Barack Obama's.

I also keep telling myself that this campaign has to be one giant hoax, but at this point, I wouldn't be surprised if his name wound up on the final ticket (not as the presidential candidate mind you).  I could see these other GOP hopefuls trying to leverage his popularity and business acumen by choosing him as running mate... I don't know, maybe I'm going too far.

Those are your possible 2016 Republican candidates, one of which will almost certainly be running against Hillary Clinton in November.

Those also weren't the only cards that Adam sent me.  I only picked one mini from each set as he sent me quite a few from a handful of those mini inserts sets.  Adam also sent over some regular back base set minis.  Here's some highlights!

Thanks for the great trade Adam, and I apologize again for the vast amount of time it took me to get this particular post live.  Hope you enjoyed it!