Everything I need to know about Marco Rubio’s rebuttal to tonight’s State of the Union address was broadcast this afternoon when he voted “No” on the Violence Against Women Act.

As Steve Benen pointed out:

As for the final vote on VAWA, all 22 votes against the proposal were Republican men. Indeed, it’s worth noting that there are only 45 Senate Republicans total, so just about half of the GOP caucus opposed reauthorizing a bipartisan bill intended to help combat domestic violence.These Republicans — including Sen. Marco Rubio and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell — knew VAWA would pass the Senate anyway, but wanted to be on record against the law.

Got that? They knew it would pass anyway, but wanted to be on record for being assholes. Markos Moulitsas hit the nail on the head with this observation:

WIth his “no” vote on VAWA, is Rubio running for president, or just the GOP nomination for president?

— Markos Moulitsas (@markos)February 12, 2013

And there you have it, folks. What we have is the same old stuff, wrapped in a youthful package and slapped with a Cuban label. But it’s the same crap sandwich all over again. The same anti-woman, anti-worker, anti-science, anti-reality stuff the GOP embraces but which the country made clear it rejects.

Last week I linked tothis hilarious column over at RedState in which demoralized Tea Partiers strategize an amazing comeback. They seem to have reached the “acceptance” stage of their grief over November’s electoral ass-whuppin’, conceding the Tea Party brand is “effectively destroyed.” Their plan to return to prominence is best summed up in this pull quote:

Ha ha ha ha ha ha. Good luck with that, fellas.

Tonight President Obama will offer a bold vision for the country, and while not everyone will agree with it, I’m going to predict there will be lots of big ideas expressed with sweeping rhetoric articulating how the president views America. And I’m going to bet we won’t hear any bold, alternative ideas from Rubio — at all. Instead, I suspect we’ll hear moaning and groaning about the deficit and the budget (which posted a $3 billion surplus in January for the first time in five years), the size of government, taxes, etc. We’re going to hear about “burdensome regulation,” plus a dose of fearmongering about our enemies in the world, like North Korea and Iran.

It’s going to be a slightly less crazy crap sandwich from what we’ll hear from Rand Paul — Rubio’s crap sandwich will have maybe one or two fewer loony condiments (I’m on a food kick today, people. Sorry.)

And by the way, can someone explain to me why the Republicans gettwo rebuttals? If Democrats had tried that under Bush there’d have been no end to the whining about Dems hogging the mic and being in disarray because they can’t be on the same page and all that. But give me a break, is Rand Paul’s opinion going to be that much different from Rubio’s? Even the Republicans I know think it’s stupid.

(Also, speaking of stupid, can we stop pretending anyone gives a shit about Ted fucking off-his-rocker Nugent? Can I tell you how little I care if he’s at the SOTU? The only reason he was invited was to piss off liberals. Why on earth are we giving these people the satisfaction? Move the hell on, already.)

Rubio is the GOPs Great Caramel Hope and if he doesn’t pull a Bobby Jindal and trip over his teeth the press will probably hand him the 2016 GOP nomination right there. But so what. The party still doesn’t have any new ideas and that’s what counts.