Oh, right. This happened:

Former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum is ending his presidential bid, two Republican sources told CNN. He is expected to make the announcement Wednesday night and will endorse a candidate. Santorum won the 2012 Iowa caucuses and ended that race with the second-most number of delegates to eventually GOP nominee Mitt Romney. But he was unable to capture any momentum this year, despite extensive barnstorming efforts in Iowa.

I called it. Four and half years early… but I called it:

Rick Santorum was never running for president. He was campaigning for four more years on Fox News. Santorum—who was turned out of office in 2006, a political eternity ago, and didn’t accomplish much when he was in office—was going to share the stage at GOP debates with the actual candidates, maybe pick up a few delegates in Iowa and South Carolina, and secure a primetime speaking slot at the Republican National Convention. And then, in 2013, Santorum was going to stride into Roger Ailes’ office and demand a big fat raise—on account of his greatly enhanced national profile—to come back to Fox News as a paid contributor.

But that script depended on one thing: Santorum had to run a plausible campaign; he couldn’t embarrass himself. But Santorum has performed so badly, his campaign has been such a disaster, that he’s going to have to beg Roger Ailes for his old job back. Santorum trails Fred Karger, the openly gay Republican stunt-candidate, in some polls. (Looks like God was just fucking with you, Rick.) He’s made himself into a laughingstock.

Santorum thought his record of rabid anti-gay bigotry would help him raise enough money to run a plausible campaign. It didn’t. Anti-gay bigotry remains hugely important to the GOP base, of course, because beating up on the queers makes folks in red states—with their higher rates of divorce, teen pregnancy, and out-of-wedlock births—feel like they’re right with God. But anti-gay bigotry isn’t enough anymore. Because they’re all anti-gay bigots now. Bachmann’s a lunatic bigot, Perry’s a Confederate bigot, Palin’s a sub-literate bigot, Romney’s an opportunistic bigot, Gingrich’s a hypocritical bigot. And Rick Santorum?

He’s yesterday’s bigot.