Jesse Benton and The "Larval" Stages of Rand Paul's Presidential Campaign

HuffPo tells us that Jesse Benton, now Mitch McConnell's campaign manager, is keeping an eye on Rand operations:

While working for McConnell, Benton keeps an eye on the larval stages of Rand Paul's bid for the GOP presidential nomination in 2016. Paul has made scouting trips to Iowa and New Hampshire and fundraising forays around the country.

The objective of the Benton nexus is as clear as the water in a bluegrass stream: to use the Paul family's tea party ties to ensure that McConnell faces no significant primary opposition in Kentucky (opposition of the kind that Rand Paul himself provided McConnell's handpicked Senate candidate in 2010). In exchange for which, Senate Minority Leader McConnell will guard Paul's flank in Washington and bless him -- if not outright endorse him -- for 2016.

"There is no quid pro quo," Benton told me in an interview in Louisville earlier this month. "But the hope is that Mitch, having worked with Rand and seen him at close range, will tell the establishment guys that Rand is a good guy and a guy they can work with."

Yup, good ole Jesse, always there to push things toward the establishment. Now helping McConnell by getting Rand to block a Tea Party bid by against McConnell.

HuffPo knows the score:

Jesse Benton  a veteran of grassroots organizing and Washington consulting, straddles the Republicans' Tea Party vs. Establishment fault line[...] 

McConnell [is] a floor leader, five-term senator and certified member of the party establishment[...]