Pawlenty Gives Best Interview Ever

Until last night, this was our favorite Tim-Pawlenty-lets-his-hair-down interview of all time. It is now a distant second, thanks this pretty darn entertaining appearance on the Colbert Report. Stephen Colbert kicked things off by asking the former Republican presidential contender why he dropped out of the race. "I was out of money, and I came in third place to Michele Bachmann and Ron Paul. I think that's enough for any one person to endure," quipped T-Paw. And then Colbert with the zinger: "But the fact that you're out of money makes you relatable to so many Americans right now. 'He's like me,' they say."

Colbert then does some election-related math, pointing out that Pawlenty finished third in the Ames straw poll with 2,293 votes; Rick Perry came in sixth with 718. "Now he's number one. You were number three. He went from six to one. You could have gone from three to negative two, which means you're automatically president." And then things get really real. In terms of making a bigger splash during his campaign, "Did you think about learning to juggle?" Colbert asked. "I thought about shooting sparks out my butt," replies Pawlenty. (More Stephen Colbert stories.)