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When John McCain joined Mitt Romney on the campaign trail this week, he brought with him something unfamiliar in this year’s race: laughter. Following former New Hampshire Gov. John Sununu at a rally on Wednesday, McCain said it reminded him of his favorite joke about governors: “There were two inmates in the chow line in the state prison and one of them turned to the other and said the food was a lot better in here when you were governor.”

A remarkable fact about the 2012 Republican presidential campaign is that it is not funny. Republican candidates give speech after speech and draw only a handful of chuckles, and the occasional wry smile. This makes for boring politics, but it also makes for bad politics. People want to like politicians they vote for and a smile helps with that. Laughter is also an effective tool for undermining your opponents and spreading your message with voters.