Cruz or Bust

St. Augustine famously prayed, Dear Lord, make me chaste — but not yet. The GOP establishment’s prayer is, Dear Lord, deliver us from Donald Trump — but not with Ted Cruz.

The increasing likelihood of a contested convention in Cleveland has led to chatter about such a conclave turning to a white knight who has the advantage of being neither Trump nor Cruz. House Speaker Paul Ryan, who ascended to the third-highest constitutional office in the land while (sincerely) saying he didn’t want it, is most often mentioned for the honor of winning a nomination he didn’t run for.

The white-knight talk has all the hallmarks of a psychological mechanism for GOP insiders to avoid acknowledging their dependence on Cruz, who is all that is standing between the party and what might be an epic Trump-led meltdown.

If there is to be a contested convention at all, it will be because Cruz beat Trump in enough places to make it happen. All the other non-Trump candidates have been tested and found wanting. The last of the alternatives more palatable to the establishment, John Kasich, is still searching for a state besides Ohio that he can win and has yet to catch Marco Rubio in delegates. His persistence in the race is a testament to how far you can go in presidential politics if you don’t care whether you win votes.

A convention could — and should — deny Trump the nomination, but it won’t be easy. There will be a perceived legitimacy problem in denying the top prize to the top vote-getter. This would obviously be magnified if a convention disregards both the first- and second-place finishers, and leaves Trump and Cruz supporters alike feeling that their man was robbed of the nomination.

And for what? Electability?

The only meaningful road test for a presidential candidate is running for president. Cruz has proved adept at it. He correctly read the mood of the Republican electorate and adjusted to Trump more skillfully than anyone else (not without some cringe-inducing moments). If it weren’t for the black swan event of Trump, Cruz might have effectively locked the nomination up by the end of February.

It’s not clear what white knight would be any better. If Ryan had run this year, in all likelihood he would have gotten chewed up and spat out like anyone else associated with the establishment. After a convention, he would be going from zero-to-60 in a pressure-cooker national campaign. I consider Ryan one of the most admirable politicians on the scene today, but lighting up crowds is not one of his natural strengths.

Who else? Mitt Romney? He had his chance. A governor? The plausible ones already ran. A senator? Ditto. (With an initial field of 17, the GOP wasn’t lacking for candidates.) A general? They are always better in theory unless they are named Eisenhower or Grant.

And who would make a white knight happen? He wouldn’t emerge like Athena from the head of Zeus. There would have to be a major whip operation at a convention. And it would have to out-hustle that of Cruz.

Commentators skeptical of Cruz’s chances at a convention revert to the cliche that he is hated. It is true that people in Washington tend to loathe him, but a convention wouldn’t be a Senate Republican policy lunch. It would be stocked with Republican activists from around the country who have no first-hand knowledge of what Cruz did to so irk his colleagues, and probably don’t care.

All that said, it is possible to imagine a white-knight scenario, but only in a convention deadlock that might descend to South Korean parliament-levels of ugliness. The best, cleanest non-Trump scenario is that Cruz has the strength to win on an early ballot and his anti-establishment credentials — and his tacking Trump’s way on immigration and trade — make a revolt by the Trump forces less potent.

In short, the only reasonable alternative to Trump is Cruz. This is the conclusion that Scott Walker and other conservative leaders in Wisconsin came to, and they backed Cruz to the hilt. Republicans around the country who care about the integrity of their party and its electoral chances should do the same.