[sargon]

While your tireless advocacy for Ted Cruz is laudable, and acknowledging your predictable antagonism for Donald Trump, you seem to be analyzing this process in more theoretical than realistic terms.

In order for either Cruz or Trump to win the Presidency, they must get elected by a national electorate that is not in any way dominated by purist conservative Republicans.

Realistically speaking, and without putting excess dependence on "polling", I think that it is Donald Trump who has captured the imagination and pulse of the American electorate, and who has the momentum and the wind at his back.

I personally believe that Trump's path to a general election victory is much broader, and Cruz's much more difficult.

If electability is the only consideration, I think that the advantage is Trump's.

But, additionally, given the momentum factor, the charisma factor, or the interest factor, I think Trump also has the advantage here as well.

Cruz's strength lies in his ideological integrity, if you will.

Though I prefer Cruz ideologically, I honestly don't believe that his ideological integrity will be enough to sway enough voters to win a general election.

Trump deserves the national lead that he has, especially in the face of his "missteps".

Trump will appeal to a much wider swath of voters, and will make electoral inroads into traditionally Democratic demographics.

That, combined with the leadership Trump has shown, the huge enthusiastic crowds, and in general the overall momentum, outweighs other considerations, IMHO.

Ted Cruz isn't going to achieve frontrunner status by default! he will have to seize on something. But it is Trump who has broght focus to the issues Americans care most about.

Cruz's "steady wins the race" strategy probably would have been effective in many election cycles, but I don't think that will be enough this time around.

But Rah! Rah! Rah! keep up the cheerleading...

[nathanbedford]

I am not going to deny the obvious, the nomination of Donald Trump appears to be more and more "inevitable."

I agree that Cruz lacks the charisma of Donald Trump. I think that once a party nominates an individual with the forensic skills possessed by Ted Cruz that momentum will more than compensate for the difference in "charisma."

I also note that Donald Trump does worse than other Republicans in matchups with Hillary and Sanders in some polls.

I believe that this is the last election (if we lose) in which the Republican ticket has a chance of winning because the demographic tsunami is about to wash over America and render conservatism as irrelevant as it is in Europe. But for this election only the fates have combined to present an opportunity in which any competent Republican candidate can win the general election. Hillary is likely to be indicted in my view. The Democrats even if she is not indicted will be thrown into chaos as Bernie Sanders destroys her image of inevitability and brings back memories of 2008.

If we elect Ted Cruz we have a chance of saving conservatism. If we elect Donald Trump, he will have no interest whatsoever in our ideology and we will be left with the legacy of his ego and we will be awash in a demographic wave even despite his wall. We will have no demonstrably effective conservative ideology of proven and successful governance. We will have had Donald Trump.

So many Americans are fed up with the ideology of the Obama administration that they are ready to try a Republican. If our economic situation begins to deteriorate as the stock market predicts and as the events in China suggest, more and more people will be out of work (see this month's dismal figures) and that will weigh heavily against the Democrats.

It would be inconceivable that someone of Ted Cruz' abilities could not capitalize on these advantages in this environment when he would have full attention of the media and all of the trappings and momentum of the Republican Party. If the nominating process can turn a peanut farmer into a president, surely Ted Cruz can do the same. If the nomination can turn Barack Obama with no ideology other than a pension for communism and no platform other than "hope and change" into a president, surely Ted Cruz can do the same.

As to conservatism controlling from a minority position, that is the fate of conservatism but actually the fate of most ideologies. When a conservative position as articulated as it was by Ronald Reagan, the tent flaps are open and the public floods in and we get the big tent. The ability to turn the nation upside down on an issue such as homosexual marriage does not belong to leftists alone. Our ideology is stronger, more reasonable, and more palatable.

We can win as conservatives.