Daniels was mentioned, as Mitt Romney is, as the choice of the Republican “establishment.” It, however, died even before its bulletin board, the New York Herald Tribune, did in 1966. The establishment was interred in 1964, when Barry Goldwater was nominated.

Today, South Carolina Sen. Jim De­Mint is the closest approximation to a Republican kingmaker, because since 1980 the candidate who has carried his state has won the nomination, and because the Tea Party trusts him. In 2008, he supported Romney. Two months ago, according to what The Hill newspaper calls “a source close to DeMint,” the senator would “never consider” doing so again unless Romney renounced his Massachusetts health care law as “a colossal mistake.” Subsequently, Romney decided to do the opposite.

Daniels’s and Romney’s decisions have made May an accelerating month for Tim Pawlenty, former two-term governor of the only state to vote Democratic in nine consecutive presidential elections — and arguably the most conservative governor in Minnesota’s history.