Cruz is a careerist who took the outsider route when his persistent efforts to ingratiate himself with insiders failed. In endorsing him, Jeb Bush had much to say about Washington being broken, but he failed to mention that Cruz was largely responsible for breaking it, forcing senseless government shutdowns, spouting nonsense during his preening filibusters, and adding significantly to the bitter enmity on Capitol Hill — and that’s on his side of the aisle. Trump’s sobriquet of “Lyin’ Ted” doesn’t sound all that outlandish to many of those who tried to work with the Texas senator on Capitol Hill.

Cruz’s conduct worked to make him famous but, until panic set in, no one thought it would work to make him the nominee, much less president. The trend so far when someone gets out is that many of those votes go to Trump. A recent Quinnipiac poll shows that were Kasich to drop out today, more than half of his vote would go to the front-runner.

Although Kasich is being hammered for continuing to exist, he has a good case for staying in: He governs Ohio, which no Republican has won the White House without, was re-elected there with record numbers, and has high approval ratings for turning the deficit into a surplus and bringing 400,000 jobs to the state. He’s pro-life and a fiscal conservative. He over-hugs but has kept out of the mud pit. He wins in every matchup with Clinton, while Trump and Cruz lose by double digits.