Exaggerating the power of #NeverTrump

Maybe some anti-Trump conservatives would indeed be willing to see Republicans lose big in order to prove that Trump was as disastrous a nominee as they always said he was. But so what? How are Erick Erickson, Jonah Goldberg, and Ben Sasse going to cause Trump to lose in a blowout? They’re not. (What’s more likely to lead to a big Trump defeat is the kind of dumb and indecent moves by Trump that McGurn spends the bulk of his column excusing.) If nominating Trump leads to big losses, then the anti-Trumpers will have “made their point” because their point about the price of nominating Trump will have been proven right. How they will feel about it, and how they feel prospectively about it now, are not very important.