Then came Monday night: I went to a caucus and gave a speech to about 3,000 Iowa Republicans. I’ve never been to a MAGA rally, but it sure felt like one. The president’s daughter-in-law, Lara Trump, spoke first and underscored the Trump bottom line: Perfect phone call; Democrats bad; keep America great. Crowd goes wild. I then got up to make my pitch, and — as you may have seen — it didn’t go well. I got booed for saying that our party needed to do some soul-searching. I said the party is going to be a party of old white men unless we become more inclusive. More boos. I said we shouldn’t be okay with a president who lies all the time. I said we need a president who’s decent, not cruel. I said, you might enjoy Trump’s mean tweets, but most people don’t. I said we must be better than a president who makes every day about himself. Boos. And more boos. One woman yelled that she loves the president’s tweets. The crowd cheered her.

I reminded folks that I’m a conservative, but I said conservative policies aren’t good enough. Decency, honesty and compassion matter, too. But they wanted nothing to do with it. There was more booing, more yelling, and I caught a middle finger or two. I’m a big boy, and I can take a tough crowd, but leaving the caucus that night, I realized once and for all that nobody can beat Trump in a Republican primary. Not just because it’s become his party, but because it has become a cult, and he’s a cult leader. He doesn’t have supporters; he has followers. And in their eyes, he can do no wrong.

They’re being spoon-fed a daily dose of B.S. from “conservative” media. They don’t know what the truth is and — more importantly — they don’t care. There’s nothing that any Republican challenger can do to break them out of this spell. (Thanks, Hannity.)