To the Republican establishment, Donald Trump may be the second worst outcome. The worst outcome may be Ted Cruz. It is why suddenly the Republicans, including John McCain, Rand Paul and plenty of others, have suddenly raised his citizenship as an issue. Roger Kimball brings this forward, Why the Sudden Love Among Establishment Republicans for Trump?

What you hear people say is that “Donald Trump may have the best chance of beating Hillary Clinton.” But what does that means? “Maybe Trump can beat Hillary, assuming she is the Democratic candidate, but anyway, despite his bluster, he really is deep down a pay-to-play kind of guy, just like us. Ted Cruz, on the contrary, really means all that stuff about ending the ‘Washington Cartel’ and restoring Constitutional restraints on government. It’s OK to say that in election years, but we don’t want to elect someone who will actually try to do it.”

The problem for them is that Cruz would do it. With Trump, you have no idea at all what he would do about anything.

And you do indeed see the drift towards Trump. This is Kurt Schlichter at National Review summing up an article in which he assesses the future probabilities on President Trump: Taking The Donald Seriously.

Trump can win the nomination. I don’t like that, because I don’t think he’s a conservative. He can also win the general, and I do like that because this country can survive a Donald Trump administration intact, assuming he learns what the nuclear triad is. But a Hillary Clinton presidency? A presidency for a woman who has not mere contempt but active hatred for the half of the population that she labels as her greatest enemy, and who aspires to restrict every amendment in the Bill of Rights that doesn’t keep her from having to testify to her own crimes? A slave to her unique homebrew of hatred, undue self-regard, and foolishness, her lawless reign will rip this country apart. If it’s Donald Trump versus Hillary Clinton, Trump all the way – and, thankfully, he absolutely could win.

And then there is this, What Bernie and The Donald portend. A year ago Bernie Sanders v Donald Trump was on no radars anywhere at all. Now it is as likely as anything. And as for “The Donald”, this is how the article concludes:

Nominating Trump is by no means a guarantee of GOP defeat. But beyond politics, what do the successes of Sanders, Trump and Cruz portend?

Well, Sanders and Trump both opposed the war in Iraq that the Bush Republicans and Clinton Democrats supported.

Both Sanders and Trump oppose NAFTA and MFN for China and the free-trade deals that Clinton Democrats and Bush Republicans backed, which have cost us thousands of lost factories, millions of lost jobs and four decades of lost wage increases for Middle America.

Trump has taken the toughest line on the invasion across the U.S.-Mexican border and against Muslim refugees entering unvetted.

Immigration, securing the border, fair trade – Trump’s issues are the issues of 2016.

If a Trump-Clinton race came down to the Keystone State of Pennsylvania, and Trump was for backing our men in blue, gun rights, securing America’s borders, no more NAFTAs and a foreign policy that defends America first, who would you bet on?

You could say the same about Cruz, but the point is that they don’t.