Let’s decode Paul Ryan’s craven surrender

Gee, big surprise. In a tweet yesterday, House Speaker Paul Ryan — the alleged big brain of the Republican party — joined the ranks of craven quislings and announced his fealty to the noxious nominee:

I’ll be voting for @realDonaldTrump this fall. I’m confident he will help turn the House GOP’s agenda into laws. https://t.co/LyaT16khJw

— Paul Ryan (@PRyan) June 2, 2016

Well, you can’t say very much in a tweet. Space limitations and all that. Perhaps our best option is to journey into Ryan’s mind in order to best understand his reasoning (such as it is). So let’s decode that tweet, shall we? The House Speaker speaks!

As the sage oracle and high-minded conscience of the GOP, I firmly stated back in March that Republican leaders need to “hold ourselves to the highest standards of integrity and decency.” I said that “we shouldn’t accept ugliness as the norm.” I also stated unequivocally that “if a person wants to be the nominee of the Republican Party, there can be no evasion and no games: They must reject any group or cause that is built on bigotry. This party does not prey on people’s prejudices.”

That’s why I insisted, back in early May, that I was “not ready” to endorse Donald Trump.

However, I have had the privileged opportunity these past few weeks to observe Mr. Trump quite closely. And in light of all the new evidence —his attacks on our Hispanic Republican governor of New Mexico; his scamming of veterans, who didn’t get their money until the press shamed him into paying up; his tantrum in front of the press corps, where he said “You think I’m going to change? I’m not going to change”; his false claim this week that he has never advocated the spread of nuclear weapons in Asia (actually, he has); his Trump University, which, according to new court documents, “preyed upon the elderly and uneducated”; his repeated smearing of an Indiana-born judge as “Mexican,” his belief that the judge has a “conflict of interest” because “I’m building a wall,” a wall that I happen to disagree with — yes, after studying all these most recent developments, I am now firmly persuaded, beyond all reasonable doubt, that Mr. Trump is maturing into a statesman.

Granted, some skeptics might question my logic.

They might wonder what Mr. Trump has done and said these past few weeks that has prompted me to arrive at my wise conclusion. They might wonder how I could possibly think that Mr. Trump would “help turn the GOP agenda into laws” when the evidence suggests that Mr. Trump shifts agendas the way he switches wives.

But what skeptics need to remember is that even a renowned man of conscience, like me, must at times bend the rigors of logic to fit the exigencies of the moment. I have now done so, to bring myself into alignment with mein leader. I am now prepared to put my soul in a lockbox and endorse the notion that a purveyor of luxury hotels is qualified to command our nuclear codes. Just like Mr. Trump’s voters, I am ready and eager to see what I want to see, to hear what I want to hear.

And therefore, for the balance of this year, and perhaps for the next eight, I duly renounce something I recently said: “Politics can be a battle of ideas, not insults. It can be about always striving to do better. That’s what it can be and what it should be.” And therefore, I am now more than ready to plant my lips on mein leader’s well-tailored posterior.

I shall also wash his limo if Christie doesn’t beat me to it.

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