Republican Presidential presumptive nominee showman Donald Trump is off to a rough start as the GOP’s presumptive nominee. In a bit of irony, the man who rose to political prominence by questioning President Barack Obama’s legitimacy as President by becoming King of the Birthers is now having his own legitimacy questioned. The latest development: House Speaker Paul Ryan, the epitome of the “thinking” conservative with stellar conservative credentials, says he can’t yet support Trump.

The operative word here is “yet” — but his nonsupport at this time speaks volumes:

“Well, to be perfectly candid with you, I’m just not ready to do that at this point,” Ryan told CNN’s Jake Tapper. “I’m not there right now. And I hope to, though, and I want to.”
Ryan has pledged to support the nominee but said on Thursday that Trump needs to do more work to show that he is a true conservative who can unify the different wings of the Republican Party.
“I think what a lot of Republicans want to see is that we have a standard bearer that bears our standards,” he said.
“I think conservatives want to know does he share our values and our principles on limited government, the proper role of the executive, adherence to the Constitution,” he added. “There are lots of questions that conservatives, I think, are gonna want answers to, myself included. I want to be a part of this unifying process. I want to help to unify this party.”

Trump was pleased by the comments from one of the country’s highest ranking elected Republicans, so he did what he always does: he lashed out.

“I am not ready to support Speaker Ryan’s agenda. Perhaps in the future we can work together and come to an agreement about what is best for the American people,” Trump said . “They have been treated so badly for so long that it is about time for politicians to put them first!”

Members of the GOP who Trump dissed and belittled are making it clear that they are in no rush to endorse him and some will skip the Republican convention. This includes:

—Bush 41 and Bush 43:

When the Republican National Convention meets this July in Cleveland, it likely will do so with no former Republican president in attendance.
Both George H.W. Bush, the 41st president, and George W. Bush, the 43rd president, have no plans of trekking to northeast Ohio this summer to witness the nomination of Donald Trump.

“He does not intend to attend,” George W. Bush’s personal aide Freddy Ford said in a statement to POLITICO.
Both former presidents said Wednesday that they will not endorse Trump for the Republican nomination, with Ford saying that the 43rd president “does not plan to participate in or comment on the presidential campaign.”
In a separate statement provided to POLITICO on Thursday, George H.W. Bush spokesman Jim McGrath said, “At age 91, President Bush is retired from politics. He naturally did a few things to help Jeb, but those were the ‘exceptions that proved t ‘exceptions that proved the rule.'”
The last two Republican nominees also plan to skip the quadrennial event.

Why would they attend? Trump blasted the Bushes and mocked Jeb Bush. He repudiated the Bushes so they’re a tad short of repudiating him.
–-Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney will sit this one out, too:

Mitt Romney, the 2012 Republican presidential nominee, plans to skip this summer’s Republican National Convention in Cleveland where Donald Trump will be officially nominated — an unusual move that underscores the deep unease many Republican leaders have about the brash celebrity mogul as their standard bearer.

A Romney aide told The Washington Post on Thursday morning, “Governor Romney has no plans to attend convention.”

Romney has been one of Trump’s chief critics this spring. He delivered a searing, point-by-point indictment of Trump in March — from his business record to his character to his divisive campaign-trail rhetoric.

Trump, who endorsed Romney in 2012 and raised money for his campaign, has since been harshly critical of the campaign that Romney ran. In an interview last month, Trump told The Post that he understood it would be “very hard” for Romney to attend the convention but that he would have no qualms about him being in Cleveland.

“I don’t care,” Trump said. “He can be there if he wants.”

—Former Kansas Senator Bob Dole said he’ll go to the convention but won’t commit to supporting Trump.

My prediction? In the end, most GOPers, egged on by conservative talk show hosts, will come together and back Trump — throwing out all of their past ideological standards and, for those who would not think of demonizing Latinos and Muslims, personal political standards.

The ostensible reason will be the grave danger (they’ll say) posed by Hillary Clinton (who has never advocated deporting everyone who is here illegally or banning Muslims from entering the Untied States).

The real reason was the thirst for partisan p-o-w-e-r. The GOP will then truly become The Party of Trump — not the Party of Lincoln or the Party of Reagan.

photo credit: Paul Ryan – Digital Painting Caricature via photopin (license)

JOE GANDELMAN, Editor-In-Chief

Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.

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