Oh, how I love the intrigue that’s building around House Speaker Paul Ryan.

Will he “save” the Republican Party by emerging in Cleveland as the party’s compromise candidate for president of the United States?

Is the speaker going to toss aside every one of his (half-hearted) statements of non-interest in seeking the presidency?

This is fabulous! I am not going to predict what Ryan will do, but it certainly has me licking my chops at the chaos that would develop if the speaker actually jumps in.

Ryan keeps saying most of the things that would suggest he’s not going to run. But there remains wiggle room in every one of his so-called statements. The room ain’t huge. He’s not going to shake his booty while saying these things.

Every pundit since shortly after the Civil War keeps waiting for the so-called Shermanesque statement. You know what I mean. Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman said, “If nominated I will not run; if elected I will not serve.”

Everything the speaker has said so far falls so far short of that categorical disavowal of any interest in running for the presidency.

He told radio talk show host Hugh Hewitt today that “you have to run for president to be president. I am not running for president. Period. End of story.”

He is “not running for president.” Isn’t that what he said? It’s tantamount to the standard dodge that pols use when they don’t “intend to run.”

Let’s parse that for a second. I take that to mean that Ryan “is not running” today, in the present tense. He says not a single thing about what he might do this summer.

The only possible circumstance that is going to quell this “draft Ryan” talk is if Donald J. Trump wins enough delegates to sew up on the nomination on the first ballot.

Let’s remember that the speaker said he didn’t want to be speaker, either. Then the Republican House caucus drafted him to take the job as the nation’s top GOP elected official.

And the intrigue will continue.