I’m going to need some more time to ponder what has just happened.

Donald J. Trump has won the Indiana Republican presidential primary. That wasn’t the big surprise of the night. Pre-primary polls pointed toward a big Trump win.

Oh, no. The surprise came from U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas, who cried “Uncle!” He ended his campaign.

Technically, the GOP campaign continues to be a two-man race. The other contestant is Ohio Gov. John Kasich, who continues to adhere to the myth that he’s going to the GOP convention in Cleveland with hopes of peeling off delegates who cannot support Trump.

A part of me wishes that would happen. The bigger part of me says it won’t. I happen to think highly of Gov. Kasich, who actually has a record of accomplishment that in any other election cycle would have been enough to win. Not this time.

Trump will be nominated by the Republican Party to run for the presidency of the United States.

Which makes me wonder: What in the world has happened to this once-great political party?

They are about to nominate a glitzy reality TV star who made a fortune building shiny hotels and who has demonstrated more times than I can remember the astonishing ability to win on the basis of insult and innuendo. His insult targets have included women, illegal immigrants, Muslims, veterans, physically disabled individuals … who have I left out?

He hasn’t formulated any form of philosophical foundation. Trump hasn’t laid out a formula for anything other than he’s going to “build a beautiful wall” along our southern border and will cut the “best deals you’ve ever seen” to get other world leaders to do business on his terms.

This, folks, is the basis for running for the GOP presidential nomination in 2016.

Holy smokes, man!