Let’s play out the rest of the Republican Party’s presidential nominating process.

Donald J. Trump will receive his party’s nomination in Cleveland in just a few weeks.

GOP moguls will try and fail to wrestle the nomination away from Trump, who defeated 16 primary opponents. He scored a record number of GOP primary votes while marching to his party’s nomination.

Then, on the Thursday night of the convention, after the balloting has been completed and the RNC convention chairman, House Speaker Paul Ryan, says through gritted teeth that Donald Trump is the party’s presidential nominee.

Someone will introduce him to the crowd.

Trump will stride onto the stage.

What kind of reception is he going to get? The norm is for political convention delegates to deliver throaty cheers. They cheer, whoop and holler, wave their signs, whistle, blow horns, laugh and weep tears of joy.

That’s the norm.

This primary season has been everything but normal.

Trump will be a badly damaged nominee. He won’t enjoy the support of many hundreds of delegates spread out before him on the convention floor. Those delegates who wanted someone else nominated will serve as a metaphor for the voting public across the land.

I was struck by the stinging critique in this week’s New Yorker by the magazine’s editor, David Remnick, who writes:

The current leadership of the Republican Party and most of its traditional funders show every sign of knowing that a pernicious buffoon has become their standard-bearer. And yet they have largely fallen into line. They dare not betray “the wisdom of their voters.” There’s Orrin Hatch, of Utah, with his reputation for integrity, telling his constituents that Trump “doesn’t have a prejudiced bone in his body.” There’s Paul Ryan, the self-advertised model of Republican probity and deep thinking, allowing that, yes, Trump is guilty of “textbook” racism, but refusing to edge away from his squeamish endorsement. And there is Mitch McConnell, the Senate Majority Leader, providing this piece of moral discernment: “Well, what I am willing to say is that Donald Trump is certainly a different kind of candidate.” McConnell has hinted that he could rescind his support, but what are the odds?

Here’s the entire essay:

http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/06/20/the-choice-hillary-clinton-or-donald-trump

It’s all coming together at the GOP convention in Cleveland.

I’ll be waiting with bated breath to see how the nominee’s acceptance speech is received by the actual Republicans who will have sent him into battle against Hillary Rodham Clinton and the Democrats.