U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell sounds like someone with some serious political regret.

The regret concerns a fellow Republican, presumptive presidential nominee Donald J. Trump.

The question came to McConnell today on ABC News’s “This Week.”

Is Donald Trump qualified to be president?

He said he would “leave that for the American people to decide.”

Huh? Simple question, Mr. Majority Leader. He didn’t answer it. He could have said “no,” and made a lot of news this morning by rescinding his endorsement of his party’s presidential nominee. Or, he could have said “yes” and then be forced to look himself in the mirror while his conscience struggles with whether Trump really is qualified.

http://www.politico.com/story/2016/06/mitch-mcconnell-trump-224809

McConnell is not alone, of course, in facing this struggle. Other members of Congress and leading political operatives are having second and third thoughts about the man who’s about to lead his party in the fall campaign against Democratic nominee Hillary Rodham Clinton.

McConnell keeps talking up the party’s conservative principles while agreeing that “our nominee” might not agree with them.

I keep thinking of previous party nominees who had sufficient intraparty opposition prior to launching their fall campaigns.

Republican Barry Goldwater had to vanquish moderates within his party before facing President Lyndon Johnson in 1964. Democrat George McGovern had the same struggle with moderates within his party as he faced off against President Richard Nixon in 1972.

They both lost … h-u-u-u-u-g-e!