Despondent conservatives invent post-Trump fantasy land of third parties

Red State, the conservative website, resembles a vomitorium after a Roman Bacchanal -- or a frat party -- after the nationwide realization that Donald Trump will be the GOP nominee for president. The site's founder, Erick Erickson, has already publicly threatened to "de-register" as a Republican in light of the news.

In a rare acknowledgement  that NBC correspondent Andrea Mitchell is right, the site blamed Twitter for the success of Trump's candidacy, especially the Trump staff's ability to flood Twitter with "lies."

"Trump voters vote for the lie that Trump tells them, not for what he actually is, or what he actually does," one conservative writer said. "That’s how he got here. I can’t tell you how many Trump voters I met in South Carolina who believed absolute, proven lies that Trump told, such as his fabrication of a quote from Tom Coburn. They took it as a fact, and they acted on the facts as they understood them."

Before the bunting has been nailed to the convention hustings, they have suggested two possible "alternative" candidates to run against Trump, signaling a possibility that Republican Party stalwarts will break ranks.

Columnist Leon Wolf wrote:

"My hope at present is that some pro-life, small government conservative will run and get on the ballot in Tennessee, and I will vote for him or her. As a second best option, I suppose I will vote for Gary Johnson or (preferably, if he really is pro-life, Austin Petersen). If it actually looks like Trump might get close to winning, I might have to vote for Hillary, because I can not and will not accept that I haven’t done all I can to keep the dangerous and unstable Donald Trump from the office."

Red State promoted a "member diary" by Martin Knight to the top of its recommended list. The diary, entitled "Trump voters should be disrespected. They deserve it," offers the following insight on the roiling thoughts in its readers' minds.

Knight characterized Trump voters as "the coalition of low IQ personality cultists, Birthers, 9/11 Truthers, Neo-Nazis, unrepentant segregationists, modern day know-nothings, WWE and Jerry Springer afficianados that Trump has brought out of the fever swamps would be upset and no longer call themselves Republicans should have no bearing on the decision to deny Trump the nomination other than to make it more attractive."

Other diarists flooded the site with suggestions on how to sabotage the nomination, or told Trump supporters "you are trash," and pleaded with delegates to save the party and the nation.

Meanwhile, William F. Buckley's poltergeist was being consulted over at the National Review. David French called for a rejection of the "evil" that is Donald Trump. He called for a third party candidate that conservatives could rally around--and pronto.

"America needs a third party alternative, and it needs one quickly. As I tweeted earlier tonight, Americans who constantly complain about corrupt and politicians have voted by the millions to put two of the most dishonest candidates in America front and center in the general election. Throughout this election season, we’ve talked about various “lanes” to the nomination. There was the so-called establishment lane, the conservative lane, and the populist lane. Why don’t we create a new lane? Let’s call it the integrity lane, and it’s the lane for people who refuse to support corruption – who refuse to waste or destroy their moral capital by arguing endlessly over the “lesser of two evils.” Why not reject evil entirely?"