IT'S PROBABLY A MOOT POINT NOW, BUT WOULD THE "THROW THE RACE INTO THE HOUSE" STRATEGY EVEN WORK?

It no longer seems worthwhile to discuss the likely outcome of a three-way presidential race, what with polls showing that Hillary Clinton beats Donald Trump by as much as 18 points and with Erick Erickson, who once seriously considered backing a third-party challenger to Trump, now arguing that a third-party challenge would be a terrible idea (from his perspective at least , because he hates Trump and doesn't want Trump's likely loss to be blamed on a supposed spoiler candidate, rather than on Trump himself).

But here's one thing I've wondered about for a while: Sure, it looks as if running a Republican establishment candidate third-party could have been a route to victory -- if that candidate could win one state and keep both of the other candidates from reaching 270 electoral votes, the election would go to the House of Representatives. Each state's House delegation would get one vote -- and since most House delegations are Republican, and Republicans in the House are presumably beholden to the party establishment, surely they'd vote for the establishment candidate running third party. Right?

Well, this BuzzFeed story, assuming it's accurate, confirms my doubts about that:

Republican Rep. Chris Collins of New York said on Wednesday that many of his House colleagues are supporting Donald Trump “quietly”, but not publicly endorsing the GOP frontrunner.

“Many members are supporting Trump quietly,” Collins told New York radio host Bob Lonsberry. “They don’t like Ted Cruz at all, and for various reasons unique to their particular congressional districts they’re not formally endorsing Mr. Trump.”

Collins, who became the first member of Congress to endorse Trump in February, said he’d gotten “no negative feedback” from other Republican over his support for Trump....

Think you could run John Kasich, say, and then elect him president in the House if he wins only the state of Ohio, GOP establishment? Well, maybe not. Maybe a lot of House members really prefer Trump. And maybe a lot of House members would be afraid not to vote for Trump, out of fear of a primary challenge in the next election cycle.

I know I just got through telling you that the party will probably repair itself right after Trump is out of the picture -- but I'm not sure House members would believe that, if faced with the choice of voting against Trump in December.

It seems likely now that we won't face this situation -- but it's clear that it wouldn't be a slam dunk for the Republican establishment if it somehow happened.