In case it isn't yet obvious, Donald Trump's campaign has kicked the bucket, shuffled off its mortal coil, run down the curtain and joined the choir invisible.  It's not only merely dead, it's really most sincerely dead.

But what is the cause of death?

The campaign is not, to be precise, dead because any of Trump's enemies on the left killed it.  Nor is it dead because of passive-aggressive #NeverTrumpers or because a group of GOP top brass pulled their endorsements.  It's not even dead because of Trump's offensive comments or behaviour.

These all may be fine proximate causes, but the ultimate reason for the Trump campaign's implosion is that the man apologized for something he said.

For a brief instant, he expressed something other than resentment, and that was all it took for him to be revealed as the God-Emperor With No Clothes, a Samson who allowed himself to be bound and have his combover shorn.

In this race, the Donald owned resentment.  That's why he connected with as many people as he did.  His simmering hatred at getting any number of what he saw as raw deals perfectly matched the mood of the Americans and people around the world who got him this far.

And if you wish to be a successful populist politician, you too must be a living testament to resentment.  Never mind what the resentment is about, or if it makes sense- your target voter may be mad about not being able to find a job, or about having to hire women and visible minorities to their boards of directors.  These people have been told they can't have something, and so the system needs to be destroyed and remade in their image.

That is how the Republican Party got taken over by the deplorables….or perhaps it would be more correct to say that the Republicans had a long-delayed coming to terms with their deplorable-ness.

That is why, as the Trump Tapes were circulating, all Trump's supporters had to fall back on was, "But but but…..Hillary broke the law! Bill Clinton assaulted women! Everyone talks the way Trump talks in private! It's not faaaaaaair! Waaaaaaaaah!!!!"

For you see, they are so preoccupied with the wrongs that have been done to them that when confronted with the reality of Trump's comments, they wrote it off as just another attempt to deny them what was rightfully theirs, and for the elites to avoid getting what was coming to them.

Now of course Canadians, even Canadian Conservatives, are finding themselves tempted to turn their nose up at this development and say it couldn't happen here, but if we're being quite honest we can see that the CPC or PCPO or anything calling itself conservative anywhere in Canada is thoroughly suffused with the exact same resentment and tendency to deplore-ability.

If you disagree with this assertion, ask yourself: What is the one thing that all those who identify as "conservative" in this country have in common?

The only possible answer is, "Dislike of the Liberals."

Are you, as a conservative, frustrated with how Kathleen Wynne and Justin Trudeau never seem to get their come-uppance?  The PCPO and CPC sure think so, which is why they cram your inbox with requests for donations every time the Liberals stickhandle and stonewall their way through their latest scandal.

Have you been in one or more conversations which were supposed to be about conservative policy which, all too quickly, degenerated into duelling rants about how the Liberals are killing the country?

When asked, "Why are you a conservative?", do you talk about what conservative ideas inspire you, or do you talk about how we need less of something?  Taxes?  Spending?  Regulation?  Corruption?  Unions?  Wait times?  Immigrants?  All or any of the above?

The most socially-progessive, pink-shirt wearing, urbane, educated, Twitter-savvy Tory sauntering along the boulevards of downtown Toronto knows the resentment of being shut out of Liberal insider circles.  They are as deplorable as the loudest Trumpeteer, even if everyone knows it but them.

Written by Josh Lieblein