Trump's Function.

It may not be Donald Trump's intention.
It may have been in the back of some of his staffers minds.
I think It's definitely God's plan.

Herding the sheep to the master. 

The republican party machine and the congress strongly opposed Ted Cruz. A true conservative was not acceptable. It would ruin their little deals, he would shut down pet projects, a factory in every state and district making one part for a tank. Cruz wants to shut down whole government departments because they are unconstitutional and ineffective. That scares the hell out of a republican congressman because if there are fewer departments there won't be as many bills to hide their earmarks in. Remember the left of any right wing party is just there to claw back a fair share of his voters taxes and redirect them away from socialist projects that he thinks is bad. Even Ron Paul did that.

Those that want the country to continue the spending spree hate Ted. The freight train of national bankruptcy is coming and Cruz, and even Trump, knows it. Reform must come. Yet the lobbyists and their pet politicians resist. They make no money from smaller government and simpler rules.

On his own Ted Cruz would have faced massive protests from the left, attacks from the Rino's and resistance from the RNC party machine at every caucus.
With Trump running they are all decoyed away. The left wing mobs organised by George Soros and the black lives matter people are at the Trump rallies shouting and being shouted down. As a result when Ted Cruz showed up in the Bronx this week only two protesters could find him. He had a chat to them.

With Trump running, dozens of terrified non conservative politicians have turned to Cruz. Some gave him the most unenthusiastic endorsements in human history but that was enough to win. I do not think there terror is based on the possibility that Hillary will beat Trump. They fear that Trump will damage Republican candidates running for the house, the senate and governor posts. Their greater fear is that Trump may win and then not know what to do with the oval office. (If Hillary disappears and it is Sanders then the republicans are guaranteed the white house. )

Trump has been getting the vote but in order to win in Cleveland Trump has to actually have people in the party on the ground in the states to allocate his winning delegate slots to. In some congressional districts he has failed that and the party found a bunch of eligible people standing around to fill those slots. Yes they are obligated to vote for Trump in the first one or two votes but they arrived on the Cruz bus. Always pays to carry a spare or two. This is what Trump was calling stealing the delegates. They were not stolen he never provided any delegate candidates in some places.

With Trump in front but not getting more that 30%, all the effort to manipulate the rules to shut Cruz out is rendered impossible. Any attempt to put a third man in will fail. Trump and Cruz have the votes to vote down any rules change to make John Kasich or Paul Ryan the candidate from nowhere. It will be Trump or Cruz not anyone else. The irony is that the rules that now block Kasich, Ryan, or any other candidate from nowhere, were put in place to block Ronald Reagan (successfully on his first two runs), Ross Perot, Pat Buchanan, and 4 years ago Ron Paul.

Early in the campaign I thought that Donald Trump and Ted Cruz were working together to tag team the others in the party that it was president Crumpz run. The question was not whether they would win but which would be the other guys vice president. Trump even named Cruz once using a joke nickname, Justin Bieber, and once directly. Sadly Trumps PAC supporters blew it all away by attacking Heidi Cruz. Yes someone, not actually on Ted Cruz's team but definitely anti-trump, attacked Trumps wife but frankly if you're going to run for President knowing your wife modeled nude someone's mentions it. You have no right to object or get insulted when that happens, it was obvious. Every other time someone mentioned those pictures Trump just bragged about her good looks. He was not wrong.

I do not believe that the National Enquirer attack on Cruz, with a not even convincing story of extramarital affairs, came from Donald Trump's camp. One of Trump's staff is pictured as one of the women. It may be Cruz's biggest mistake to assume it is from a Trump supporter. It is something some left wing would be scandal reporter cooked up to attack all of the republican candidates. It probably sat around on someone's desk since january. It's irrelevant. Anyone voting for Cruz knows it's fake. Anyone thinking it's real never remembers to vote.
Gawker just got sued for billions in damages over another scandal, hidden cameras in someone's bedroom, will get you bankrupting damages. Gawker is effectively propping up the National Enquirer financially. Gawker essentially is the web arm of the scandal mag. If one goes bankrupt they both do. So suddenly the unbelievably fake scandal on the editor's desk became his parting shot. You can't be sued if you're already bankrupt.

However Cruz and his supporters are making two errors of note. They are attributing all attacks on them as coming from Trump's team. I genuinely don't think Trumps team is that well organised. The attacks are coming from people, some of whom are openly democrats, but have a talent for getting Trump social media fans to follow their lead. Trump has a good media team but the one thing they can't do is shut down attacks on Cruz and others that come from outside. It does not help that Trump repeats them sometimes.

The second common mistake common with Cruz supporters (but not Ted himself) and all anti-trump people is to attack the Trump supporters as Trumpkins, Trumlings or just idiots. They are not fools. They are just really desperate and afraid. Most understand the threat of islam, the dangers of the politically correct social framework and the impact of trade on the industries they once worked for. But like almost everyone else they have not been given any solutions. Yes Ted Cruz and others have solutions but they are complex and detailed and based on ideas and premises that have not been taught in schools for three generations.

Trump supporters are not uneducated or less intelligent. They are miseducated and they know it and their angry and scared. They  see the problems but not the solutions. The most surprising thing is that we few who know of these complex and subtle solutions exist at all. Nothing taught in school got us where we are today. Cruz's teachers at harvard law school were all very left wing.

It is now clear that Trump has peaked and will continue getting 30% or less in the next few states. He may get 40-50% in New York but it is closed primary which favors Ted Cruz and it's Winner-take-most which also favors Ted. New York is a big state not just the city. The up state vote (rural New York) will not go the same way as the city vote. Trump may again win Congregational District delegate slots only to have no one available to fill those slots. Enter Cruz's spares again. Running for President does require a little planning.

I Expect Cruz to win on the second vote. I do not expect Trump to explode. He and his people will focus on stopping Kasich or any other candidate from nowhere from being parachuted in. This is actually a democrat party thing; it's never actually worked for a republican I don't think.
Trump will have two more months to come to terms with the fact that they don't have the ground game at the congressional district level. If he does not win the first vote out right he will switch to playing king maker. That role suits him fine, it gives him bragging rights without the workload.
Remember they worked so well together in the early part of the race against the Party favorites. At Cleveland if Trump does not have a clear majority it will turn into an outsiders versus the insiders. A battle between those that know that a recession is coming and government bankruptcy is pending; and those that want to kick the can one more term and hope for a miracle money tree to sprout somewhere on the Washington lawns.

Trump is the decoy candidate for Cruz. A candidate that is popular, enticing but just a little inferior to the other guy. A decoy product is a product that draws people to another product. It entices people away from the rest of the competition but is flawed relative to another product. This makes the choice binary and people put the decoy back on the shelf and buy the best.

As I said while someone in the wood work may have had this in mind only God can engineer such things. We are in a huge multilayered mess it will take a man of faith, law and genius to save the day; or at least mitigate the damage. Ted Cruz is the only candidate available and capable out there.