That sound you hear is the small but steady drip of Republicans deciding that they want no part of the campaign of their presidential nominee, Donald Trump.

This week, a sitting Republican House member – albeit a retiring one – penned an op-ed saying that he is going to vote for Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton because "at a minimum the president needs to consistently display those qualities I have preached to my two children: kindness, honesty, dignity, compassion and respect." Then GOP Rep. Mike Coffman of Colorado readied an ad saying, "People ask me, 'What do you think about Trump?' Honestly, I don't care for him much." Rep. Adam Kinzinger of Illinois also explicitly came out as #NeverTrump.

This follows a handful of other less prominent Republicans, including Meg Whitman and advisers to former 2016 candidates Jeb Bush and Chris Christie, saying "I'm with her," as it were, due to Trump's uniquely terrible terribleness.

It's not a bad week, certainly, for wary Republicans to break from the former reality television star. Clinton's post-convention bounce is far bouncier than was Trump's – the HuffPost Pollster average now has her up about seven points nationally – and he seems intent on doubling down on all the aspects of his personality that render him unfit for elected office: His inability to absorb criticism, his penchant for lying and, most significantly, his terrifying ignorance regarding the most important parts of the job of the president.

A Fox News poll this week showed Clinton winning about 12 percent of Republican votes, compared to 5 percent of Democrats voting for Trump. In some districts and states, that first number is almost definitely higher. And eventually, as many commentators have pointed out, it is going to be too late for Republicans to get off the Trump train without looking craven and out only for themselves – better to do it now, some have apparently concluded, than when it looks like a desperate attempt to shed the weight of Trump's political anchor.

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In addition to fueling the "Trump is unraveling" storyline, the defections also reinforce a notion that Democrats laid out at their convention in Philadelphia last week: That Trump is no Republican, and therefore it's okay for conservatives to abandon him without abandoning their principles. "Any party that would nominate Donald Trump for president has moved too far away from his party of Lincoln," said Democratic vice presidential candidate Tim Kaine in his DNC acceptance speech. "And if any of you are looking for that party of Lincoln, we've got a home for you right here in the Democratic Party."

Clinton and President Barack Obama made similar overtures to the GOP during the convention. (And I don't really buy that Obama is playing a game of 12-dimensional chess, making it harder for Republicans to abandon Trump by pushing the idea that they should do so.) Team Clinton is also ramping up its effort to chase Republican votes.

The trouble here for the GOP is twofold. As noted before, there's no telling where the bottom is with Trump, so timing a leap off the deck of his sinking ship is difficult, but, perhaps, a political imperative (and, I'd argue, of vital national interest, but whatever). His candidacy also, though, makes it so that Clinton and the Democrats can woo Republican votes without actually offering any concessions on policy. Case in point, Clinton's convention speech, while heavy on the morning-in-America message during a confab draped in the American flag, was on policy matters closer to a blueprint for winning Bernie Sanders voters than a centrist manifesto. And GOP'ers who otherwise have to support putting the nuclear codes into Trump's tiny hands are in little position to strike a better bargain.