Permit me to attempt to raise your spirits, or at least stiffen your resolve, with the below call to action; you still have very important and not at all futile work to do.

To all of my friends in the Cruz campaign, the Rubio camp, the not-Trump camp and/or the #NEVERTRUMP crowd: Feeling a little discouraged? Demoralized? Nauseous? Trust me, I sympathize, and have the stains on the carpet to prove it.

It is tempting to hold out hope still, to look at the delegate count and say, Trump still doesn't have 1,237, therefore it's not over. Yes, denial is a natural and normal part of the grieving process. But let us not be like Michael Palin's pet shop owner in that immortal Monty Python sketch who insists, against all evidence, that the Norwegian Blue parrot his customer (John Cleese) is attempting to return is not dead but just pining for the fjords (fjord, for those unfamiliar, is a Scandinavian word signifying an open Republican convention in which your not-Trump candidate is miraculously selected on the 17th vote). Cleese's exasperated customer will set the record straight:

"'E's not pinin'! 'E's passed on! This parrot is no more! He has ceased to be! 'E's expired and gone to meet 'is maker! 'E's a stiff! Bereft of life, 'e rests in peace! If you hadn't nailed 'im to the perch 'e'd be pushing up the daisies! 'Is metabolic processes are now 'istory! 'E's off the twig! 'E's kicked the bucket, 'e's shuffled off 'is mortal coil, run down the curtain and joined the bleedin' choir invisible!! This...is an EX-parrot!"

With that reality squarely and maturely faced, we move to the next undeniable reality: Hillary Clinton still has far too great a chance of becoming President. Getting the hint?

But I will not press you while you are still bereaved (Mr. Cleese's office did not return my calls inquiring as to the appropriate duration of the parrot-mourning period). Instead, I will tell you this: Pick yourself up, pick the campaign of a congressman or senator in a competitive and/or endangered race, anywhere in the country, and work your tail off for that candidate from here until November.

We are in the throes of a slow motion constitutional crisis that is over one hundred years in the making, with "progressives" of all stripes doing their level best to tear down the checks and balances of our wisely divided branches of government, and impose in its place a European-style, top-down, integrated and "energetic" state, commanded by high-IQ technocrats under a supreme chief executive. Americans instinctively rebel against this model, which they correctly recognize as a threat to their liberty, whether it comes from the Left or the Right. Nixon overreached and was taken down. Now Obama's abdications and arrogations have likewise provoked a reaction to restore a prosperous and free nation more in keeping with traditional notions of work, responsibility and national pride.

But the answer to Messiah Left is not Messiah Right, Messiah Establishment or Messiah Populist. All earthly messiahs ultimately fail, whether Obama, Trump, Cruz, Bush or Clinton, to the degree that they are worshipped as such. Cults of personality are suicide cults.

What is necessary is a restoration of the institutional balance of power between the Executive, Judicial, and Legislative branches, specifically the responsible and effective reassertion of the primacy of the latter over the former and over the unaccountable administrative agencies and their czars. It's bigger than one man or woman.

Making this restoration work in our favor requires holding and expanding the number of congressional and Senate seats held by constitutional conservatives. And that in turn requires the active and vigorous participation of all of us who hold these values in common, especially those of us who had pinned our hopes on the White House.

This election will not be about conservative legislators riding on the coattails of the presidential candidate at the top of the ticket (indeed, many not-Trump commentators are now convinced that The Donald will provoke devastating losses down-ticket); rather, this election will be about every conservative voter taking his or her legislator as the top of the ticket.

So again, if you had plans to take an unpaid leave from your job to spend your summer volunteering for the Cruz, Carson, Fiorina or Ryan campaign, take that commitment, double it, and pour it into your man or woman in the Capitol.

Then, on November 8th, take a deep breath, say a prayer, swallow hard, hold your nose, suppress your gag reflex. And pull the lever for Donald J. Trump, 45th President of the United States of America.

ABC.

Howard Hyde is author of the book Escape from Berkeley: An EX-liberal progressive socialist embraces America (and doesn't apologize)