For two weeks now Donald Trump has been whining that he is the victim of sinister, shadowy forces colluding to deny him the Republican presidential nomination. This miniature campaign began with an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal in which Trump complained about the Colorado convention, calling it “a rigged delegate-selection process.” A few days later he complained at a rally that the Republican primaries were “a rigged, crooked system that’s designed so that the party bosses can pick whoever they want” and that it’s all filled with “so much phony stuff.”

As a factual matter, none of these charges is true. The Republican primaries, caucuses, and state conventions are perfectly reasonable. You may not like the system. But it is not rigged, nor crooked, nor phony. The rules are pre-determined and designed to reach an outcome in a particular manner, one that values not just popularity but the ability to rally members of the party. The system is orderly and transparent.