Rand Paul has announced he’s dropping out of the presidential race:

Republican Sen. Rand Paul dropped his 2016 campaign for president Wednesday, eclipsed by other candidates who kept his base of support from growing into a viable force in the crowded 2016 field.

I’m a little surprised that he decided to do this before New Hampshire, but it makes sense for him to turn his attention to the Senate race in Kentucky. It matters more now for the causes he cares about that he be re-elected to the Senate, and continuing as an also-ran in the presidential race wouldn’t accomplish anything. It’s unfortunate that his presidential campaign didn’t have more success. In a cycle that included both Trump and Cruz, there was too much competition for Republican voters disgusted by their party leadership, and their demagogic style seems to have been better-suited to the mood of these voters. Paul made some good contributions in the presidential debates, and he was practically the only one challenging the party’s dangerous hawkish consensus, but that was evidently not what most Republicans were looking for in this election.

If Paul’s supporters are going to go to any other candidates, they would most likely prefer Cruz. That ought to help Cruz in his bid to hang on to second place there, which would confirm that the real contest going into the rest of February will be between Trump and Cruz. Perhaps some of Paul’s supporters will vote tactically for some of the non-Rubio “establishment” candidates to try to push them ahead of Rubio.