The New York Times: Indiana Primary Takeaways: For Donald Trump, Now Comes the Hard Part

This was wishful thinking, and in Indiana, Mr. Trump put an end to the mirage. He defeated Mr. Cruz by more than 15 points and won more than half the vote in a seventh consecutive state — this time, in the Midwest.

There was no anti-Trump majority left to rally, if it ever existed in the first place. [...]

Mr. Trump’s emergence as the all-but-anointed Republican nominee may change this dynamic. Giving him a monthlong head start to rally skeptical Republicans behind his campaign, while Mrs. Clinton continues to grapple with Mr. Sanders’s challenge on the left, could become an intolerable prospect for Democrats eager for a free hand to engage Mr. Trump.

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Salon: Ted Cruz’s epic downfall: How the Texas senator took Donald Trump to the brink — and then watched it all fall apart

With Cruz, no myth was too outlandish or ridiculous to be stated as fact to his audiences. (That he is losing to a conspiracy theorist like Trump only makes this more hilarious.) But it is not enough to just repeat this nonsense to people. You have to make them believe that you believe it. And in that, Cruz failed. His weird and offputting attempts to ingratiate — the terrible Mr. Burns impressions, the unctuous speaking style that made him sound as if he was leading a seminar on a get-rich quick scheme — all of it came off as calculated and phony. [...]

How did Cruz cover up his incompetence for so long, to the point that 14 other candidates were gone from the race before him? Well, for one, even Cruz’s worst enemies say that he is incredibly smart. (In fact, that is one of the traits they find most frightening about him.) He and his team came in prepared. He had a delegate-wrangling scheme in place from the get-go and used it to great effect, going into state conventions and picking off delegates that would have otherwise been bound to Trump. His campaign put on polished and slick rallies while those of his competitors, including Trump, sometimes felt ramshackle, thrown together.

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The Washington Post: Russia offers free land to all citizens willing to move to the Far East

In recent years, Moscow has grown alarmed at the prospect of a Sinification of its Far East, with the entrance of Chinese businesses into the region and the emergence of Chinese communities compensating for the labor shortfalls. There's an inexorable demographic argument: Birthrates on the Russian side of the border are in decline; on the Chinese side, they are on the rise.

Last summer, a Russian government official suggested that the population of the Far East could be increased six-fold to about 36 million people through the land scheme. [...]

Not all are thrilled by Moscow's interest in populating the Far East. According to the BBC, protesters and officials in the Sakha region expressed concerns in March about the potential effects of an influx of outsiders. They are fearful of a 21st-century gold rush.

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