I wanted to get it out of the way, right up front, that I have absolutely no factual basis for anything I’m about to say. You all saw that in the headline, and you clicked on it anyway. That’s on you.

I have emails out to both campaigns asking for comment on the alleged meeting between Cruz and Rubio today, but neither have yet responded, and I kind of doubt that either will, or that they would not play it cagey even if they did respond. Definitely, they would not confirm my going theory even if it were true.

But… hear me out.

Here is the one fact we know from today – we know that Cruz fired Rick Tyler. We know that it happened so abruptly that he was essentially yanked from an on-air interview that he had with MSNBC:

Now here’s where we get into speculation. The rumor mill has been running rampant today that Cruz and Rubio held a closed-door, private meeting in Nevada today. Again, I can’t confirm that this even happened and I’ve heard nothing to verify that it did. But the timing of the rumor more or less coincided with the surprise Rick Tyler absence from MSNBC.

Here is my crazy conspiracy theory, that is, I should emphasize completely based on my own conjecture and might well be totally erroneous: what if Rubio and Cruz held a meeting in Nevada today to discuss burying the hatchet on their escalating public feud. What if the price for such a truce, from the Rubio side, was a prominent scalp? What if Rick Tyler turned out to be that scalp, in light of Biblegate?

I have no actual facts to confirm this, but it fits the rumors and speculation that we are hearing. And it also fits my fervent hope for this race, which is that Cruz and Rubio would stop their ongoing nuclear war against each other. And as with all conspiracy theories, that’s what makes it most believable.

UPDATE: I warned you all that this theory was completely unconfirmed. This statement from Rubio campaign pretty much rules out my conspiracy theory being true.

Just in — @marcorubio campaign responds to @tedcruz asking for Rick Tyler’s resignation: pic.twitter.com/GVGidNBSmE

— Patrick Svitek (@PatrickSvitek) February 22, 2016

Wow.

UPDATE II: According to the campaigns, the meeting never ever happened. So, basically, this story is just as meritorious as Donald Trump’s theories on 9/11.

Hey. You were warned.