Though it is more than a year in the future the next presidential contest will be upon us fast and horrid.
THE PRIMARIES
On the Democratic side, barring any extraordinary exogenous event, such as a serious health event, Joe Biden will be the nominee. Robert F Kennedy jr., despite a name of Democratic royalty, will be a gadfly and I fully expect that vaccine denying idiot to be tossed aside and not present any serious threat.
For the Republicans things are much dicer, dangerous, and chaotic.
No declared and soon to be declared candidate has shown the chop, the skill, and the willingness to be a ‘Trump killer’ if such a thing is possible within the poisonous voter base the GOP has built over the last 30 years. So, there will a fight across the primaries, and I suspect right on to the convention floor, unless Trump simply wins the primary contest right out. If Trump wins the delegates count in the primary the GOP will stay true to their runny, warm jello spines and supplicate themselves again the macaroni Mussolini. IF Trump does not win the primaries, then he will challenge each and every loss as stolen, turning to the courts and the local party apparatus, the latter which he has gained a firm hand on, to take the delegates anyway.
Should Trump fail to steal the delegates in the courts or in the local committees, then the floor fight will start, and it will not be a calm, considered conflict, but a vicious brawl waged with Trump’s well-known restraint.
Should he win that fight he will go into the election with the GOP fractured, a weakened but not a defeated candidate.
Should he lose that fight, I do not think, as many do, that he will run as a third-party pick, but rather he will stand on the side and throw figurative eggs at the GOP candidate. Pettiness and vengeance are much more powerful emotions for Trump than any form of reason. This alternate future I think would give Biden his best chance for a clean and easy victory.
Th worst outcome for Biden, the nation, and democracy would be for Trump to clearly win the primary contests, putting him in the strongest position to win.
Remember, while Biden racked up millions more votes than Trump in 2020, he actually won by only 40 or 50 thousand votes. 2024 could go to Trump with Biden having an even larger popular vote win.
I do not think the court cases, or the criminal charges will seriously damage Trump with the GOP base. These events only ‘prove’ that the liberal system is out to get him, further enhancing the ‘persecuted’ complex of the modern GOP. Nor will he be in jail, even if convicted, he will be free on appeal, as all rich people are, and that appeal process will turn slowly, leaving him free to chase that election.
