It Can Not be Trump, nor Biden.
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Cannot be Trump:
The Republican leadership has clearly turned away from Trump. They point out that Trump picking weak candidates who, if they won, would be beholden to him and would likely support any 2024 efforts by Trump, to use the House, or the Senate, or a Governor or a state's Secretary of State, to overturn elections. These candidates failed miserably. It needlessly cost the Republicans several offices for Governors and control of the Senate. A total fiasco.
None of this makes any difference. Post November 2022 polls indicate that support for Trump among Republican voters is about as strong as ever.
Reasons for Republican voters to turn against Trump:
1. He makes it harder for Republicans seeking office to win their elections.
2. He has clearly committed criminal acts. In his business practices. In his efforts to legally, if unethically, overturn the 2020 election, overturn the choice of the people. In his efforts to illegally overturn the 2020 election, by rallying a mob to come to Washington, to storm the Capitol, and, in mid-riot, reminded the mob that the critical target was Vice President Pence.
Reasons for Republican voters to support Trump:
1. He is the only candidate who clearly will do whatever it takes to win in 2024, and establish permanent Republican control of the government, insuring Republicans always win the Presidency, and other offices as well. Trump not only offers a possible solution to winning in 2024, but in all future elections for the foreseeable future. This is important because I believe that Republicans fear changing demographics doom their party in the long run, without adjusting their stances on issues which they do not want to do.
2. His criminal behavior merely makes it more likely he will do what it takes to get power, to avoid persecution. So it's not a negative, it's a positive.
It seems likely the Republican voters will insist on sticking with Trump. The recent polls make this clear.
So, the Republicans will try to get their voters to see reason. They won't see reason. And in the coming months we will see a parade of Republican politicians making pilgrimages to Mar-a-Lago, seeking forgiveness and once again promising to sin no more.
This future seems fixed and as unavoidable as a Greek prophecy. This will be a disaster for Republicans in 2024. The voters turned against, to a certain extent, and against Election Deniers, to a great extent, because of the fear that:
1. Trump will announce his candidacy for President.
2. Trump will be nominated by the Republicans.
3. Trump will win or be selected in the election of 2024.
Even though none of these three steps had taken place yet, the voters still took some precautions, to limit the power of Trump in 2024 to overturn elections. If the first two steps are taken by the summer of 2024 the voters will take even more extreme steps to prevent this from happening:
The majority will vote against Trump, of course. In addition, they will vote against Republicans in the House, in the Senate, for Governors, for even State legislature representatives. Yes, technically Republicans would take these offices too late to help Trump in 2024, but the voters will want to make the strongest statement possible. DO NOT TAKE AWAY OUR VOTES. It will be apparent that the Republicans did not listen to the message the voters sent in 2022. They will have to make this message even stronger in 2024.
So, individual Republicans should try to steer their fellow Republicans away from this course, which promises disaster. But I don't think enough will do so. Some things the Gods just decree.
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Cannot be Biden:
The Republicans will take over the House. They will start an investigation of President Biden and Hunter Biden. One must understand, that the possible innocence of the Biden's is immaterial. Even if there is no fire, the Republican House will generate a hell of a lot of smoke. This smoke will be timed to reach a peak in the fall of 2024. This formula worked in 2016 with the Hillary Clinton email scandal, which does not seem to have much in it, but it didn't matter. It dominated the news cycles in the last ten days of the campaign.
His age is a concern. A sudden stroke in the fall of 2024 could be a disaster.
Still, I like President Biden. It think he is a good president and certainly a good man. I think the inflation problem is just a natural result of an overheated economy coming out of the COVID-19 recession. Biden is using the same policies that worked well under Obama, but the times have been tough. His support for Ukraine is correct and absolutely needed. America needs to support Democracy when it is under assault.
None of this matters. Trump is coming and we must have the strongest possible candidate to run in 2024.
I don't think Governor Gavin Newsom is that candidate. His efforts to stamp out homelessness have been something of a disaster, as one could have predicted. In any event, not a great success. I think Sherrod Brown, Senator from Ohio may be that candidate. But the Democrats must find the strongest possible candidate to insure the survival of Democracy. Because another storm is coming.
