Genius

With the third indictment of Donald Trump, it's time to reflect on the political parties who are the ringmasters of this circus and the likely outcome as the show goes on. It's reasonable to state that the Democrats have exhibited political genius in their manipulation of the politics of Trump's post presidency, and that the GOP base has exhibited a degree of rank stupidity that is comical (if you're a Dem) and sad (if you care about competent governance of this country).

It is indisputable that the GOP base rightly sees the unprecedented post-presidency impeachment and the three subsequent state and federal indictments of Trump as politically-motivated (puleeze, spare me the sanctimonious wails of "no one is the law"). It is equally clear that with every attempt to negate (or imprison) Donald Trump, his support among the GOP base grows stronger. And ... it is reasonably certain that Trump cannot and will not win the general election if he is the nominee—there is simply too much visceral hatred of the man among independents (Dems are a given), suburban women, and core minorities. 

Andy McCarthy summarizes this reality:

The problem for Trump is he has no upside. He is as known a quantity as has ever sought the presidency. In a normal race, the 46 percent of Republicans who do not favor Trump could be expected to “come home” in droves in the general election if he is the nominee. That is not true of Trump. As the Guardian reports, recent Pew polling indicates that just a hair under a third of Republicans now view him very or mostly unfavorably. The remaining two-thirds view him favorably, but that is down from three-quarters last year. It is reasonable to forecast that at least a quarter of Republicans will not support Trump under any circumstances. That doesn’t mean they will vote for an unpopular Democrat, they just won’t vote (or will vote third-party, write-in, or some similarly futile vehicle for registering discontent).

To have a chance in the general election, Trump has to make up that support. But from where? Polls consistently show that Democratic opposition to Trump is nearly universal. They also consistently show that his unfavorability with the general public hovers around 60 percent. There is no reason to believe this will change. To the contrary, about 54 percent of voters cast their ballots for someone other than Trump in 2016 and 2020, when he was more popular nationwide than he is now. He couldn’t win in 2020 with 46 (he won by a miracle in 2016 with 46). He is not going to win with less than 46, but there’s no reason to think he would ever sniff 46 again.

The genius of a Democrat strategy is that:

1. It is designed to make Trump look the victim of government persecution during the primaries, at least in the eyes of the GOP base. Given that, it is hard to see a way for any other GOP contender to defeat him, regardless of their leadership qualities, intelligence or political ideas. Hence, Trump becomes the nominee.
2. It is designed to make Trump look like a criminal throughout the presidential campaign itself, allowing Dems (and their trained hamsters in the media) to use all news about on-going indictments, legal proceedings, and trials as a battering ram to denigrate Trump in the eyes of the voters he needs to win over—independents, suburban woman, and core minorities.
3. It deflects attention from the many, many problems associated with the Biden presidency including dishonesty, corruption, incompetence, weaponization of federal agencies, profligate and ineffective spending, and obviously, the harsh reality that Joe Biden is a stage one dementia patient who cannot speak without a teleprompter and cannot answer substantive questions coherently.
4. Trump's legal problems will allow a biased media to deflect from any meaningful discussion of real issues—the rightful size of government; inflationary spending; mandated and authoritarian governance; the current trend among Democrats to mute free speech; the use of government to censor opposing views; the dishonesty of government officials and the ineffectiveness of policy positions throughout the Covid debacle. An honest conversation about these issues is exactly what the Democrats do NOT want to have happen.
   

This is political genius, and it will work if the GOP allows itself to be played. It looks like that's going to happen.

In a perfect world, Trump would recognize the trap and withdraw from the race for the good of the country (another four years of a Biden Administration would be nightmarish), allowing a younger GOP nominee to rise to the top. Biden has been so bad that any other of the main GOP contenders would likely win the general election, even with the predictable demonization that the propaganda media would level on the candidate.

But Donald Trump is a bully and a narcissist. He will never withdraw, and as a consequence, Joe Biden, or maybe his last minute replacement, will win, continuing the policies that certainly will NOT make America great.