Maybe

There's no way to eye the future with any accuracy, even though we all savor our own hopes and dreams. Both parties' candidates could fall over dead at any time; I'm not being flippant, a dramatic and sudden death or two has never been more possible. Biden looks more and more deathly every day. Lots of folks--responsible people, many of them Democrats--are convinced that he should not run again. Me too. I can't help but think he'd go out as one of the great winners of the age because he steered us through the darkness post-Trump, reversed economic trending, created infrastructure jobs that put the nation to work, and then, when it became clear that age was a factor in his ability to govern, he left. He'd be a star. 

Besides, voracious Trump lapdogs like Matt Gaetz may well take him down in their own vainglorious attempt at a now-it's-our-turn impeachment. They'll dangle Hunter before cameras on all the right-wing media until there is no Hunter to dangle; and then they'll bring him back post-mortem. "You thought Trump was a crook?--everybody does it, brother--everybody, even your liberal pansies!"

But let's just say that, come November 2024, we're stuck with the same choices, and let's say that no third-party candidate scores enough votes to really affect the outcome of the tired old race--Trump vs. Biden. What's going to be the outcome?

I hope this is more than hopeful thinking, but I'm putting my money on the older of the old guys and here's why.

You may remember a phenomenon back in 2016--no one, including pollsters, ever dreamed that a bad boy from NYC, a known adulterer who claimed to love grabbing women's privates, a gambling magnate who said he didn't like vets like McCain, men who got themselves captured, a big mouth who violated every last code ever created for American Presidents, that man could win in November. When he did, people said that shocking victory, unforeseen by almost any polling agency, was created by the deceit of men and women who swore they'd never vote for the guy, then did.

Trump was so degraded as a candidate that tons of people who ended up voting for him, said they simply wouldn't and then did. They were afraid of being dragged into the gutter by their own preferences, so they lied to pollsters. Lots and lots of people who voted for the Orange Man wouldn't admit to it before their votes were cast. But they did. 

Here's my prediction. Right now, every Presidential poll has the two old men neck and neck, as impossible as that may seem. Trump may well end up in jail--don't figure on it! --from any of, what? 90-some indictments. He's an unlikely winner, although he's pulled victory from the eye teeth of defeat before. 

This time around, I'm thinking the pollsters are being lied to in a fashion that works the opposite direction. Amid all the indictments, the sympathy generated for the man who will undoubtedly go down in history as the most forked tongue President of all time, garnered a lot of bucks and regard. No longer are people ashamed to register their sympathy for a man who registered his weight at 215 pounds. I think they'll tell anyone who asks that they're Trump people. It's cultish, and cults are fun.

HOWEVER, when in November, push comes to shove, literally millions of his minions will sit there in the booth and tell themselves they're frickin' sick of it, all the horror and hoopla the man puts out every last day of life, all the deceit that simply part of the package, all the ballyhoo, which is fun to watch--most of us are addicted--but is immensely and horridly tiring. 

What I'm saying makes a claim that the American public has more moral character than many others believe. When push comes to shove and they're standing there in the voting booth, I'm saying lots of people who claim to be MAGAs will check the box across the ledger from the heavyweight candidate. 

I'm saying, this time around, the lie will reverse course because those who are charmed by his naughty-boy status will suffer an attack of morality and send the Prince of Orange on his way.

You know, maybe.  Hope springs eternal.