Somewhere out in the vast multiverse there’s a world in which National Zero is strictly publishing articles about stuff like morons getting killed dancing atop a moving 18-wheeler and snowplows being brought into clear a mass mink roadkill. Well, strictly those sort of articles rather than just the darkly humorous momentary diversions from our politics-focused coverage they were in this reality.
Because in that dimension we’re too depressed to want anything to do with politics at all really. It’s where Trafalgar polling was right and the Republicans won 60+ seats in the House, have a 55 seat majority in the Senate, and – worse yet -hardcore MAGA scumbags like Kari Lake, Tudor Dixon, Tim Michels, Mark Finchem, Jim Marchant, Kristina Karamo, and Doug Mastriano won their crucial swing state contests, positioning themselves to rig the 2024 election for Republicans.
It’s a world in which fat former President Trump this week had the wind at his back announcing his 2024 comeback bid, giddily anticipating two years of commanding his loyal scumbags in the new deep red House to impeach Joe Biden again and again and again. The MAGA trolls would take over the entire internet while libs would stare glassy-eyed at Netflix reality shows, eating bowl after bowl of Count Chocula with Nesquik in their pjs. Chuck Todd is cackling and chittering with delight.
We’re not in that world. We’re here where the Dems are likely to increase their Senate majority by one, held the Republicans to a single-digit gain and majority in the House, and won every swing state governor’s race except for in Nevada. None of the force multipliers Donald tried to set up in the electoral college are in place for 2024, Clarence Thomas and Sam Alito have to stay alive another two years, and it’s unlikely the House GOP have the votes to impeach Biden for having an irresponsible crackhead of a son. A lot of Republican leaders are trying to move on from their Orange Allah, and some Republican voters are too, as evidenced by polling showing asshole Florida Governor Ron DeSantis pulling ahead of Trump among 2024 GOP primary voters. The wind is in Trump’s face rather than at his back as he starts on the road to his third popular vote loss.
It’s a recipe for the next two years, to say the least, to be pretty goddamned entertaining. This is a circle that cannot be made square by the GOP. They’re stuck with Trump no matter what. Simply too many of their voters are fanatically loyal to him and nothing is going to change that. Those people are going to be fucking PISSED if Trump loses a single state primary to Ron DeSantis. They’re going to explode if DeSantis wins the nomination outright. That would all but guarantee Donald running a third party presidential campaign, splitting the vote and reelecting Biden (or electing Kamala Harris or Gavin Newsom) and causing further absolute chaos for the GOP down-ballot.
This of course assumes that outside events won’t intervene. War, famine, pestilence, and death have their way of shaking things up in American politics. We’re probably headed into a mild recession as the Fed injects its sedatives into a thrashing economy, but things could always get worse. The House GOP majority could find other ways to fuck things up – especially with the economy. Joe Biden turns 80 on Sunday. Russia could start a nuclear war. China could invade Taiwan.
So on and so forth. Things could absolutely make it easier for Ron DeSantis or Donald Trump to be sworn in as the 47th President of the United States in 2025. But they’re not going to make it easier on each other with or without those outside factors (and as we mentioned, those factors importantly do not include MAGA governors or secretaries of state). It’s going to be an extremely costly and destructive war that’ll make Hillary vs Bernie in 2016 look like a joint ticket.
Trump still probably has the edge over DeSantis when this is all said and done – and this not in spite of, but because of the all but certain indictment on charges that will probably put him in prison for the rest of his life if he’s convicted. But it’ll be close and there will be a lot of hilariously ugly meltdowns along the way. It’s coming and there’s no way out of it for Republican leaders. There’s no outcome to Trump vs DeSantis in which they will not have pissed off and alienated a significant portion of the voter base that already showed up for them in 2020 and 2022. Whatever happens, it’s not likely to be the kind of world they’re going to want to live in.