there is no certainty what will happen next.

If he loses, there will still be a massive clean-up job and mopping-up operation. And how that goes will depend on the down-ballot results. None of the problems we have now will suddenly go away if Biden wins. And a lot of other things can go wrong. The GOP will be much weakened, but they will not be out and will be determined to cause trouble. The Dems will be tempted to get distracted, overreach and under-perform because, after all, that's what Democrats do. Biden is a good man, but I believe he's well past his prime, and I have my doubts about Harris.

And if Trump wins, well, I think we both agree on how that will turn out. He will feel justified, secure, unchained. And he will settle a lot of old scores as well as consolidate his position. America will never be the same again, but it will look a lot like the America of the first decades of the Gilded Age--but we'll be on the way down, not on the way up. And before he runs again, there will be a real brawl to select his replacement. We know the kind of people that have flourished under his administration; Cruz, Graham, Barr, Cotton, Pompeo, McConnel, Nunes. Perhaps none of them, but someone much like them. It will be a bloodbath.