The two burning questions of the day. First: why do so many people (okay, 40% of the electorate qualifies as “many”) support Donald Trump? Second: why do so many people (more than 40% of the electorate) distrust the Democrats?

I think the answer is the same. Trump supporters believe that the current system is stacked against them, and that Trump and MAGA generally will destroy that system and that whatever they put in place will be better for them than what they currently confront. Trump supporters believe that the Democrats (and you can add to that those traditional Republicans, now known as RINOs) are the ones who have created and control the system they find stacked against them.

Of course, you have to add something to that to get the full picture. You have to add Trump’s cleverness, and Trump’s ruthlessness, and Trump’s chutzpah. His cleverness allows him to lie continually, convincing his supporters that his lies are a necessary part of his plan, that they are strategic lies and should be ignored as lies. His ruthlessness allows him to approach potential enemies, especially those with access to enormous resources, and tell them that they will follow his wishes or wind up (along with their entire business enterprises) in the gutter. His chutzpah allows him to ignore standards, norms, laws, the courts, constitutional standards, really anything, and claim his actions all as necessities.

Only he can fix it: people believe that. He can murder someone on 5th Avenue: there are always casualties in a war. People who disagree with him are his enemies: you have to quash them, or they might win.

I have said it before. We are lucky that Donald Trump is 79 years old. If he was 29, or whatever Castro was, when he took over Cuba using many of the same techniques (putting aside his very different vision for his country’s future), he was able to stick around for 58 years. And the one thing that Trump has not, and can not, take into granted, is what will happen after he is gone.

And, although we presume he will be gone in 2028, you never know what is up his sleeve. He could try anything. The most likely of the very unlikely scenarios would require the Republicans to win the presidency (Vance or Rubio or someone else) in 2028, and win at least the House of Representatives. The House, when it convenes in 2029, for the first time elects a Speaker who is not himself a member of Congress, a man named Donald Trump. (An alternative would have Trump, as his presidency winds down, run for Congress in, say, Palm Beach County or somewhere in, say, rural Mississippi, and be elected to Congress.)

Once Trump is Speaker of the House, the wheels will be set in motion. The newly elected President of the United States resigns, and the newly elected Vice President resigns, and – according to the Constitution – the Speaker of the House is next in line. Donald Trump becomes president for his third term, without violating the Constitution which says that no one can be elected more than two times to the presidency.

The biggest stumbling block to this scenario might be the president’s age. In 2028, he will be in his 80s. But, in spite of the Big Macs and Diet Cokes, he may be a healthy octogenarian, providing that his mental capacity does not continue to decline.

For that reason, perhaps the most troublesome problem we have is the sanctity of our elections. And Trump and his crew are going to try very hard (they already are trying) to limit the number of people who would vote against him by controlling or patrolling voting places, by limiting mail in and other forms of early voting, by placing ID requirements on voters that many would be unable to meet (at least on a timely basis), by challenging voters at the polls, by challenging close elections after the ballots are counted, by general intimidation, and by actions that we may not even yet contemplate. All these must be opposed – both through the courts, and on a precinct by precinct, state by state basis. How this will play out…..we just don’t yet know.

As you can see, I haven’t even mentioned the Democrats, who need to find a way convince so many (perhaps the majority) of the populace that they are not the enemy. To have Democrats moving to the left with progressive policies at this time is probably not a good idea. That time may come, but it is not now. Now, the attempt must be to convince that great center of the American voting public – the “independents”, whose votes most count, and especially the independents in the “swing states”. And, equally important, the Democrats have to get out the vote in the urban centers (thinking particularly in Pennsylvania) where the turnout will decide the race.

The question is: can the Democrats unite where there is such a danger if they fail to capture Congress in 2026 and again in 2028? Unity is not something that Democrats are very good at. That is one thing on which we can all agree.