The mess we’re in for a Presidential year

The dye is pretty much set for the 2016 race for President of the United States.

Hillary Clinton took at least four out of five races Tuesday night, including the delegate-rich winner-take all races.  Donald Trump, the wildest of all wild-cards in political history, took four out of five but John Kasich won the winner-take-all face in Ohio.

That one loss could force the Republican presidential race into a brokered convention this summer but the momentum, at this point, belongs to Trump.

Clinton recognizes that and is turning her focus now on Trump, her presumed opponent in November’s general election.

If everything in this Topsy-turfy election in this Presidential year goes as normal — that is still a big “if” — the moderates, independents and minorities that control the final decisions in a national race should favor Clinton.

In that end, the race will between the racists, bigots and haters on the Republican side who back Trump and the rest of the country, which — hopefully — still prefer a President with experience and a focus on the needs of the nation.

Both Clinton and Trump come into the general election with baggage — both political and non-traditional.  Trump is, without a doubt, the most inexperienced, issue-deficit candidate ever to run for President.  He’s a real estate developer with a spotty record, a former reality show host with a  big mouth and a monomaniacal ego that surpasses even the high standards of perceived self-importance found in American politics.

Clinton has the baggage of her husband, former President Bill Clinton, and her own focused way of doing things — like having her own, insecure, email server as Secretary of State — that raises questions of her judgment and adherence to the law.

This election could well be decided by which of the “anti” groups dominate”  The “anyone but Trump” or the “anybody but Hillary” groups.

Political primaries are a mix of partisan votes, old-fashioned caucuses and decisions by party leaders — called “the elites” — who deliver a final candidate for the nominations.

Clinton is the choice — with some reservations — of traditional Democrats while Trump is the madman who drives mainstream Republicans crazy and leaves them facing an almost unequal decision to back Texas Senator Ted Cruz, the hard-right winger who angers his own party as much as the opposition.

Trump cashed in on national anger against the “Washington establishment” to take control of the GOP nominating process.  Clinton’s primary opponent, independent and self-declared socialist Bernie Sanders, is still a headache because he taps that same voter anger but is falling too far behind to be more than a nuisance.

Having dealt with — and once worked for — the myopic, single-issue and intolerant-often racist Republican party back in the 1970s — I can understand how a Donald Trump could turn the place into chaos.  He appeals to those who put hate above reason and self-determined claims of superiority above the needs of the nation as a whole.

The American political system is broken and the damage it can afflict on a troubled nation is a major threat.

In a normal year, Clinton should become the fist woman President of the nation — following the first African-American.  Her victory could bring back comparisons to the Democratic triumph of Lydon Baines Johnson over Barry Goldwater in 1964.

In a normal year, perhaps, but this is hardly anything but a “normal” election.

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