Will he run in 2024? He has to.

Since Trump was ejected from the White House by the voters nearly two years ago, there has been widespread speculation as to whether he might run again in 2024. On the one hand, his fragile ego probably couldn't handle another defeat, and that prospect might be a sufficient disincentive.  On the other hand, his thirst for the revenge he could reap from the Oval Office is clearly a huge incentive. 

But the clincher is surely the prospect of avoiding prosecution and and jail. As Bibbi Netanyahu showed, getting into the highest office in the land is a great way to stymie investigations into wrongdoing and run out the clock on potential prosecution. As the net tightens around him on his numerous alleged felonies, running again may be his only salvation from serious time.  

A question of interpretation

The former president's Mar-a-Lago residence was raided today by the FBI, looking for papers illegally from removed the White House by the former president, allegedly.  He and his supporters were incensed, claiming this was unprecedented and thus further evidence of left wing deep state vendetta against the him. 

Of course there is another (more plausible) explanation for it being unprecedented; simply put, this was the first president whose conduct had risen to this level of illegality.  

The boiling frog

Little by little it looks like the United States is sliding into a one party autocracy. The constitution already favors one party, the Republicans, with its over-weighting of sparsely populated states in the Senate. Red states are also making it harder for their opponents to vote through legislation predicated on false claims of voter fraud and the gerrymandering of electoral boundaries. Compounding this, the GOP is installing party loyalists in the election machinery making it possible to sway elections in their favor by throwing out opponents' votes. It has been working for over a decade to politicize the federal judiciary, culminating in its take-over of the Supreme Court.

If re-elected, the MAGAP plans to hollow out the civil service and put in place party loyalists. Law enforcement is generally more sympathetic to the GOP than the Democrats and there are already many more MAGAP members in law enforcement (and the military) than Democrats. The last remaining step will be the trampling of the free press, something Trump would dearly love. If the current trend continues, America will be a one party illiberal democracy (like China or Venezuela).