Niall Ferguson
The president’s ex-lawyer squeals, but no one knows when this show ends. . . "Now imagine a similar exercise in March 2019. On what date will Donald J Trump leave the office of president? If, as in 1941, the majority of your seven senators were Democrats, I would guess that at least three would predict January 20, 2021 — the day the constitution requires Trump to hand over the White House if he is defeated in the 2020 election. But I doubt they would all say that.
"Senate Democrats are under instructions not to talk about impeaching Trump, but I am sure more than a handful think about it. So perhaps two out of seven would go for an earlier date, perhaps some time next year. But that would leave two pessimists. The first might say January 20, 2025, acknowledging that the president they love to hate could win a second term. The most pessimistic of them all, having read all those overwrought articles from two years ago about the coming Trump tyranny, might write “never”.
"One great benefit of recording such political wagers is that, years later, they can remind historians that the familiar past they study was once the uncertain future. We all know the United States eventually joined the fight against Axis powers. But that did not seem inevitable to many Americans, even in March 1941. In the same way, no one should pretend to know for sure how long the Trump presidency will last." . . .
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