It’s also likely the most unusual and disturbing, featuring one party shunning the normal practice of political warfare to employ lawfare by indicting, suing, and tying up in courts the dominant front-runner of the other party.

While our media, with its constitutional protections as a government watchdog, ignores for partisan purity the political burglars going about their crooked business.

No wonder polls find growing public anxiety and mounting distrust in once-hallowed institutions, including that media. 

America has proven resilient during and after previous public crises. But corrupting the equal imposition of justice, as Joe Biden’s administration has done, is a dangerous, volatile game that can play out badly both ways when political tides inevitably turn.

First, the latest Trump-less debate: NBC News ran it pretty well without the baiting of previous debates. Donald Trump is wise not to attend. His outbursts, insults, and sharp comebacks would not contrast well with the overall intelligent, to-the-point presentations of the five others.

The debate also made clear that, despite RNC qualification rules, the realistic Trump alternatives are narrowed to two: Former Gov and Amb. Nikki Haley and Navy veteran Gov. Ron DeSantis. 

Much attention will focus on that pair at the fourth GOP debate, Dec. 6 in Alabama on NewsNation, moderated by Megyn Kelly.

Qualifications tighten for that one: Candidates must draw at least six percent in two approved national polls or six percent in one poll from two separate early-voting states: Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada, and South Carolina. Each candidate must also have at least 80,000 unique donors, with at least 200 unique donors per state or territory in 20 or more states.

Like all female candidates, Haley has the unfair challenge of appearing firm and decisive without sounding shrill and Hillary-abrasive. It’s an unfair dual standard that men can be firm, but the same words from a woman’s mouth are domineering.

In my opinion, she has pulled that off well throughout, effectively deflecting attacks without sounding defensive while revealing her foreign policy chops along the way. 

Given world developments and two wars these days, foreign policy seems likely to play a larger campaign role than normal.

Given the former president’s large lead in contemporary polls, the GOP field’s critiques of Trump have proven completely ineffective in draining his support.

Having witnessed years of the former president’s perpetual punching back on even insignificant slights, voters could reasonably anticipate a revengeful second Trump administration.

The new tack of his far younger party challengers is to credit the many positive achievements of the 77-year-old ex-president but note that he’s changed.

DeSantis said, “Donald Trump's a lot different guy than he was in 2016. He owes it to you to be on this stage and explain why he should get another chance.”  

Haley suggested Trump has gotten “weak in the knees” when it comes to U.S. involvement abroad. “I don’t think he’s the right president now. He put us $8 trillion in debt.”
 
Chris Christie added: 

Anybody who’s going to be spending the next year and a half of their life in courtrooms focusing on keeping themselves out of jail cannot lead this party or this county.  

Democrats’ relentless assaults on the man and his business have actually created notable sympathy support, at least among likely Republican voters. All coming after the shameful Russian hoax, the relentless, negative Deep State leaks, and two impeachments.

Democrats think, or hope, that no one remembers Vice President Joe Biden’s threats to fire a Ukrainian prosecutor investigating the gas company paying his son large monthly retainers. While Trump’s phone call to Ukraine seeking dirt on Biden brings a Democrat impeachment.

Not to mention the Justice Department (and media) ignoring Hunter Biden’s incriminating laptop, its sweetheart plea deal, and slow-walking other probes. 

Oh, and do you remember media’s saturation coverage of Chinese interests paying millions of dollars to Joe Biden’s family for unexplained reasons, as documented in Suspicious Activity Reports by Biden's own Treasury Department?

No, you don’t. There wasn’t any. In contrast to breathless coverage of everything Trump.

Trump’s in legal peril over willfully keeping secret documents. Biden, who did much the same longer in Congress and after his vice presidency, isn’t. He claims ignorance, though. Poor guy.

Joe Biden has spent months attempting, in vain, to sell Americans on how swell Bidenomics has made their inflation-riddled lives.

This president is good at biting into ice cream cones for the cameras. But pretty much everything else Biden touches — inflation, medical shortages, the Afghan withdrawal — melts into a mess. 

So, he thinks more of the same will convince anyone?

Polls are not predictive. But here’s how bad they are for him right now:

Biden’s job approval is 14 points underwater – 41 to 55.3 -- according to the RealClearPolitics average.

On the Economy, he’s 38.3 to 59.3. 

Foreign policy 38 to 57.6. 

Immigration 33.6 to 63.4. 

Inflation 34 to 63. 

Direction of the Country: Right 25. Wrong 66.5.

You get the direction of public opinion, worst for an incumbent POTUS since 1980 when Democrat Jimmy Carter garnered 49 electoral votes to Ronald Reagan’s 489.

What about Biden’s age? He turns 81 next week and plans on staying until he's 86. Three-quarters say he’s too old, including (Ouch!) 69 percent of Democrats. 

For Trump, who’s 77, it’s 51 percent too old, with only 28 percent of Republicans agreeing.

Nationally, Americans prefer neither man for president. Biden’s Favorable/Unfavorable numbers are 40.6 to 54.6.

Trump’s matching numbers are worse: 39.6 to 56.2.

A CNN Poll found that when discussing the nation’s challenges, 95 percent of the GOP, 67 percent of Independents, and even 23 percent of Democrats see Biden as “part of the problem.”

Still, in a hypothetical replay of the 2020 election, with one exception, polls have the two men running neck-and-neck one year out.

That, however, does not account for any third-party challengers. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is running as an Independent. Cornel West and Jill Stein of the Green Party are in the race. And Sen. Joe Manchin has hinted he might take a shot, likely on the No Labels Party ticket.

None of them has a chance of actually winning. But they do have a very good chance of affecting the election and hurting the major parties, mainly Democrats. 

Remember 1992 and Ross Perot? He won no electoral votes, but he did reap 19 percent of the popular vote. If a large chunk of those 20 million votes -- half as many as President George H.W. Bush got -- had gone to the Republican incumbent in the right places, Bill Clinton would be only an asterisk now instead of a sexual chuckle.

A recent poll of six key battleground states by the New York Times and Siena College found Kennedy capturing 24 percent in a three-way match-up with Biden and Trump. In the hypothetical race, he comes within 10 points of both men.

This is the strongest showing of a third-party candidate at this point since 1992. 

It's not so much the actual number of years that is Biden's problem. It's the effects of those years displayed in his public appearances on his thinking, speaking, slurring, rambling, and movements. All of this suggests that voters appear receptive to a fresh face, presumably a younger one.

One fascinating part of that Times battleground-states poll didn’t gain as much attention as it should for Republicans tired of losing:  

At this moment, Trump ties Biden in Arizona and beats him in two other states (Michigan and Wisconsin).

Ron DeSantis, who’s 45 years old, beats Biden narrowly in four states (Arizona, Nevada, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin) and ties the president in two (Georgia and Michigan).

However, Nikki Haley, who’s 51, defeats Joe Biden in all six battleground states by as much as 10 points in Michigan and Pennsylvania and 13 points in Wisconsin.

Did I mention the appeal of a fresh face?