With each pitiable passing day, the plot arc of the ’24 Republican presidential race becomes ever more obvious. For the first time in our history a criminal defendant will likely be nominated for the highest office. The unprecedented horrors he has committed – stoking a violent insurrection, plotting to overthrow democracy, stealing classified documents – clearly enthralls Duh Base, and woe to any party official who tries to talk even a modicum of common sense.

This past weekend, Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp took that tack. In an address at a party retreat, and later on CNN, he said that if Republicans (i.e. Trump and his nutjobs) keep obsessing about the lost 2020 election and the various law enforcement probes, they will drag the party down to defeat in 2024 – in his swing state, and nationally:

“We have to be able to win a general election…Being distracted by what is happening at the Manhattan and Fulton County district attorneys’ offices is not going to win us back the White House. Not a single swing voter will vote for our nominee if (that person) chooses to talk about the 2020 election being stolen…(We) can’t control what the judicial branch is doing or what a local prosecutor is doing…We have to tell people that we’re going to be focused on the future and what we’re going to do for the American people…focus on the future, not look in the rear view mirror.”

He says that 2020 is “ancient history.” But his Georgia Republican base is still marinating in grievance. In a new poll sponsored by the University of Georgia, measuring sentiment for the ’24 statewide primary, Trump beats Ron DeSantis by 21 points (51-30) in a multi-candidate field, and by a solid 10 points if the matchup is one on one. Even though Trump is in deep doo-doo with various DAs, he’s still deemed more appealing than a guy who’s getting beaten up by Mickey Mouse. And as for the other Republican aspirants, they barely move the needle.

Take Nikki Haley, for instance. She openly rebuked Trump the other day (“we have to move forward, we can’t deal with the drama that’s following him, we can’t deal with the baggage”), but she’s polling at only 18 percent in her home state of South Carolina (23 points behind Trump), and the other day she got caught trying to double-count her anemic fundraising numbers.

I suppose it’s worth pondering for the umpteenth time why oh why so many grassroots Republicans still refuse to divorce Don the Con, who’s destined to go down in history as the first prexy to be arrested and fingerprinted (in all likelihood, multiple times). But maybe we should just let those voters speak for themselves, as they’ve done recently in focus groups. The gist of their sentiment is that Trump is a rebel (good) and that everyone else is from “the elite” (bad).

Mike Pence is “too entrenched in the establishment.” Haley is “milquetoast,” a “status quo politician.” DeSantis is “still establishment.” And so on. Sarah Longwell, the anti-Trump Republican strategist who ran those focus groups, offers this conclusion: “If you forged your political identity pre-Trump, then you belong to a GOP establishment now loathed by a majority of Republican primary voters…I’ve sat through hundreds of focus groups with GOP voters over the last four years and one thing is perfectly clear. The Republican party has been irretrievably altered and, as one GOP voter put it succinctly, ‘We’re never going back.'”

Indeed, the deeper Trump sinks in his stink, the more these voters want to join him. Back in January, according to a CBS News/YouGov poll, 65 percent of Republicans said that loyalty to Trump was very or somewhat important. In the latest poll, post-indictment, the loyalty share has spiked to 76 percent.

Asa Hutchinson, the Arkansas governor who’s also running for president (with microscopic poll numbers), insists that Republicans will come to their senses and reject Trump’s appeal “to our worst instincts.” He declared the other day: “Realism is coming to the party.” Clearly, whatever he’s smoking has a potent dose of THC.

Those of us who treasure democracy and the rule of law may well persuade ourselves that this MAGA idiocy is a good thing, because (as Brian Kemp said) swing voters will likely go blue in ’24 and buttress a Democratic victory. But how long can this country go with only one sane political party? It sure ain’t healthy for Uncle Sam to fly with only one engine.