Despite the exciting lineup of choices to kick out Biden and Kamala, the order of the day now is to close ranks behind Trump.

Except perhaps for Andrew Johnson, no man ever has been as persecuted — and unfairly so — from the moment he entered the presidency. Johnson was a quirk of history. He was a Southern Democrat from Greenville, Tennessee, who joined as Republican Abraham Lincoln’s running mate amid the Civil War. Andrew Johnson never was supposed to be president. However, secessionist John Wilkes Booth murdered Lincoln moments after the Civil War ended, and suddenly the victorious Northern Republicans found themselves led by a Tennessee quasi-Dixiecrat. They never accepted him, made his life miserable, impeached him for a non-offense, and came one vote short of convicting him.

Other than Andrew Johnson, no other president has been so persecuted, demonized, and tortured as Donald Trump. He is too strong to say “They are torturing me.” So I will say it. This is unbridled torture, outside all bounds of behavior in American history. This garbage is why America ends up with so many mediocrities like Biden and Kamala leading our country into quagmires — because truly great Americans decide: “I don’t need this.”

[I think there is a firm distinction between “closing ranks” to defend Trump from this nonsense prosecution and “closing ranks” to renominate him. The first is necessary and the second isn’t. It is possible to defend Trump from a politicized prosecution while making a reasoned choice to choose a new path for the GOP, especially given Trump’s age, baggage, and term limit. — Ed]