Now let’s say that Trump’s prosecution is ongoing when the election takes place, complete with the nightly news overload of Jack Smith’s witnesses unloading on Trump, and the essentially unending, and ubiquitous, stream of acid commentary about how shocking it all is.

And then three days after the election, Trump gets acquitted, either of everything or most things. Or the jury hangs, leaving Trump still presumed innocent.

Is that likely? Hardly. Is it possible? You bet. OJ walked despite the utter obviousness of his guilt. Casey Anthony killed her daughter and got away with it. And if Trump loses under the circumstances I’ve described, it will be undeniable by reasonable people that he was robbed of the White House by a prosecution launched by his opponent’s administration, based on charges a jury did not accept.

Prof. Goldsmith’s name for this — “historic disaster” — will be an understatement. It would amount to a subversion of democracy unlike anything we have seen, a subversion brought to us by the very people who’ve been bellowing for months that hailing Trump into court was essential to — ready now? — “preserve democracy.”

[It gets worse, Bill argues, so read on. This seems to be a “War Games” scenario, in which the only winning move was not to play. — Ed]