DON SURBER: Life after Trump. “We can talk about cheating and the fix being in and mail-in votes. We can go on and on about the deep state and the media. We can spend months in denial but the fact is, Americans do not want Donald John Trump to be their president. He did not save the Republican Party. He spent it. . . . I really wanted Trump to come back but I just don’t see it. He’s damaged goods, done in by Barack Obama and the FBI and the Washington media. Chuck Schumer warned Trump on TV two weeks before his inauguration, ‘You take on the intelligence community? They have six ways from Sunday of getting back at you.’ That is evil. That is unfair. That is the world we live in, for like Sarah Palin, our enemies turned Trump into an albatross. He came so close to bringing Washington down that they now will destroy him, ruin his children and salt his fields because he threatened them.”

And all too often he’s cooperated.

Related thoughts:

But now, sniping from the sidelines at Ron DeSantis instead of providing leadership, he’s made clear that his era has passed. I’d still support him if he were the nominee, but I don’t think he can be the nominee with the kind of campaign he’s likely to run, all he can do is divide the party and elect a Democrat.

Plus, a reminder that it’s never really about a single hero:

We owe a huge debt of gratitude to Trump. Without him, Hillary would be in the middle of her second term and things would be worse even than they are now under Biden. And if this were Trump’s second term, things would be a lot better than they are now. But ultimately, it’s about what he can do for the country now. I’m hearing from several of my friends who were tremendously pro-Trump that they think it’s time for him to step back, and I think they’re right.