How ‘Consequential’ Is the 2024 Election?

Yesterday I was watching a bit of the news, and when they did the nightly, 3-minute segment on the 2024 campaign, they had Kamala standing in front of some crowd and saying that this campaign was one of the most ‘consequential’ of all time.

I assume that what she meant was that she would do some really important things if she were elected, and that Trump would do some really horrible things if he got his fat ass back behind the real Resolute desk for another four years.

So, I began thinking: exactly what makes a Presidential election ‘consequential?’ Obviously, it must mean that the individual who gets elected will be making decisions that will really change our lives or change the whole shape and direction of the country, or both.

Now, I’ve been aware of things outside of myself since 1956 when I was 12 years old. Which means I have lived through the administrations of 13 Presidents, and I can only think of one really consequential decision that any of those men made, and that was LBJ’s decision in 1964 to widen the Viet Nam War.

That decision was consequential in three fundamental respects. First, it resulted in some nearly 60,000 American troops losing their lives, along with at least that many men who suffered extreme injuries from which some of them are somehow getting through every day of…