The 2020 Campaign
The polls have been favourable and stable for Biden since the beginning. The House seems to be in the bag. Off late, its being projected that the Senate will flip as well. Chances are, Democrats will be in power of the Congress and the Office of the President, for the first time since 2011, which means the Democrats will enter the next two years with a lot of political capital to spend on the issues they choose.Biden's Campaign
Biden's campaign has been running on the healing America. The messaging has been amorphous relative to other campaigns over the years. There have been glimpses of policy details, but the campaign has decided that it can get away not focusing a lot of energy on policy. Biden says its time to heal America - from aftershocks of overt racial provocation by government and law enforcement, from derogation caused to immigrants, from Covid-19, and its effect on the economy, from weakened instituions run by appointing unqualified/ill-incentivized lobbyists, healing american relations with its allies. In a way its a call to go back to the pre-Trump America.Pre-Trump America
Since 2017, American politics has moved into a radical new direction. Trump has always been an unconventional candidate. Back in the campaign for 2016, his unfiltered practice of politics made him popular with his supporters. This unconventional Trumpian politics resonated with a class of voters who were perhaps too cynical to participate in the democracy over the years with establishment candidates. Overall, America was doing better, it had recovered, albiet unequitably, from the Great Recession and there was no major ongoing war with overt American participation. The progressives had also started to get some wins, with respect to Gay Rights, the Paris Climate Accord the restoration of relations with Cuba, and the Iran Deal.The Right
After winning the Presidency and the Congress in 2008, the Democrats spent a large portion of their political capital on healthcare reform. The ACA, an excessive blob of compromises that it was, proved to be a politically liability for the Democrats till 2016. The Republicans opposed it from the outset, despite the new law undeniably protecting people. They used it as a campaigning weapon - "repeal and replace Obamacare", challenged it in courts, didn't support it in states, at the peril of their people's benifit, never proposing a coherent replacement. Such behaviour became the norm for Republicans for anything related to Obama. The Democrats lost control in Congress in two years. They also started loosing Governerships and State Legislatures. Right-wing media played a role in this. With the echoing of right-wing media, and money from lobbyists, and political unpopularity of working and compromising with Democrats, candidates further to the right started running, and shifting the conservatives further right. The establishment members of congress either participated in the right-shift or lost to those on their right. Compromise and working across the isle was considered weak and participating in gridlock with my way or the highway rhetoric was considered heroic. The political discourse was getting siloed.The Left had a slight leftward movement but was in no way congruently reflective with what was happening on the right. In the final year of Obama's second term, the Republican senate decided to not hold confirmation hearings for the judge Obama nominated to fill an empty chair on the Supreme Court Bench. The Republicans seemed had a win at all cost strategy. Partaking in gridlock for the sake of political gain, and with the hope to blame the lack of progress on the opposition is a gross strategy. It damages the political culture of a society. The Republicans didn't mind using such means at times. These seem to be an act of desperation. The Democrats had mostly continued their restrained, ethical - appeal to morals - "when they go low, we go high" political discourse. They continued to vouch for fairness, truth and compromise.
Political Demographics
Each younger generation is more liberal than its predecessor. By definition, older generations are more conservative, and they form lesser and lesser part of the electorate. Migrants are left leaning, so are minorities. With the Republicans moving further right, the conservatives have a party with a smaller and smaller political spectrum to represent them. The Democrats, the only non-conservative party, consequently embody a large spectrum of center-left. The Democrats have a natural popular advantage. The Democrats have won the popular vote in all presidential elections since 1988 except 2003 (the year America went to war on Iraq).The constitution has many check against majority rule, one of which is the electoral college. Voters in rural, sparsely populated states are given an electoral advantage. This diffuses the Democrat's popular advantage. Futher, upon winning State Legislatures, Republicans (and to some extent Democrats) have redrawn districts to sway advantage in their favor. Since 1988 the Democrats and Republicans each have had 4 presidential terms.
Trump
This broken political discourse with one side acting with a different set of values, even facts than the other, with a part of the media seemingly living in a different reality, with historically partisan public, turned out to be an excellent environment from Trump to rise in popularity. He ran as an outsider who speaks as he sees, and isn't afraid of upending the system. His victory was a surprise. He won, with a higher turn out of white working class voters who historically do not participate as enthusiastically, and with the support, albiet wavering, of the conservative establishment. His presidential term delivered on many of the conservative campaign promises, lower taxes for the rich, less environmental regulation, severe stand on immigration policy. His protectionist policies were in complete contrast with his party's free trade ideology. His foreign policy was radical to say the least. Trump also engaged in a campaign to discredit the media, calling anyone critical of him "fake news". The Covid-19 crisis was met with an incompetent, at times a politically charged overtly destructive, response, with America, the highest healthcare spender in the world, having the highest number of deaths, and one of the highest death rates in the world. Trumps approval never went beyond 45% in his term. The rhetoric of anti-Trump thus gained strength.Trump's Campaign
In 2020, Trump is, unsurprisingly, not running on any policies, but on personal attacks and negative campaigning. He is not committing to any policy, is directly giving credence to conspiracy theories, overtly lying, and yet for the sizable loyal supporters he has built up, all this does not matter. He feels confident that this is his strong point, and that is how he's choosing to run.Trump's Grassroots
As to his radical policies, they are here to stay as long as there are people willing to run for office on them, as long as media is willing to give them equal time on the stage. They are the new normal for the Republicans. Moreover, his politically incorrect, bashful, unpredictable tone resonates with his supporters. The vast majority of the brunt of the Great Recession has bean beared by working class white people, and many of themy has chosen Trump to be their voice. They might be living in their echo-box, but they are, after long, politically engaged, and thats a positive. For now with their staunch support, Trump is in a position where incoherence or hippocracy that don't him, but they do hurt his targets, whose supporters extend value to ethics.Not-Trump
Biden's campaign doesn't seem to have the need/time to talk about the new things they intend to do. They want to undo and "go back" to the status-quo of pre-Trump times. This rhetoric points out that Biden-Harris are running on undoing the radical policies that the President, aided initially by Congress, and later by the Senate has enacted more than on what they would do. They do include parts of the left's ideas, just enough to ensure the left turns out to vote, and not too much so that the independents, centrists and not-Trump conservatives still vote and not for Trump.Democrats do not have the one popular leader that can embody them, like Trump does for Republicans, like Obama once did for the Democrats. They blue-wave this year is more of a "Not-Trump" wave that is surging the Democrats margin.
The Next Two Years
The Democrats can come in and work on what they have promised. The economy will do what it has to, Covid will do what it has to, Trump will do what he has to. In two years there will be a midterm election. Two years isn't enough time to bring the economy back its to pre-Covid strenth. It isn't enough to sooth the destruction Covid-19 has engendered. An with the right's apparatus, the fact of progress will be contested, any effort to "heal" won't be bi-partisan. Chances are, in two years, the Senate will be lost again. Although marginal, there are chances that the House could also be lost. Trump has asserted that he will contest the election's result if he loses. Biden's legitimacy will be questioned by Republicans from day 0. In all likelyhood, in 4 years, Trump will run again. In the meantime the Republicans will turn Trumpists, without a coherent ideology, but still popular with the voice of Trump, and approval of Trump, and criticism of everything the Democrats do.Even if Biden wins, if there are no systemic changes to the way the American democracy works, there will be little hope for partisan reconciliation. Without the two sides working together, without compromise, there can't be a democracy. Democrats need to use their political capital on fundamental structural changes.
The Democrats need to energize the grassroots and get some wins in State Legislature and Gubernatorial races. They need to use their capital on issues as Gerrymandering, Campaign Finance Reform, the Fillibuster, Electoral College Reform, Primaries, American Territories Statehood. These issues do not allow for distinguishing of values held by Liberals or Conservatives, they appeal to the American value of fairness. Only with a structurally sound democracy can the political divide heal.