By R. Emmett Tyrrell

Washington — The election of 2020 is well underway. President Donald Trump is probably overhead, if you scan the skies long enough. Former Vice President Joe Biden has left his basement and returns to its comforts only occasionally. This campaign is heating up.

What can we expect? Well, I can tell you it will be a very acrimonious race. Recently, Biden called the president a liar and said something to the effect that a liar should not be president. Of course, Joe is a proven plagiarist who cheated as a student and, for that matter, cheated for over 40 years as a senator. One cannot be a plagiarist and a cheat without being a liar. So, I guess Joe considers himself exempt from his charge against the president. As I say, this is going to be a very bitter race.

Yet no one I have listened to understands quite why it is going to be so bitter. The Democratic leadership obviously hates Trump, but why? After watching him for the last four years, I have come to the conclusion that it is not because of his endless tweets or his penchant for name-calling or any of the standard Democratic complaints. It is because he stole the Democrats political libido and put it to Republican purposes.

As I have written for years, the Democrats have the political libido of a nymphomaniac. At times, the Democratic political libido puts me in mind of a sex maniac. They simply cannot restrain themselves. The Republicans, by comparison, have a more chaste political libido. Theirs is more like that of a Victorian lady or gent. They do not want to make a scene. They do not want to bring down the house. The Democrats do, and they will stomp on the ruins if necessary.

From time to time, the Democrats, driven by their intemperate political libido, break a precedent. Remember when the precedent was that an American politician would never speak ill of a seated president while traveling abroad? Ever since the defeat of President Jimmy Carter, every Democratic presidential candidate, either elected or defeated, has spoken ill of a seated Republican president. There are other precedents the Democrats have broken of late. All have been the victims of overactive political libidos.

In the 2020 race, the reason for all this bitterness is that Trump has entered politics not understanding the Republican and the Democratic political libidos. He has disturbed the Democrats and some of the Republicans — forget not the Never Trumpers — by applying the Democratic political libido to Republican issues. It has served him well in terms of results, but it has riled up the Chuck Schumers and Nancy Pelosis of this world. The president, so far, has rammed through 208 judges, completely changing the judicial makeup of the country. He has revived the economy by lowering taxes and ridding the country of scores of useless regulations. He has overruled countless precedents. At times, he has brought down the house, and at times, he seemed ready to stomp on the ruins. He would be a perfect Democrat, except for one thing: He is not a socialist.

Trump has roared through politics with a zest for the game that Republicans really do not understand. Sure, the normal Republican politician likes the great game of politics, but at the end of the day, he or she goes home to the spouse and the family. Donald is more like a Democrat. He grabs a bite to eat and begins the night shift. He flips on the evening news. He calls his chief of staff, brings in his overworked speech writers, works the telephones. Possibly, he flies off to a battleground state. Frankly, the Never Trumpers should be glad he became a Republican, and they should have stayed around for the fun. Trump has gotten more done in his first term in office than any predecessor. The only one who comes close is Ronald Reagan, but then, he was originally a Democrat and may have had a bit of the Democratic political libido when he left the Democratic Party.

Now the president is running for reelection. The polls say he is behind. Well, at this point in 2016, he was behind also. For that matter, at this point in the race in 1980, Ronald Reagan was behind, too. The pollsters said the race was a toss-up as late as the night before the election. Then came the deluge.

R. Emmett Tyrrell Jr. is founder and editor in chief of The American Spectator. He is a senior fellow at the London Center for Policy Research and the author, most recently, of "The Death of Liberalism," published by Thomas Nelson, Inc. To find out more about R. Emmett Tyrrell Jr. and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate webpage at www.creators.com.