IF TRUMP IS STAGING A COMEBACK, MAYBE THAT'S A GOOD THING

For a while, it looked as if Donald Trump would spend his post-presidential days as a greeter at Mar-a-Lago -- he was off social media, he hadn't found a way to communicate regularly with the public, and he wasn't doing the rallies that were his favorite form of self-aggrandizement.

But now he's back online (after a fashion), he's been receiving supplicants -- and, according to the Daily Mail, he's planning rallies again:

Former President Trump will hold two rallies in June as he looks to capitalize on a series of crises engulfing President Joe Biden and lay down a marker for 2024, according to an adviser familiar with planning.

Those will be followed by a third event around July 3....

Factors under consideration are whether to appear at events with candidates that he has already endorsed or whether to travel to locations that reflect a specific campaign topic.

Trump has also teased the idea of visiting the border....

I don't want him back. I don't miss having that whining, grating, hectoring voice in my ears every day. But Trump's return, if it happens, might be good for us.

We know that President Biden is popular -- but Biden's popularity doesn't seem likely to preserve the Democratic majority in the House and effective majority in the Senate. The party out of power generally does well in a president's first midterms. Some observers believe that Republicans could take the House back based on their likely redistricting gains alone. And "generic ballot" polling points to Republican gains. New election laws in Republican-controlled states will hurt Democrats, too.

Democrats win the presidency when voters are fed up with Republicans -- but Democratic voters tend to relax after electing a president. They forget what they were angry about. It happened in 1994 and 2010.

Which is why Trump's comeback might be a good thing. The only good midterm election a Democratic president has had in the past thirty years was in 1998, when Democratic voters had a clear and present enemy: Newt Gingrich's merry band of impeachers. Next year, Marjorie Taylor Greene and Matt Gaetz might not be enough -- the politically engaged know who they are, but other Democratic voters might need more motivation to turn out. Trump might provide that motivation.

We know Trump's popularity is fading:

The Washington Post reported over the weekend on a Republican retreat held last month that featured a polling briefing for GOP members.

When staff from the National Republican Congressional Committee rose to explain the party's latest polling in core battleground districts, they left out a key finding about Trump's weakness, declining to divulge the information even when directly questioned about Trump's support by a member of Congress, according to two people familiar with what transpired. Trump's unfavorable ratings were 15 points higher than his favorable ones in the core districts, according to the full polling results, which were later obtained by The Washington Post.

In these battleground districts, "strongly unfavorable" views of the former president were twice as high as "strongly favorable" views.

Trump's numbers might rise if he emerges from hiding, as GOP voters recall why they first fell in love. But many of these voters didn't turn out to vote in 2018, because they didn't think it was worth the trouble if their God Emperor wasn't on the ballot. And he may have thoroughly alienated a small but significant sliver of the GOP electorate, who won't respond to his ranting (which will be more unhinged than ever).

So it might be good to have him out there. It might be good to have im back on Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube. Less engaged Democratic voters might not vote unless they're voting against him. So welcome back, Donnie.