Say the polls are right - non-white voters across the board swing 20%+ right, age polarization vanishes or possibly even inverts, and so on
Why would this election specifically be such a large re-aligning election? Both the candidates are the same form the last election. Neither’s messaging has changed significantly. There hasn’t been some major recession or world war. What would be the acclimate for this sort of re-alignment?
If such a re-alignment happens, I think what it represents will be a loss of faith in American institutions.
Post-COVID inflation may end up being the straw that breaks the camel's back. But it's hardly alone. America does have problems with over-regulation, wealth inequality (including generational wealth inequality), runaway corporate abuses and regulatory capture, lack of a truly functional medical or judicial system, etc.
Now, I personally don't think Republicans have solutions for any of America's ills. They're the political equivalent of a pyromaniac who wants to deal with the leaky roof and broken plumbing by burning the house down with people inside (and who's being encouraged by the real-estate speculator who'd like to buy the property cheap). America's future under the Republicans would be terrible.
But that doesn't mean that the Democrats have been doing a great job either. Obama did damned little to address the problems many people see with America. I think Biden has done better, especially given what he has to work with, but its still a hard sell. (A whole generation spent 8 years hoping for some change they never saw, and isn't going to settle for slogans again.)
I think Republicans have contributed to the Democratic Party's own dysfunction (although the responsibility rests with the party and its voters); by becoming the party of terrible people and insane ideas, the GOP removed any pressure for the Democrats to be a party of better ideas and effective follow-through. The Democrats have existed for decades on the strength of "being better than the orcs". But that's a pretty damned low bar, and they suffered for it in 2016, and may suffer for it again this year.
If the GOP wins a solid victory, Republicans will take it as a ratification of all their worse impulses. And it will be, from many of their reliable voters. But the people who can hand them a victory will not be any happier with religious fanaticism and billionaire worship than they were with vague promises and very slow incremental change. Not that I think it will matter, as I expect a GOP trifecta - should they get one - to destroy the Constitution and America.
