“The end may justify the means as long as there is something that justifies the end.” — Leon Trotsky, “Their Morals and Ours”

“Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others.” — Winston S. Churchill

I watched last week’s debate between President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump with increasing horror and revulsion.

I turned off the tube that night depressed, convinced neither man should serve in the White House. It’s taken me roughly a week to wrap my head around the words needed to express the total sadness and inherent woe induced by that conviction.

Trump and Biden will probably remain our primary choices in November, both men nominated by the majority of the slim minority of voters who actually cast ballots in presidential primaries.

Yet both men in that debate showed us the very worst of their candidacies, with Trump lying through his teeth and Biden stumbling through his sentences like a lost man.

I don’t want either man to have his finger on the nuclear button, yet one of them will probably be president for the next four years, with all the increasingly mighty powers of the Oval Office at his disposal.

Either man could do a lot of damage between Jan. 20, 2025, and Jan. 20, 2029.

How are we to know when Trump ever tells the truth?

CNN’s fact-checkers counted at least 30 mistruths uttered by Trump during the debate (at least nine for Biden), according to the Associated Press’s roundup of fact-checkers’ work. Politifact highlighted 16 lies by Trump, while New York Times fact-checkers counted at least 20. The AP itself chronicled 11 lies by Trump, four by Biden.

All politicians lie, stretch the truth, or cherry-pick facts to make themselves, their agenda, or their accomplishments look better and their political opponents worse.

But Trump lies almost pathologically, and his lies stretch into outlandish realms that breed conspiracy theories believed or least espoused by scores of his supporters, including many in Congress. Those conspiracy theories spur division, because we can’t talk to one another if we don’t agree on basic truths.

Those lies can have deadly consequences. In 2021, I called the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol an attack on the truth, and nothing I’ve seen or read in the years since has changed my opinion.

What will happen in January 2025 if Trump loses?

Then there’s Biden and his five or six seconds of loud silence.

Early in the debate, on the first or second question, Biden started into a rambling, mostly incoherent answer before appearing to lose his train of thought and going silent for what seemed an eternity before spitting out the non-sequitur “we beat Medicare.”

Because his time had not run out, the CNN moderators just let Biden stare and say nothing while 51 million people watched, for which I believe the moderators deserve immense credit. That silent stare was incredibly revealing, and Americans needed to see it.

Biden’s camp said the president had contracted a cold, contributing to his foggy-headedness, and the president himself blamed jet lag for his poor performance, saying he nearly fell asleep during the debate.

All reasonable explanations if you’re not yourself at your grandson’s soccer game or can’t finish a crossword puzzle.

All entirely unacceptable when you could be called upon any minute of any day to make the most consequential decisions on the planet.

The president, with a single word, can start wars or send the stock market tumbling. I kept imagining the president blank-staring as a Russian nuke headed for an American outpost.

To be fair, Trump, just three years younger than the president, has had his own physical and verbal stumbles in recent years. Either man would be the oldest president in history by the end of a second term.

But Biden fell apart in front of the largest audience of the campaign so far, and that started at least private murmuring among Democrats that maybe Biden should not carry their flag into November (it’s all but impossible to do that unless Biden bows out, which he has said he won’t do).

We’re stuck with both men until November and stuck with one of them for four years, and that stirs in me great fear and loathing.

Whichever gets the presidency this fall, it’ll be up to us — every American — to hold the White House accountable and to hold Congress accountable for its role as a presidential watchdog and a check on executive powers. We must support a vigorous, free, and independent press.

We must vote, especially in primaries.

We must never let down our guard, because either one of those men could remake America into something she’s never been before, and it could be something none of us want her to be.

Justin A. Hinkley can be reached at 989-354-3112 or jhinkley@thealpenanews.com. Follow him on Twitter @JustinHinkley.