THE BURNED OVER DISTRICT

And not just because that megalomaniac fabulist and notorious thinskined vulgarian Benedict Donald Trump is running. However he is expected to be a major contributor.

America’s about to endure the closest, nastiest, most unpredictable presidential election in more than three decades.

Not since Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan ran against each other in 1980 has the choice been so stark, the warnings from each candidate about the other so dire, the likely outcome so murky.

As this year’s political conventions end, there’s no clear favorite. But watch the polls next week. The leader in the first polls conducted entirely after the convention ends has won the White House every time since 1948.

There’s potential for another sort of email drama. Republicans won’t let voters forget about Clinton’s use of a private email server while secretary of state.

“We've known from the beginning of this campaign that Clinton's personal political history was going to be a drag on her candidacy,” said Patrick Murray, director of the Monmouth University Polling Institute in New Jersey.

Clinton will counter by painting Trump as inept, incompetent and all but insane.

“Imagine him in the Oval Office facing a real crisis. A man you can bait with a tweet is not a man we can trust with nuclear weapons,” she said in her convention speech Thursday. “I can't put it any better than Jackie Kennedy did after the Cuban Missile Crisis. She said that what worried President Kennedy during that very dangerous time was that a war might be started – not by big men with self-control and restraint, but by little men – the ones moved by fear and pride.”

Stoking fear about an opponent is a time-tested tactic. President Lyndon Johnson’s 1964 “daisy ad” suggested Republican Barry Goldwater would involve the nation in a nuclear war. In 1980, Jimmy Carter made the same insinuations. In his October, 1980, debate with Ronald Reagan, Carter used the word “dangerous” six times to describe his Republican opponent.

Despite the loss of Roger Ailes, the GOP still has the fully functioning disinformation bureau he made of Fux Nooz in place. And the lies they have told the last 30 years have done a good job poisoning the minds of the young.