i agree with most of what you said here.... trump needed to take covid a little more serious and had he have done that, he'd be president now... even with his horrific handling of covid he still barely lost reelection.... so on the one hand he was smart, but on the other hand not so much....
I'm not so sure what gives everyone so much confidence that Trump was guaranteed to be elected without Covid.
We're talking about a guy that has never won the popular vote, never had an approval rating above 50 % (the ONLY post World War 2 President with this stat), and was a major cause behind two disastrous midterms for his party.
What are the data points that support Trump being guaranteed reelection without COVID? The first time he got impeached was for trying to coerce the Ukrainians in to giving him dirt about Biden, so clearly HE even thought Biden was a problem for him before COVID.