> I am extremely extremely skeptical that Donald Trump will win the nomination of a major political party.
There's some very good structural reasons to expect that, even if gets the most votes in the primaries, he may not win the Republican nomination.
OTOH, major parties have collapsed entirely before in US politics, and not having a candidate finish at least second in the Presidential general election would be a pretty big sign of collapse -- and pretty much every three-way head-to-head poll conducted with any has an independent Trump taking the #2 spot by a wide margin over the Republican.
Trump may well define the major party that replaces the Republicans.
I certainly hope so. But what about the next rich old white guy who panders to the ignorant masses in the next election cycle (or the one after, or the one after that).
Predicting that the US will remain in the hands of some what sensible leaders seems rather naive to me.