What are the best case, worst case and median scenarios for a Trump presidency?

[Seriously?]

Best case: Trump "Makes America Great Again," defeats ISIS, thwarts future terrorist attacks, balances the budget and sells off assets to pay down the debt, wins 2020 in a Reagan/Mondale landslide. Hillary! goes to jail.

Median Scenario: Trump "Makes America Great Again," defeats ISIS, thwarts future terrorist attacks, balances the budget and sells off assets to pay down the debt, wins 2020 in a Reagan/Mondale landslide.

Worst Case: Trump "Makes America Great Again," defeats ISIS, thwarts future terrorist attacks, brings deficit spending under control, wins 2020 with a Bush/Kerry margin.

[Maxwell]

Best case: Trump "Makes America Great Again," defeats ISIS, thwarts future terrorist attacks, balances the budget and sells off assets to pay down the debt, wins 2020 in a Reagan/Mondale landslide. Hillary! goes to jail.

Median Scenario: Trump "Makes America Great Again," defeats ISIS, thwarts future terrorist attacks, balances the budget and sells off assets to pay down the debt, wins 2020 in a Reagan/Mondale landslide.

Worst Case: Trump "Makes America Great Again," defeats ISIS, thwarts future terrorist attacks, brings deficit spending under control, wins 2020 with a Bush/Kerry margin.

Reagan never balanced a budget, and never got especially close

Bush Sr. never balanced a budget, and just about every year deficits climbed

Bush Jr. never balanced a budget, and in fact wrecked the only balanced budget we've had in recent years.

Republicans don't balance budgets, because their priorities don't make that possible. The only Presidents who have reduced deficits consistently since Reagan are Clinton and Obama.

[Atlas Has Shrugged]

Best case: Trump "Makes America Great Again," defeats ISIS, thwarts future terrorist attacks, balances the budget and sells off assets to pay down the debt, wins 2020 in a Reagan/Mondale landslide. Hillary! goes to jail.

Median Scenario: Trump "Makes America Great Again," defeats ISIS, thwarts future terrorist attacks, balances the budget and sells off assets to pay down the debt, wins 2020 in a Reagan/Mondale landslide.

Worst Case: Trump "Makes America Great Again," defeats ISIS, thwarts future terrorist attacks, brings deficit spending under control, wins 2020 with a Bush/Kerry margin.

Reagan never balanced a budget, and never got especially close

Bush Sr. never balanced a budget, and just about every year deficits climbed

Bush Jr. never balanced a budget, and in fact wrecked the only balanced budget we've had in recent years.

Republicans don't balance budgets, because their priorities don't make that possible. The only Presidents who have reduced deficits consistently since Reagan are Clinton and Obama.

There is truth to this. This is Obama's best legacy IMO.

[Boston Bread]

Best case: Trump is a democratic plant. He reveals that his whole campaign was a joke. Governs like the 3rd term of Obama.

Median case: Trump gets nothing of his key immigration, crime or trade planks done. A generic GOP agenda is passed through congress and Trump signs most of it. The economy is in a recession, millions lose health care, crime has gone up, and America's international reputation suffers, although at least there are no major wars.

Worst case: Trump presses the red button and starts a nuclear war.

[Maxwell]

Best Case: Trump gets into the White House and immediately tries to implement THE WALL. As it turns out, it won't budge, so Trump agrees to pass the end to EB1 and other types of work visas, beefs up border enforcement, and puts a taskforce together in charge of making it harder for companies to hire illegal immigrants, in exchange for a long term path to citizenship.

In the White House, instead of going along with his tax reform, he embraces his moderate Republican platform plank and passes massive rebuilding of infrastructure, improved restructuring of the way education is provided, universal childcare, and tax credits for small businesses in the inner cities. He pledges to balance the budget by reforming the military, making it so that it is stronger with fewer administrative costs and less contractor corruption, and signing Bernie Sanders' bill to make Medicare negotiate drug prices.

Trump's foreign policy involves pushing back against the Chinese on their illegal activities, focusing on reducing trade deficits around the world, and putting together a special operations force to defeat terror in the middle east.

Trump appoints conservative justices to the court, but proclaims that gay marriage is "the law of the land", and becomes the first President ever to support state to state marjiuana legalization. To appease his base, President Trump remains stalwart for the second amendment, vetoing every attempt by the Democratic congress to pass gun reforms.

Trump's tough talking attitude still lands him in trouble, but nevertheless is re-elected to a second term and is proclaimed, oddly, as one of the most progressive Presidents ever, though his failure to pass major Wall Street reforms in his second term is labeled as one of his biggest missed oppurtunities.

Median Case: Trump gets into office, but is in way over his head. When his general agenda lands with a resounding thud in congress, he attempts to use executive orders to get his way.

Relationships with the US across the world sour thanks to President Trump, and trade deficits get far worse, not better, as countries refuse to buy Made in the USA products. America becomes increasingly isolated.

Trump's only agenda piece that makes it through is the tax cut, which lowers rates from 39.6% to 30%, the lowest tax rate since Reagan in 87. Revenues suffer, and as a result, cuts are made to a wide variety of social programs, angering voters and putting tons of Democrats in the mid terms.

Trump talks tough, but the Wall flops, his attempts to enforce immigration law sufficiently scare nation, and thanks to a wide variety of internal fights never seems to gain the dictatorial power that some believe he so craves. Trump, tired of the job, retires in 2020 instead of running for term 2 and the winner of the Republican primaries of 2020 repudiates the Trump agenda, barely making mention of the deeply unpopular President, as Democrats take the White House.

Worst Case: See, Mussolini but as an orange haired cartoon character.

[Nichlemn]

I do think the movements of the financial markets indicate that "Trump nuclear annihilation" type outcomes probably can't be all that likely. If traders seriously thought there was a real risk of that, then whenever Trump's odds improve significantly, markets should crash.

[Lyin' Steve]

Now this is a great Atlas thread.

Best: Trump gets his trade policies enacted and a wall with Mexico, and dramatically increases law enforcement, effectively reducing our drug and poverty problems.  Cities expand and new transportation and construction projects foster a general feeling of American progress and patriotism.  With his popularity, Congress has difficulty opposing him, and he's able to get expanded war powers and intelligence capabilities that enable us to destroy ISIS.  The rest of the world doesn't like us much but we're so powerful that we can bully them around anyway, and the booming domestic scene gives us a good image.  Debt is out of control though.

Median:. Trump lets Pence, Christie and some old Bush hands do most of the real work while he acts us a figurehead.  Our policies mostly stay unchanged due to Congressional gridlock that he is ineffective at breaking through, but our reputation is damaged by his constant stupid statements and ideas that dominate news coverage.  Russia defeats ISIS for us and swallows up Eastern Ukraine for its time but we don't do anything to stop it.  Also arms separatist groups in the Baltic states.

Worst:. Trump does a bunch of sh**t without consulting people or waiting for approval.  The white house becomes an internal war between Trump and his people trying to stay ahead of him or prevent hook from causing harm.  Partisans in Congress refuse to impeach him despite numerous violations of various laws.  Basically it's a sh-tshow and nothing gets done.  Eventually there's a real crisis and he's completely incapable of leading the country out of it and it turns into a huge disaster like hurricane Katrina did.