the most charismatic Republican politician of the last decade.

Funny how Trump has become "The most charismatic Republican candidate of the last decade." He was literally supported by Hillary in the "pied piper" strategy because he was supposed to be so easy to beat. I recall the conventional wisdom in 2015 was that the Republicans would have to shift to the center to appeal to Latino voters or they'd be finished because of demographics. Right up to election day, every major media outlet said he had no chance of winning, before he barely squeeked out a win, while losing the popular vote, of course. He's at negative 12% in terms of net favorability. I guess he still counts as "most charismatic Republican candidate of the last decade" but only because that's an incredibly low bar.

Either the dems win and nothing happens, or the republicans win and the dems shift right to attract moderates.

Well, the question is how far can they keep shifting right before they start bleeding more voters from the left than they're attracting from the center? The democrats are right wing and would much rather shift to the center, but just because they managed to barely win against a historically unpopular president in the middle of a botched pandemic doesn't mean it's a reliable strategy.

But if they think they can win without the left then they're welcome to try. I'd just better not hear anybody blaming the left afterwards if they lose.