We are down to the last few days before the election, a fact that you are intimately, probably painfully, aware of if you are reading this publication. I suppose it is a custom of sorts for one in my position to start making predictions.

Not me. Making election predictions puts a commentator in an untenable position. Only one of two things can transpire: a) I will be right, which could expose me to the temptation of adopting an “I told you so” mindset, to which I am temperamentally disinclined — and in any case, as a Christian I recite a prayer every day which ends with a plea that I not be led into temptation; or b) I will be wrong, a condition so unfamiliar to me that mere contemplation of it brings on chills, so best not to chance it.

I limit my efforts instead to the merely analytical, which (for the record) is entirely, unequivocally different from conjectural.

Considering first the presidential race, which everyone seems so agitated about: I have no idea who will win, and neither, really, does anyone else. Yes, the polls have former VP Biden leading, but polling has been wrong before, and there could still be extrinsic factors at play that polling doesn’t adequately reveal. The corollary to that is, yes, the polls were wrong in 2016, but pollsters like to stay in business, and have presumably made the requisite corrections and adjustments to their methodology.

Neither candidate, in my judgement, is entirely suitable for the post. There is, as a conservative, a case to make against Trump as I wrote recently in The Washington Examiner; but at the same time there is no viable case that can be made FOR Biden.

I don’t believe a Biden Presidency would be catastrophic (though a Harris Presidency, which the odds are in favor of her inheriting within four years if Biden wins, would be likely worse), which is a very long way from saying it would be benign, or even harmless. One holds out hope that Biden, if he wins, can still activate enough moderate enzymes to mount a defense against the more eccentric urges of his party, though it would be foolish to count on that.

A Biden/Harris presidency and a Democratic Senate, on the other hand, would be closer to courting disaster. Given the current trajectory of the Democratic Party, the temptation accompanying full legislative and executive control could prove too difficult for the remaining adults in the room to control. The dangled threats of court packing are adumbrative of what could turn out to be rather broad damage to the institutional character and structure of the nation. A broadside attack on the nation’s institutions — the Senate, the Electoral College, the Supreme Court — would come with pretty steep political costs, but there is a risk that the transformative inclination that appears to be ascendent within the Democratic Party may be strong enough to overcome the normal political instincts geared toward self-preservation.

This argues in favor of the electorate maintaining a Republican majority in the Senate. If, as I suspect (okay, one prediction) Biden wins, and he proves incapable of resisting the pull to the left, a Republican Senate would be able to do what a Senate is supposed to do — serve as a check against whatever fanatical insanity may be conjured up by a Democratic House and complicit president.

We don’t have too look far to see what can happen. The Democratic trifecta here in Colorado creates all sorts of public policy mischief which could adversely impact the state for years. Electing Republicans to the state Senate would at least provide something of a speed bump along the road the economic perdition.

To be sure, the desire for political balance is generally strongest in whichever party finds itself in the minority; liberals, who consider the Supreme Court a supra-legislative body, have been quite ferociously advocating for “balance” on the high court the last few weeks (of course, what most consider a “conservative” court in itself provides balance in the system by returning the court to its intended adjudicatory function and reimposing separation between the branches, but I digress.)

Nevertheless, this is not a strictly partisan issue. I know a lot of Democrats, good people all, most of whom are not quite ready to torpedo the Great American Experiment just yet. Many of them wouldn’t mind seeing the voters install a legislative brake.

Do the voters want that too? They should. Political pendular swings are tiring, at best. At the very least they ought to be assured that it is okay to not vote party line reflexively; that you can, if so inclined, vote for Cory Gardner and not vote for Donald Trump, and nothing bad will happen. It might even be good for your soul, and your country.