Remember Nikki Haley, Ron DeSantis, Vivek Ramaswamy, Chris Christie and Asa Hutchinson? It has been quite some time since those Republican contenders, or pretenders, were eliminated.

For that matter, remember a fellow named Joe Biden? Though it’s only been six weeks since he withdrew from the race, he and his decision seem well in the past.

Labor Day has come and gone, the days are getting shorter, and this election, once out on the horizon, is drawing quite near. For those states like Colorado that employ vote-by-mail on a mass scale (sorry, Donald Trump and a few other Neanderthals, but that trend is irreversible), those ballots will be arriving in little more than a month.

The history of presidential polling certainly indicates that one would prefer to be ahead rather than behind at the start of September. In most cases, the early September leader has gone on to victory. However, that comes with asterisks.

The first asterisk traces back to 1980 when Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan were tied going into September before Reagan blew the race open in the second half of October on his way to a landslide win. The second note, lest we forget, comes from 2016 when Hillary Clinton led Trump in early September, albeit quite narrowly.

Third, and most importantly, given the sorting of America into red and blue states, national polls are of decreasing relevance. Just seven states are up for grabs in this election. Statewide polling in Georgia, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Arizona, and Nevada matters far more than national numbers.

As in 2016, this looks to be a very close race, befitting an evenly, intensely divided country. Anyone with a deep-rooted interest in one way or the other will need substantial discipline if they are to have fingernails left by the time this is over.

Still, a week into September, Harris holds a narrow advantage in national polling and an even narrower lead in each swing state, save for North Carolina, where Trump remains ahead.

At the same time, this past weekend, the prognosticator Nate Silver assessed Trump to be an ever-so-slight favorite, mainly due to doubts about Harris’s polling strength in Pennsylvania, this year’s ultimate battleground.

A mea culpa here: When Biden’s pullout looked inevitable, I weighed into the effect that the Democratic Party needed some abbreviated, competitive process instead of just a Harris anointment.

From where we now sit, that was not the case. Biden’s free fall and Harris’s sudden ascendancy were akin to an unexpected recovery from a near-death experience. Given the unprecedented circumstance, Democrats were in no mood for uncertainty, wanting simply to high-five and celebrate joy.

Trump may yet rebound and exploit Harris’s vulnerabilities. But time is growing short, and he seems badly off his game, dismayed that an elderly Biden is not his opponent, second-guessing his Veep pick and plenty of advisers, contorted in search of a viable position on abortion and IVF, and relitigating an endless list of grievances best put to bed.

About one thing at least, Trump is right. Namely, he desperately wanted a rematch with Biden, especially after the incumbent’s disqualifying performance in their late-June debate.

In our topsy-turvy political world, it may well turn out that Biden was the only Democrat able to defeat Trump in 2020 and four years later the rare Democrat incapable of doing so.

In the relatively few weeks since her entry into the race, Harris has exhibited more than a few chameleon-like qualities. In many circles, that would be an insult. In politics, it is often a compliment. She is an unfinished painting on which a wide swath of voters, united only by their loathing of Trump, can project their wishes.

Add to that a factor of freshness. Bear in mind that the last three presidents before Biden ascended to the top job rather early in their political careers. George W. Bush had been governor of Texas for six years; Barack Obama had been a senator from Illinois for just four years; and Donald Trump, well he had never been elected to anything.

Trump now is old, not just in chronological years, but having unrelentingly dominated the nation’s consciousness for a full decade.

If Trump is to manage another victory, a fully plausible prospect, he needs to define Harris as too left, too California and too tied to Biden. Each of those is a reasonable argument. But making the case will require a focus and discipline than an aging, enraged Trump seems less and less to possess.

To my thinking, two variables will dictate this election. First is the question of where the so-called “double haters” line up. This description applies to those voters with little appetite for either candidate. In 2016, that contingent broke hard for Trump and against Hillary Clinton. In 2020, they came down markedly on Biden’s side over Trump.

Up second is the question of which candidate is able to most credibly and effectively adopt the mantle of change. This would seem to accrue to Trump’s benefit as Harris is the sitting vice president. However, there is growing indication that the status quo from which voters want relief is not specifically the Biden-Harris administration as much as it is the reign of Trump as the ever-present, all-consuming, central force in our politics.

Show me which candidate wins the issue of “change” and I’ll show you the next president of the United States.

Of course, all this is written before the fast-approaching September 10th debate. Even as my expectation is that the encounter will be more informative than decisive.

Then there is the great unknown of what surprises still await. Just over three weeks spanning June and July witnessed a debate collapse, a near-miss assassination attempt and a presidential exit. Given the tenor of the year, it would be folly to expect the remaining weeks between now and November to unfold in a straight line.

Under the heading of surprise, I mean something more shocking and unanticipated than Liz Cheney’s affirmation this past week of her intent to vote for Harris and what could well be a coming endorsement from Taylor Swift. That might well be the first time those two names have appeared in the same sentence.

Eric Sondermann is a Colorado-based independent political commentator. He writes regularly for ColoradoPolitics and the Gazette newspapers. Reach him at EWS@EricSondermann.com; follow him at @EricSondermann