How odd it is, living in a time when we daily expect the president of the United States, leader of the free world, grand poobah of the Gulf of America, to lie.

Not just lie a little. Rather to boldly fib to the point where the best assumption is that whatever Donald John Trump says, the opposite is the case.

In recent weeks, for instance, Trump not only claimed to have the “highest poll numbers that I’ve ever had”; he says they are the “best numbers for any president in many years,” and shared an apparently doctored image on his miserable Truth Social claiming approval of his job performance by 57% of Americans.

In actual fact, the most recent poll, a survey of 1,443 adults, conducted from Nov. 10-13, found that 39% approve of Trump’s job performance, which is his lowest rating since just after the Jan. 6, 2021 attack that he ordered on the United States Capitol at the end of his first term.

So, you would expect the Democrats to be grinning Good-time Charlies these days, and, to the extent that the schlubs who pass for heirs to JFK in our time can be dressed up, taken out and pushed in front of a microphone, they are.

The problem is that the sole grabbable brass ring in their future, the mid-term House elections that could give Democrats control of the lower House of Congress and the ability to block much of Trump’s agenda in the last two lame-duck years of his term, are almost a year away. That’s essentially an eon in which the stumblebums can stumble.

That same NPR/PBS News/Marist poll shows “the Democrats holding their largest advantage, 14 points, since 2017 on the question of who respondents would vote for if the midterm elections were held today.” Sixty percent of Americans blame congressional Republicans or Trump for the recent government shutdown.

Only a fool would bet the ranch on Democrats being able to keep up that momentum over 11 months. They can barely find a decent candidate for governor, or an issue other than beating up on Trump, in true-blue California. In middle America, they are lost in the political wilderness.

However.

If one had, say, been the fool who placed that bet, and needed to coach this junior varsity of a political party back to state-champ level if one didn’t want to lose the ranch, clearly the issue that is resonating with Americans, and leading to disillusionment with Trump, is the cost of living.

Because 6 in 10 Americans also say Trump’s focus should be what he claimed on the campaign trail it would be: lowering prices on stuff. Instead, it turns out, what he enjoys doing is bombing little boats in the Caribbean and kissing the ring of a Saudi despot.

While he’s playing those games, the Dems, if they are smart, which is a big if, need to do precisely what their version of a big-tent party showed it could do in this month’s scattered elections. In California, yes, that means Trump-bashing, which is why Prop. 50 won, resoundingly. But Dems don’t need an entirely unified message elsewhere on what they would do to lower prices. They need an entirely localized one. You don’t have to be a democratic socialist to marvel at the way a complete unknown named Zohran Mamdani became mayor of  New York City. To control costs for average New Yorkers, he offered free stuff: free buses, frozen rents, universal child care. And won.

Won’t work elsewhere. What will work is finding eminently moderate candidates, women, preferably, like Mikie Sherrill, the next governor of New Jersey, and Abigail Spanberger, next governor of Virginia. A Navy helicopter pilot and a CIA operative. The New Jersey mom buys groceries for a family of six, and says she’ll work to create a better economic environment for food retailers to lower prices. The new boss in VA says she wants to boost the economy by “bringing Virginia back to its rank as ‘America’s Top State for Business.’”

Calling Mamdani a commie is fun; New York doesn’t care. But if the Democrats in normie places elsewhere can find candidates like these two governors — why can’t California, for pity’s sake? — you win your bet, keep your ranch and buy a bunch of new cattle.