I think you may have missed the point of my post (or I yours).
I think the OP is alarmingly spot on, but it seems not in the way that he meant it (again, I didn’t know the poster’s views).
The OP describes a very believable scenario:
Hillary will be elected.
The right wing will hyperbolically excoriate her — *irrespective of her actions *— and will continue its current mantra that everything is terrible — irrespective of the actual state of things.
They will repeat the lie for four years. At the two-year mark, when they regain control/expand their lead in congress (which is typical for mid-term elections, more so after the 2010 redistricting), the number of hearings and talk of impeachment will increase irrespective of any action she takes. The Benghazi model of politics.
In 2020, Trump’s electoral base will, to paraphrase the OP, say ‘See? We told you so’. Every dire prediction they made about Hillary’s administration will, and must, come true because irrespective of facts, the alt-right press and TrumpTV will declare it to be true. Nothing can be done by anyone to stop it. They will have been repeating the lies for four years now.
Enter a candidate with Trump’s penchant for demagoguery but not his ignorance of the facts. Someone with a neo-colonialist bent but with the awareness not to outright declare we should have taken Iraq’s oil. Someone with a eye for divisiveness but not the overreach to harp on building a wall. Someone who would be as damaging as Trump but without Trump’s damaging past.
A candidate who would capture the Republican ticket by appealing to the same alt-right crowd as Trump to dominate the primaries, but who is able to adroitly pivot and make an appeal to the generalist voter.
That candidate would face Hillary, who mostly because of the effects of 20+ years of vitriolic and mostly unfounded criticism and lies is starting out with negative ratings at the beginning of her presidency. Add four more years of targeted Republican attacks that make this year’s slide down into the gutter and she will be a weak candidate.
Considering that, it’s entirely plausible that the country will elect a wolf in Trump’s clothing. There’s a real danger to the Republic in the next election.
“Let’s cut straight to Godwin: This is where Hitlers come from.”