To the casual politician, assuming we accept that ALL men (and women) are ‘political animals’ and some are more political than others, 2019 is still quite a way off. To the more political ‘political animal’, however,  2019 is now, because the knots tied or untied today will,  by and large, determine who gets what or who loses what come that fateful year. The observant person knows that nationally a lot of alignment and realignment is taking place, sometimes subtly, in other instances not so subtly. Old debts and IOUs are...