Having dumped on Donald Trump yesterday, Facebook Friend Ron Fournier widens his field:

If you had asked me four years ago to concoct the most dispiriting and debilitating 2016 presidential campaign, I might have said, “Start with a political family; find a scandal-scarred creature of Washington addicted to 20th-century identity politics.”

“Now find a vacuous outsider; somebody who reflects the worst of modern politics and culture. A celebrity would be perfect. Better yet, a reality star who is famous for being famous, a social media whore, a boor, a bully who traffics in old hates via new technologies.”

I might have picked Hillary Clinton vs. Donald Trump. What could be worse for a creaky, cancerous political system than what the Democratic and Republican parties are brewing up? Nothing really. This is as bad as it gets.

In contests Tuesday that put Clinton and Trump on the verge of a general-election face-off, voters across the spectrum signaled displeasure with the duopoly’s work. Among GOP voters, 37 percent said they would consider a third-party candidate if faced with a Trump vs. Clinton matchup. Democratic voters found socialist Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont to be more trustworthy than their likely nominee.

More broadly, 53 percent of Americans disapprove of Clinton, according to Gallup, and 63 percent have a negative opinion of Trump. Most voters don’t find either candidate to be particularly honest.

As Michael Barbaro wrote for TheNew York Times, “Should they clinch the nomination, it would represent the first time in at least a quarter-century that majorities of Americans held negative views of both the Democratic and Republican candidates at the same time.”

Both major parties must now confront the depth of skepticism, resistance and distaste for their front-runners, a sentiment that would profoundly shape a potential general election showdown between Mr. Trump and Mrs. Clinton.

They are devising appeals that are as much arguments that their all-but-certain opponent would be disastrous for the nation as they are messages trumpeting their own virtues or character.

Aides to both predict that a Clinton-Trump contest would be an ugly and unrelenting slugfest, as she pounces on his business practices and personal integrity, portraying him as unscrupulous robber baron, and he lacerates her over ethical lapses and sudden riches, painting her as a conniving abuser of power certain to be indicted in a federal investigation.

There is, both sides concede, plenty of material to mine, stretching back to 1980s Arkansas (for her) and 1970s New York (for him).

This is not to suggest equivalence: The candidates are not equally revolting. But for millions of voters, today begins a process driven by their aspersions toward one candidate rather than their aspirations for another—the acceleration of a grim trend that political scientists call “negative partisanship.”

“Come November,” voter Ed O’Malley tweeted me in response to Barbaro’s story, “I’ll vote for one or the other then go outside and throw up.”

What about people like him who claim to hate their choices and yet consistently vote Democrat or Republican? Imagine a doctor telling you that because of some gnarly disease, he had to cut off one of your arms. You get to choose which one. While your decision would be easy—“I’m right-handed, Doc. Cut off my left arm”—you wouldn’t be happy with your choices.

My friend Matthew Dowd, a former political consultant who now works for ABC News, said Tuesday’s results show just how “corrupt and broken” the political system has become. Even if the most experienced and, arguably, most qualified candidate wins in November, Dowd said via email: “Hillary won’t be able to govern, and the GOP is past its expiration date. Democrats are closing in on theirs.”

A column like this will trigger torrents of manufactured outrage and exaggerations. From the left: How dare you compare Clinton to that bigoted, bullying empty suit of a man? And from the right: ARE YOU NUTS? She’s not qualified! She’d destroy America!

Together, blindly loyal and satisfied partisans represent a fraction of the electorate. Millions of other Americans will suffer through another ugly campaign before making two decisions.

First: Do I even bother to vote?

For those who do cast a ballot, there is the even sadder choice: Which candidate do I loathe the least?

I have never missed a presidential election in my life, so of course I will vote. Of course I will not vote for Clinton or Comrade Sanders, under any circumstances. I am almost as unlikely to vote for Trump, for reasons including the fact that he is not remotely conservative:

A related observation comes from former Birmingham (Ala.) Post–Herald reporter Jim Bennett:

Although one a New York millionaire and the other a former golden glove boxer from Clio, Alabama, there are similarities in their races for president.

Each appeared on the political scene as unlikely candidates for the leader of the free world, both appealed to voters who felt they were being ignored by an out-of-touch political leadership and each brought cheering crowds to their feet with fiery bombast.

Donald Trump and George Wallace turned the political world on its proverbial ear. In doing so, they perplexed the pundits and confounded the media, some of which blamed them for political divisiveness. Populists upset the status quo.

Gov. Wallace, if you might recall, not only called for state’s rights, he also declared he was a self-proclaimed champion of the working class against big government; same as Trump. Both were tough on crime and critical of people in Washington “who don’t know what they are doing.”

Wallace said they reminded him of people who “can’t park their bicycles straight.”

Both were capable of packing Madison Square Garden or the Cleveland Convention Center to the consternation of their more liberal opponents. Both have been critical of the U.S. Supreme Court, although not the same decisions.

As a reporter, I was assigned to cover Wallace in his presidential bids both in 1964 and 1968. In Democratic primaries in Wisconsin, Indiana, and Maryland in 1964, Wallace got a third of the vote running against three surrogates backed by President Johnson. Trump  is expected to do well in these three states as well, having already carried 18 states including Alabama and most of the South.

Trump, like Wallace, has attracted large numbers of demonstrators along the way who protest his campaign positions, some unpopular with students, minorities and immigrants.

I remember in Maryland, Wallace commenting about demonstrators trying to block his car, “If they lie down in front of my car, that’s the last car they will ever lie down in front of,” he told me.

When they would try to shout him down during his rallies, he would, say “Look at those pinkos. Get a haircut.” The crowd would roar in approval.

Like Trump, Wallace could stir crowds with his oratory. The Huntsville Times interviewed Bill Jones, Wallace’s first press secretary, who recounted “a particularly fiery speech in Cincinnati in 1964 that scared even Wallace.” “Wallace angrily shouted to a crowd of 1,000 that ‘little pinkos’ were ‘running around outside’ protesting his visit, and continued, after thunderous applause, saying, “When you and I start marching and demonstrating and carrying signs, we will close every highway in the country.” The audience leaped to its feet “and headed for the exit.” Jones said, “It shook Wallace who quickly moved to calm them down.”

Trump has had his share of noisy protestors too. He usually says, “Get them out of here. Good bye.” He once said he would like to sock some guy who was yelling invectives. “When they have organized professionally-staged wise guys, we have to fight back.”

Last Friday Trump postponed a rally in Chicago amid clashes between supporters and demonstrators, protests in the streets and concerns by the police that the environment at the event was no longer considered safe.

The announcement, which came amid protests both inside and outside the event at the University of Illinois at Chicago, followed heightened concerns about violence at campaign appearances. Hundreds of demonstrators packed into an arena, broke out into protest even before Trump had shown up. At least five sections were filled with dissenters.

It is a hard choice for any candidate. They can’t just ignore someone disrupting their campaign stops. Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders have had them as well.  Usually, building security or the local police will escort the protestors outside. Some supporters, more passionate than others, may, themselves, throw an unlawful punch without the candidate being aware of anything other than the commotion it brings. Certainly, they should encourage civility.

Wallace was a U.S. presidential candidate for four consecutive elections, in which he sought the Democratic Party nomination in 1964, 1972 and 1976, and was the American Independent Party candidate in the 1968 presidential election. He remains the last third party candidate to receive a state’s Electoral College votes. Wallace carried five Southern states and won almost 10 million popular votes in the race won by Richard Nixon that year.

I remember one campaign stop Wallace made in Portland, Oregon in 1964 where protestors and counter protestors circled the hotel where he was speaking; some carrying “God is Love” signs, one of which whacked the head of one of the governor’s supporters.

Such is American politics.