Almost all the political chatter of the past, oh, six months has been about how Donald J. Trump turned his Republican Party primary presidential candidacy from a joke to a matter of serious discussion.

Who among you really thought this guy ever — in a zillion years — would achieve GOP frontrunner status when he declared his candidacy this past summer? I didn’t either.

He has. Trump is beginning to wobble, though, because his glaring lack of study of the issues is finally catching up to him. He’s likely to get hammered in Wisconsin on Tuesday. Then it’s on to New York, where he figures to do better, if not real well.

OK, enough of that.

Those Democrats have produced their share of campaign wackiness, too.

Let me ask you this one: Who out there really and truly thought at the beginning of her campaign that Hillary Rodham Clinton would be challenged as strongly as she’s been challenged by U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders, the independent from Vermont, the “democratic socialist”? I’m with you. I thought she was a shoo-in.

She’s been hammered by the right — as expected — over Benghazi, those “damn emails,” as Sanders has described them, and over an alleged lack of “authenticity.

But she’s also been pounded by the lefties. Those kids who’ve climbed aboard Bernie’s bandwagon because of his pledge to provide college education for everyone has helped lift this guy’s candidacy to heights never imagined when he started out.

Bernie well might win in Wisconsin this week. Then he goes to New York, which Clinton represented in the U.S. Senate after she served two terms as first lady.

Clinton’s task in Wisconsin is to keep the result fairly close; a blowout win by Sanders might light a serious wildfire in his campaign that could cause some serious trouble for Clinton in New York.

Clinton now has to win big in her “home state.” I put that in quotes because, as you know, she really didn’t spend much time there before being elected to the Senate in 2000. It’s that authenticity thing, aka “carpetbagging,” that keeps nipping at her.

Clinton remains miles ahead of Sanders in the delegate count. If she wins yu-u-u-u-u-ge in New York, then she is on track to sew the primary campaign up by the time it rolls around to California.

If she stumbles there after getting beat in Wisconsin, well, then we’ve got a different game.

Yesterday’s sure thing, thus, becomes a candidate in for the fight of her life.

Go figure.

I’m telling you that when historians over the next generation or two try to examine the impact of strange and weird presidential campaigns in this great country, they’re going to hold Campaign 2016 up as their starting point.

I’m not sure how it can get any stranger than what we’ve witnessed on both sides of the divide.

It probably will.