Ted Cruz is out. John Kasich is out. Donald Trump is in. Big time.

First things first: Donald Trump is not going to win the presidential election this year. He's much too controversial for his own good, which means the fence-sitters in the Republican Party will most likely be voting for Hillary (assuming she grabs the Democratic nomination). Trump vs. Hillary will almost certainly result in a second President Clinton.

But this isn't why the 2016 presidential primaries and election is so scary. The real reason why Americans should be worried is the precedents that are being set. Both the Republicans and Democrats have introduced dangerous ideas into the sphere of American politics, with the Republicans descending into a fight over who has the best persona, and the Democrats actually indulging Bernie Sanders' socialist leanings.

Let's say that 2016 passes and Hillary Clinton becomes president. This will likely result in another four years of Barack Obama's doctrine. The thing Americans need to pay attention to most is not what's happening in the White House or Congress (assuming anything is happening at all), but what is happening in the political parties.

Bernie Sanders has introduced socialism into the Democratic Party this year, and has been incredibly successful among millennials and the American youth, but what if more socialists start running as Democrats? Will the Democratic Party morph into a party with actual emphasis on socialist policy? If this is the case, tax rates are almost certainly going to increase in order to pay for the new government programs like welfare and free college. While free college sounds like an outstanding proposition, many fail to realize that the countries in which it is a reality have significantly higher tax rates than the U.S., meaning that when this generation of college students get out of their free education, they will be stuck paying more in tax and have less options for affordable housing.

Donald Trump has introduced immaturity into the Republican Party. While Hillary and Bernie are at least congenial during most debates, the past Republican debates have spiraled down to the point where candidates for the highest office in the American government are calling each other childish nicknames and arguing over the size of a male appendage. The candidates often referred back to the good old days of the Republican Party under Lincoln and Reagan, claiming they are the best representatives of the GOP heydays, but this is hypocritical; neither Reagan nor Lincoln ever stooped to the lows Trump and the other former candidates have in order to win the presidency. Is the Republican Party bound to become a stage where the playground bully can stomp around and push the real politicians out?

The greatest question to come out of this election is not who will be president next, but will these precedents continue?

Before Trump turned the GOP on its head, Ted Cruz was doing just that. He lambasted the Republican establishment as if it were a bad thing. His attacks on the actual politicians in Washington may have opened the door to those like Trump, Ben Carson, and Carly Fiorina, who have no experience (and no place) in American governance. These people are business figures, not political leaders. Business interests should be represented by interest groups, not by CEOs and moguls jumping into the fray of political leadership; this will pull the U.S. dangerously close to corporatism, becoming a country in which the corporations impose their views on the government. Is this going to happen in the 2020 election? What about the 2024 election?

Bernie will be 79 by the time 2020 rolls around, so if he doesn't make the nomination or loses to Trump, he probably won't be a candidate in that election, so hopefully the threatening influx of socialism in the Democratic Party will leave with him. Things are not as good on the Republican side, however. Senators like Tom Cotton are following Cruz's example and making active efforts to sabotage political action because of disagreements. What happened to people like Henry Clay, the "Great Compromiser?" Cotton inappropriately sidestepped President Obama and wrote a letter to the leaders of the Islamic Republic of Iran, claiming that any agreement made between Iran's leaders and Obama wouldn't be binding because the Senate would block it. John McCain, Jeff Sessions, and even Marco Rubio, were among 47 of the 54 Republican senators to sign the letter. Not only has Cotton's letter been seen by many in the government as a violation of the 1799 Logan Act, which forbids unauthorized citizens from negotiating with a foreign government in a dispute with the U.S., but it interfered with the negotiations of the Iran nuclear deal. Opinions surrounding the deal with Iran aside, when officials interfere with government negotiations in a tense area, international security is jeopardized. Cotton claimed that "there are nothing but hardliners in Iran," failing to understand that the current president of Iran, Hassan Rouhani, is a moderate, and the Iranian government has become increasingly more tame coming off of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's presidency. This simple information was missed by Cotton, and apparently 47 Republican senators, making their actions amateurish and belittling of such a prestigious office and party.

Following this election, Americans need to realize that U.S. politics are headed down a dangerous road. A road filled with personal insults, uneducated and unsubstantiated claims, and drastic policy leanings. America needs to come back to the center of the political spectrum. American leaders need to relearn how to compromise and give a little. American citizens need to understand the consequences of the actions of their preferred political leaders, both good and bad, and not be drawn to them simply because they are the most popular, entertaining, or defiant.