Melville might say, I presume, that it cannot be done without a drastic ethical transformation of the country, the recognition that Trump is the mere excrescence of America’s dark soul. Our author would point out that what now plagues us are the sins of the past coming home to roost: America’s tolerance of bigotry and racism, America’s optimistic blindness to its own faults, America’s love affair with bogus spectacle and masquerades, America’s culpable innocence amid imperial expansion.

Oh, well-written. The Right exposed the rotting underbelly of America - I hold my nose and appreciate the accomplishment. The question is, how to heal it. I suspect it will happen in waves, and we should expect ebb and flow.