“It is not enough in life that one succeed,” the droll economist John Kenneth Galbraith is supposed to have said. “Others must fail.”
We’re at a moment, in this week before Donald Trump’s second inauguration, when the 45th and soon-to-be 47th president is succeeding at just about every enterprise he undertakes, while his political and ideological opponents are failing in spectacularly visible fashion.
This time, Trump won the popular vote with a percentage that, rounded off, is identical to those of former Presidents Jimmy Carter, John F. Kennedy, and Harry Truman. National polls show him with majority approval, something he never achieved before. This year, in contrast to 2017, there are no plans for a counter-inaugural parade or moves by journalists or politicians to style themselves “The Resistance.”
Trump secured the reelection of House Speaker Mike…
