It's always easier in the Senate minority to maintain unity.

The evidence does look like this wasn't just a casual - world leaders don't just pick up the phone and call each other. It does appear that the Donald Trump phone call with the president of Taiwan was a deliberate move, a deliberately provocative move.

Other than they may or may not have discussed the relative merits of the Electoral College vs. the popular vote, what I am told by sources close to Al Gore is that this was at the instigation of Ivanka Trump, that she reached out to the former vice president recently to discuss climate change, and that he was really impressed with the way she was thinking about the issue, framing the issue.

The Donald Trump phone call with the president of Taiwan seems very much in line with his rhetoric during the campaign that he intended to be tough on China. And don't forget, we have seen a lot of presidential candidates, memorably, Bill Clinton, who used to criticize George Herbert Walker Bush for coddling dictators and then take the much softer line with China once he's in office.

It's always easier in the Senate minority to maintain unity.

I think that Donald Trump, how many times during the campaign did he tell us that his plan for dealing with foreign policy was to be unpredictable? Well, there we have it.

Every revolution begins with the power of an idea and ends when clinging to power is the only idea left.