I think people are beating each other up in the halls of Congress, as they did in the late 1850s.

The fact is, beneath the hype, Iraqis will soon appreciate American help and idealism far more than French perfidy. It is never wrong to be on the side of freedom - never.

A Ted Kennedy, John Kerry, John Edwards, Howard Dean, George Soros, or Al Gore looks - no, acts - like he either came out of a hairstylist's salon or got off a Gulfstream.

Politicians in their hubris who believe they can ignore debt or wish it away are sorely disappointed - as we see now with the plummeting approval ratings of both the administration and Congress.

Trump is a symptom of widespread disgust, not the head of a carefully crafted ideological movement with a checklist of issues.

Nor did Americans believe that Republicans had been waging war on minorities, women, or gays - especially given that Republicans have held the House only since 2011 and have been out of power in the Senate and presidency since 2009.

Our institutions, if they do not erode entirely, can survive periods of decadence brought on by our material success, eras when the whole notion of civic militarism seems bothersome, and in which free speech is used to focus on our own imperfections without concern for the ghastly nature of our enemies.