One thing is certain to me: the re-election of Donald Trump has fundamentally changed the United States. He and his movement have succeeded in that regard, over the most severe reservations of just under half the country. In my opinion, it will bring a terrible and chaotic change that, in its blind zeal to upend, will actually rip away much of the institutional fabric and principled commitments that have made us the leader of the free world. I hope I’m wrong. I hope the incompetence of Trump and those around him will limit the long-lasting damage his retributive and isolationist bent might inflict. And perhaps I’ll be doubly wrong and some of his chaos will actually have unforeseen benefits for the country. Perhaps we can muddle through and things will somehow snap back to some normalcy after what could be a lame-duck presidency. Perhaps. But it doesn’t feel that way. It feels like we’re spinning. And muddling through was certainly not the story of Trump’s first term, which saw two impeachments, abuses of executive power, and a violent insurrection against the government. As a country, we’ve now effectively said none of that mattered. We’ve invited more. And we are permanently changed because of it. I’m afraid we have yet to even begin to bear the full consequence of that choice.