“Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard.” H.L. Mencken

Perhaps the moment will melt in the snows of Iowa and New Hampshire, dissolved for all but those obsessed with electoral trivia. Paul Tsongas, Phil Gramm, and Pat Robertson were major players for a few minutes in past campaigns. A generation or two may look back at the rise of Trump as a grunt that signified nothing, or it might determine the flakes of 2016 were made of more than snow.

The tendency has been to dismiss Trump as vacuous, or to see him as the harbinger of ruin. Both could be accurate and they are related. Mr. Trump has slouched onto the national stage with little study and less experience. His campaign boils down to, “I can fix things, just let me do it,” though there is nothing in his background to suggest this is true. Trump has turned his poor preparation into a badge. Such ignorance, and there is nothing else to call it, could be dangerous if he manages to secure office. Like any neophyte, he would be at the mercy of his advisors and would need to stow his pride long enough to act on their advice. If things ended there, maybe we could live with it, but Mr. Trump has shown so much bravado and bluster that one worries he may feel compelled to act on his rash promises.

Trump’s ascent, or descent, depending on perspective, has truly divided the right. Peter Wehner, an evangelical who worked in W’s White House, wrote, in colorful terms, that he will not, under any circumstances, vote for Trump.

Mr. Trump’s virulent combination of ignorance, emotional instability, demagogy, solipsism and vindictiveness would do more than result in a failed presidency; it could very well lead to national catastrophe. The prospect of Donald Trump as commander-in-chief should send a chill down the spine of every American.

The battle, it seems, has been joined. Ian Tuttle, of conservative flagship National Review, answers Wehner, but not with a defense of Trump. Though not unprincipled, Tuttle’s pragmatism carries his thinking in the end.

I do not want Donald Trump to become president. His election would be bad for conservatism, for the Republican party, and for the country. But we do not know the contours of a Trump presidency; they may still be able to be shaped by more sober minds. We know well, though, the likely contours of a Clinton presidency — and there is reason to think that it would prove worse.

(Interestingly, Tuttle’s editors today rolled out their own take on the presidential race. It is titled “Against Trump.”)

Maybe all of this hinges on the Trumpettes themselves. They are, we are being told, without college degrees, blue-collar Americans who are tired of running in place. They are competing for fewer jobs that are swamped by more applicants. The economy has not recovered for them, and it may not. They see immigration as the critical issue in our nation and they want government to respond to their concerns, and not those of the elites. In many ways, these are classic Reagan Democrats and independents who feel abandoned by both parties and Trump has become their symbol of hope. Republicans, instead of dismissing them, have to acknowledge not only their existence, but importance. Ben Domenech struck such a tone in the Transom, his email newsletter:

How can you brand yourself as inclusive if you don’t respect, if you don’t even want to share a cup of coffee with, a group of people whose tendency is naturally on your side of the political ledger? Wasn’t the whole conversation after 2012 about how the Republican Party needed to activate the white working class which underperformed for Mitt Romney in Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Iowa? How can you advance an argument that these somewhat conservative, economically moderate, populist American nationalists who have grown disaffected with both parties are not a voting bloc that ought to be respected, just because they rejected someone like Scott Walker for two guys they actually think will fight for what they believe? Are their votes less valuable because they are not the people you wish to win with, or are they less valuable because their perspective is at odds with yours?

As a political matter, Domenech is right. For these reasons, I think Donald Trump has hewn a possible path forward for the Republican Party, but he is precisely the wrong person to lead it. Trump’s supporters have made him a symbol of change. They have poured their anger into an empty vessel. In some ways, they are the mirror image of President Obama’s supporters in 2008. Those voters were motivated, it seemed, by hope for a bipartisan, or purple, future. They wanted a leader to speak to Americans, not partisans. Obama stoked that hope and then spent most of his presidency actively dousing it.

All of this is exacerbated by the second candidate in the GOP field, Ted Cruz. The Republican presidential primary has been painted as a debate between the Republican establishment (which favors Bush or perhaps Rubio) and either true conservatives (who favor Cruz) or outsiders (who have obviously gravitated toward Trump, though they flirted with Carson and Fiorina for a time). There is much truth to this, but it obscures things as well. Cruz, we are finding out, is seen by the GOP establishment as perhaps more of an outsider than Donald Trump. Fellow Senators have taken every opportunity to show their preferences against Cruz, even when they have fallen short of endorsing someone else. Perhaps the “establishment,” in reading its tea leaves, has decided Trump has more potential in the general election, but Nate Silver, at 538, depicts Trump as uniquely unpopular among general election voters.

Cruz has brought this outcome on himself to a degree. His approach to the Senate, at least publicly, was far more show horse than workhorse. He garnered attention by accusing his colleagues of lying and unfaithfulness to conservative vows, while he played the role of the angry, jilted, but pure, wife. It should not surprise us that Cruz is not so much struggling to consolidate the party, but in his charge over the battlefield, he is slowly turning to see no elites are following.

Successful presidential nominees have historically been able to piece together disparate elements of their parties, even if the fit was sometimes less than ideal. Trump, it appears as of now, is the only candidate able to appeal to enough voters, and, through the negation of his rivals, secure at least some level of elite support. To think that such a man is in this position speaks ill of us.

Donald Trump is the Twitter candidate, for his knowledge of most policy is exhausted in less than 140 characters. He reminds me of the President from Idiocracy, a Mike Judge film that bitingly satirizes America’s future. President Camacho (full name: Dwayne Elizondo Mountain Dew Herbert Camacho), is far more professional wrestler than politician. In his State of the Union address, he takes to the floor of the House of Representin’ and has to drown out taunts from South Carolina delegates with automatic weapons fire.

Absurd? Of course. But Judge’s satire was short-sighted. It assumed it would take another 500 years before we elected a man like President Camacho. Star Trek’s communicators appeared fanciful during the 1960s, but Captain Kirk’s device is woefully unsophisticated only fifty years into the actual future. We did not need to travel to the stars to make a smart phone. Such is Judge’s portrayal of American politics and culture. We didn’t need 50 decades to get a glimpse into our fetid future, but only one.

Donald Trump has managed to tap into American frustration. That feeling is real, and it is not only the result of blind fear. The American political system, if not broken, is sagging under the weight of poor leadership. Trump’s supporters have not necessarily erred in their understanding of what ails us. They have erred in their prescription. Pinning our political hopes on a cipher, a man with no discernible set of convictions, who runs asking for the power to fix things, is folly.