When the headline says that Scott Bessent might have saved the global economy, you know we are in deep trouble.

Because Bessent is the secretary of the Treasury and the man he had to save the global economy from, for the time being at least, is his boss, the president of the United States.

How things change: I hardly heard a word about politics on vacation in the Caribbean, and wrote a column about it after getting back with the headline "Don't worry, be happy." And now, only a couple weeks later, I've never been more worried in my lifetime.

Throughout that life of writing and teaching about politics, I've always argued that it shouldn't matter much to a normal, well-adjusted human being in a country with the kind of checks on political power (and thus tyranny) that our founders gave us.

I was too young to experience the Cuban Missile Crisis, but confess to never having lost sleep over Vietnam, Watergate, 9/11, or the 2008 financial crash. As bad as those calamities were, I always thought we would somehow muddle through.

Although I found the first Trump administration a chaotic, embarrassing mess, what the late Charles Krauthammer called the "guardrails" of our constitutional order still held. Covid disturbed me not so much because of the pandemic itself but........

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