In 2022, I identified two rising stars who could redefine America’s political future: Wes Moore and Kari Lake.

I was half-right.

In 2022, Lake was the Republican candidate for governor in Arizona. She was a well-respected television journalist with high name identification, and great communication skills. She seemed poised to win, but her campaign violated a cardinal rule of politics: Campaigns are about addition, not subtraction.

Tying herself closely to Donald Trump, she demanded that any John McCain supporters “get the hell out.” That's hardly the right formula for a Republican candidate to win in Arizona.

In 2024, Lake ran another losing campaign — this time against Sen. Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.), for an open U.S. Senate seat.

Today, the former journalist is Trump’s choice to supervise the dismantling of Voice of America.

So I was wrong about Lake. But I think I was right about Moore.

In 2022, Moore won a competitive Democratic primary to succeed two-term Republican Gov. Larry Hogan. Facing a Trump 2020 election-denier, Dan Cox, Moore won in a landslide.

There are three things a candidate needs to win the presidency. First, to hold the right office at the right time. In 2016, Trump did not hold any elective office, but he presented himself as a successful businessman who could fix Washington, D.C. around a time when fewer than one in five Americans trusted the government to do what was right. Right candidate, right background.

In 2020, Joe Biden was the insider the country wanted to end the COVID-19........

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