this because it's important to recognize that Trump really does have a worldview of his own and has held it for a long time. As intellectually incoherent as he is about virtually everything, his fundamental philosophy is that America should return to the period in which he grew up, the 1950s — a time when "our police" were free to intimidate and terrorize racial minorities and the U.S. dominated the planet economically and militarily because it was the only industrial power left standing after World War II.

In order to recapture that moment in time it will take another worldwide conflagration. That leads us to Trump's strategic adviser Steve Bannon, the apocalyptic media mogul who also thinks we're on the verge of collapse and sees this as an opportunity.The New York Times published a story this past weekend about Bannon's obsession with the 1997 book "The Fourth Turning," a half-baked theory of political history that says everything happens in 80-year increments. We're about to have a massive meltdown, Bannon thinks, after which the U.S. would presumably once again be on top and Donald Trump would be young again.

In the interview, Mr. Bannon rattled off a list of White House policies that he said fit with the larger goal of strengthening the country for whatever calamity might await just over the horizon. They included starting the process of building a wall on the southern border, barring foreigners from seven predominantly Muslim nations, and taking steps that he said were meant “to empower the secretary of defense, the