Donald Trump’s assault on the world — not to mention democracy, diplomacy, basic human decency and the rule of law — may look like an incoherent series of vindictive episodes aimed at “flooding the zone with s**t,” as the now-clichéd expression holds. Bewildering and overwhelming the opposition is certainly among the goals, but it’s important to grasp the method behind the madness.

Masked goons stage a military-style attack on a Chicago apartment building. The president and his “secretary of war” deliver unhinged macho-snowflake monologues urging senior military officers to wage war on civilians in American cities. Federal employees are fired en masse, and then begrudgingly rehired piecemeal under court order. Punitive tariffs are imposed on longtime allies, seemingly for whimsical or ins

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