Will a class of ambitious Democrats take a lesson from AOC?

Her artlessness is exactly what was wanted in disowning what she called “Woke 1,” a set of policy ideas that would be death to anyone who wants a future in national politics.

A Brainless Detour

AOC showed up on ABC News Sunday show. She seemed to be saying, “forget it ever happened.”

Holman W. Jenkins, Jr. thought the only real Democratic hopefuls in 2028 would be those who spent the past decade outside of Washington, like Andy Beshear, Josh Shapiro, Gretchen Whitmer and Rahm Emanuel.

A Better Way

In imitation of AOC, find a venue to say: “Of course it was wrong for Democrats to fabricate evidence of collusion. It was wrong to mobilize the CIA and FBI to lie to voters.

The Joe Biden Grift?

Democrats failed in 2024: “The most irresponsible thing ever.

Even in hopeless contests against an FDR or Eisenhower, continues Mr. Jenkins, both parties always did their duty and gave Americans someone for whom they could vote.

Day #1: the Media tried to ignore such a speech.

Day #2: the press tried to shoot it down.

Day #3: a catharsis would begin like the Mississippi overflowing its banks.

The speaker would benefit by wrong-footing half the Democratic firmament. He or she would become instantly votable to much of America that voted for Mr. Trump.

Why, asks Mr. Jenkins, has it not happened already?

This was obvious when two of these hopefuls visited the Journal last year.

Recall Chuck Schumer at the start of the Trump era: Don’t make an enemy of the intelligence agencies. “They have six ways from Sunday at getting back at you.”

A Second, Subtler Reason

Look for an answer in “Regime Change,” a new book by reporters Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan.

Kayfabe

How can Donald Trump be so courtly to Joe Biden in person yet so abusive on the hustings? It’s no mystery. The authors don’t give the answer—kayfabe—because they’re participants in the kayfabe.

What is Kayfabe, readers might ask? It is the fakeness of professional wrestling.

Recall Mr. Biden’s 2024 ABC interview after his debate debacle. This is what it looks like when kayfabe takes a day off. He didn’t say, for once, that Mr. Trump was a threat to democracy—because now it would undercut his own plea to stay in the race despite lousy polls.

Between every line of Ms. Haberman and Mr. Swan’s huffing disapproval of Mr. Trump’s reckless ignorance and impulsivity is their delight in having him as a subject, a ticket to the bestseller list. Their most clunkingly dishonest passage? After the Butler, Pa., assassination attempt, they segue to Mr. Trump’s bone spurs to escape Vietnam, supposedly re-establishing his reputation for “the opposite” of “physical courage.”

Mr. Jenkins promises readers that “no national journalist is really so stupid—so historically, psychologically, sociologically stupid—as to imagine physical courage is what distinguished those who went to Vietnam from those who didn’t.” What this is, is purely a kayfabe assertion—to get Mr. Trump back in his baddie costume and their … narrative back on track.

Ms. Ocasio-Cortez refers to the “Overton window.” The O window decides when outré ideas may be discussed. “But as important is the emperor’s-new-clothes effect, which determines when it’s personally advantageous to ignore plainly obvious realities.”

What’s Missing?

In 2016, Mr. Trump was the “outsider” and “disrupter” whom a surprising number of Obama voters would take a flyer on, explains Jenkins.

By 2024, the Times would later admit, his enemies had metamorphosed him. He became the “righteous hero triumphing in the face of smear campaigns, relentless prosecutions and even an attempt on his life”—though it still took astonishing mismanagement of their own nomination by Democrats to return him to the White House.

Another Kayfabe Telltale

In a hundred lifetimes, Rachel Maddow might never stop to ask how it could benefit Mr. Trump for the Russians constantly to be calling attention (as she alleges) to their support for Mr. Trump. Her disincentive is channeled directly into her $25 million paycheck, which obviously isn’t awarded for accurate reporting and analysis.

When Enemies Did Favors for Trump

What else could Trump do but “gawp.” Ditto, writes Mr. Jenkins, “any open-eyed citizen.”

Kayfabe’s derivation is uncertain but the term is strikingly similar in mouth feel to “coward,” a description repeatedly merited by the national press in the Trump era.

But explain as you will the spell Mr. Trump and his enemies have cast over our politics. When a prominent Democrat finds the courage to step outside the spell, on that day America might regain hope of being able to elect a serious president for serious times.