There's a small part of me that wants to see Trump win

2. Progressives would learn that “history” is not on their “side.” Progressives believe in … progress. It’s their ideological faith, held as deeply as any religious creed. “Which side of history are you on?” — that’s the rhetorical question progressives are always tempted to pose when some event or trend seems to belie their providential convictions, and that’s very much been the case with the rise of Donald Trump. With Barack Obama, they believe, or want to believe, that the arc of history bends toward justice (with justice defined in such a way that it perfectly conforms to progressive assumptions about morality and government). Since I don’t believe that history has “sides” — and think that those who do are often led by their faith to make foolish mistakes — I would enjoy seeing the presumption flouted by a Trump victory, much as I enjoyed watching the surprise outcome of the Brexit vote send progressives on both sides of the Atlantic into hysterics.

3. Never Trump conservatives would be forced to sacrifice their smugness. I’ve been impressed with and moved by how many members of the conservative movement have taken a firm and consistent stand against Trump (even as almost every Republican elected official has embraced him). Yet it’s also the case that many of these same people spent years encouraging and contributing to the very right-wing populism that he’s ridden all the way to the front gate of the White House. The idea was to pick populist candidates who could (hopefully) be controlled and guided by intellectuals. Trump has refused such guidance, which is one reason why the pundits have rejected him. Their hope, it seems, is that Trump will lose decisively, enabling the writers who kept their hands clean to mount a comeback within the GOP while gloating about how wrong everyone else was to capitulate to the know-nothing insurgent. Part of me would like to see this plan go down in flames. No one who elevated or championed Sarah Palin — whom George Packer has aptly dubbed Trump’s John the Baptist — should be able to come out of the mess of this election with his smugness intact.