As of January, Pelosi will stand between Trump and the few things he wants: to build his wall; to escape Mueller’s noose; and to elude impeachment. Trump may have underestimated Pelosi’s impact on those things from prior encounters when he held all the cards. He tricked her on protecting Dreamers, luring her into thinking he was for it before he was against it. Like many in his adopted party, he brushed her off as a San Francisco Democrat, the worst kind. He thought the talk of “generational change” might remove this pesky woman from his life.

Just the opposite. Trump may have inadvertently helped her bat away the insurrection by rogue newbies. Even those who promised to vote against her for Speaker saw you don’t want to send a rookie to negotiate with a rudderless yet wily president who got so rattled he volunteered to put his name on any government shutdown as if it were one of his buildings.

Pelosi doesn’t rattle, which makes her less interesting to cover but a perfect enemy combatant. The main difference between the two is that Pelosi is a grown-up.