Trump’s foreign-policy critics are losing

Some of these views are insightful, some are eccentric, and some are deeply misguided. But what seems clear is that the president remains largely in control. Mr. Trump’s critics will be hard put to wrest control of American foreign policy back from his grasp. He is driving a consequential shift even in the face of congressional rebukes.

This partly reflects constitutional realities. Presidents have wide latitude in conducting foreign policy. There is also the pressure of events; Congress is slow and the world moves quickly…

That points to a deeper truth. Mr. Trump has plenty of problems with the polls, but in neither party does the electoral base show much nostalgia for the mainstream foreign policies of the post-Cold War era. On the Democratic side, there is little appetite for the robust engagement of the Madeleine Albright years. Among Republicans, neither neoconservative democracy hawks nor hard-line free traders seem able to mount much of a challenge to the president. Whatever comes after Mr. Trump, it won’t be a simple return to the Republican or Democratic version of the post-Cold War consensus.