How many zillion column inches of anguished outcry have we seen about the January 6 Capitol protesters, Donald Trump’s egging them on (which he did, there’s no use in denying it), and the damage it all did to America’s most hallowed tradition of governance — the peaceful transition of power from one party to the (sometimes viscerally antagonistic) opposing party? Liberals and others have wailed daily for more than two years that it was Trump’s threatening and soiling this tradition that was by far the most grievous of his numerous grievous sins as President.

In this they are partly right. It was Trump’s biggest failing, and in my view disqualifies him from again holding a position of public trust and power, as I argued here.

But it’s now time to ask the critical question that Alvin Bragg’s indictment raises but, oddly, has been all but absent from public discussion over the last week: What exactly has made possible the tradition of a peaceful transfer of power?

It’s one thing above everything else — the losers’ faith that the winning party won’t use the power of government to put them in jail. That faith disappeared from America a week ago.