There's a Way to Make Trump an Adequate President

For quite a few smart observers -- see Dan Drezner and Maggie Haberman -- it's increasingly obvious that Donald Trump simply cannot be helped. Drezner, assessing Trump's decision to omit the line affirming NATO's Article V from his European speech even after the speech was locked in (and despite the strong urging of Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, Secretary of Defense James Mattis and national security adviser H.R. McMaster), concludes none of the "adults" in the administration have any influence on the president. Brian Beutler says that anyone who entered the administration as a patriotic act to keep Trump from harming the nation should now realize it can't be done.

Perhaps. And yet: I keep thinking back to Ronald Reagan. The Reagan administration after the Iran-Contra scandal broke was in such disarray, and the president so ineffective, that insiders worried that he might be losing his capacity to govern, and that a 25th Amendment removal from office might actually be necessary.