europeans told pollsters who bothered to ask before tuesday<u+2019>s election that they would vote for hillary clinton if they could. their own votes closer to home say otherwise. one suspects, on the basis of europe<u+2019>s elections past and near future, that the private attitude toward the american electorate is not so much horror as envy. it<u+2019>s not just that americans have catapulted their popular anti-establishment leader into power. europeans have been trying to send messages to their elites for years. they<u+2019>ve voted for far-right and far-left populists. they<u+2019>ve voted for or against referenda they were told by their leaders to oppose or support. they always hit a snag. the only politicians they<u+2019>ve been able to find to champion anti-establishment causes have turned out to be nuts few sane voters would want to vote for, no matter how disgruntled (think le pen p<u+00e8>re ). they<u+2019>ve been forced to vote again in referenda until they get it <u+201c>right,<u+201d> as on constitutional treaties. and when they have managed to boost an anti-establishment leader over the fence as the greeks did last year, the system<u+2014>the eurozone, or the european commission, or someone else<u+2014>has fought back successfully. maybe this is a virtue. europeans have a far worse history with demagogues than americans do. if italians send a message against a proposed constitutional reform next month, it will be because they want to preserve a parliament that is more sclerotic and less responsive to the popular will. the european union exists in large part to try to protect european voters from themselves. yet suppressing protectionism or isolationism or xenophobia or any of europe<u+2019>s other political bad habits has not eliminated them. instead, that form of populism is reviving. america<u+2019>s suggestion: let the invaders in. this election season has focused on donald trump<u+2019>s hostile takeover of one of america<u+2019>s major parties<u+2014>all the ways his personality and what he possesses of an ideology are at odds with longstanding republican principles, or his personal feuds with republican leaders. it<u+2019>s philosophically and programmatically destructive even if it was electorally successful. now, however, the republican party has its chance to take over mr. trump. whether he realizes it, by running as a republican mr. trump has bound his fate to the success or failure of the congressional republicans he spurned during the campaign. the only pool of administrative talent large enough for mr. trump to tap to staff his administration will be the vast body of republican think-tankers and former officials on whose loyalty he can rely only because he bears an r after his name. a sufficiently brash demagogue can ignore both of those moderating forces in government and maybe mr. trump will. at best americans took a gamble on this and at worst they<u+2019>ve made a terrible mistake. his victory speech wednesday morning, however, hinted at a sudden recognition that, having acquired real power on tuesday, he now has to deliver results. his only path to results runs through the gop. it<u+2019>s a marked contrast to the european model, with its emphasis on pushing dissenting politics outside of the mainstream and then hoping it goes away. britain<u+2019>s conservatives refused to accommodate the frustrations that became the u.k. independence party. germany<u+2019>s christian democrats govern in an alliance with their center-left competitors rather than trying to accommodate the voters who would pull the center-right party back to the center-right but otherwise are supporting the alternative for germany (afd) party. what europe is missing is the opportunity american voters have seized to hand an insurgent a bicycle with the training wheels still on. america is in for a wobbly ride that may end in a crash, but it won<u+2019>t be any wobblier than what europe is experiencing as popular parties harass the polity without ever experiencing the burden of power. britain is the exception. the revolt against the european union introduces a moment of seriousness about what britons might be prepared to sacrifice for the independence that proved such a popular rallying cry. it<u+2019>s becoming an awkward moment for ukip and tory brexiters as brexit<u+2019>s costs<u+2014>a weak pound and rising inflation most immediately<u+2014>grow. such clarity is in evidence hardly anywhere else. the result of europe<u+2019>s attempts to suppress contrarian politics is 70 years of peace and stability, yes, but also a politics sufficiently unserious that the continent still hasn<u+2019>t managed to purge itself of obsolete communist parties left over from 60 years ago. america<u+2019>s trump moment may prove short-lived now that voters have demanded he put up or shut up. europe<u+2019>s many trump moments<u+2014>spain<u+2019>s podemos, italy<u+2019>s 5-star movement, germany<u+2019>s afd and more<u+2014>will continue on and on, with no way up and no way out, lurching from one crisis inflicted on mainstream politics to the next. forgive europeans if they<u+2019>re secretly jealous of americans.
europe<u+2019>s secret trump envy - wsj
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