If Democrats want to understand one of the reasons the Republican Party is ascendant, they can look to President Joe Biden’s pardon on Sunday (Monday AEDT) for his son Hunter. In its rank mendacity, political hypocrisy and naked self-dealing, this wretched example typifies so much of what so many Americans have come to detest about what the MAGA world calls “the swamp.”

Start with the mendacity. Last December, Karine Jean-Pierre, the White House press secretary, insisted, “I’ve been very clear: the president is not going to pardon his son.”