Trump may not be capable of destroying America, but nor is he going to improve it

America has seen and survived presidents who defended the institution of slavery, who were drunks, who womanised, who were mentally ill, who bought or cheated their way into office, who lied about their health, who dodged military service, and even one who was forced to resign in ignominy. Not one managed to produce a crisis that the constitution could not overcome. America is a nation of behemoth proportions; physically and psychologically, the country is a colossus whose momentum is difficult to impede. America will go on. The Republican Party may not.

Six months into the Trump presidency, the sky has not fallen. Neither has anything been accomplished. Many moderate Republicans, including this author, argued that Trump should have time to find his footing in office. Well, he’s had his time, and the results are damning. Six months on, Americans are no less fat, broke, poorly educated or addicted to heroin than we were before he assumed office. What has become eminently clear is that he has no interest whatsoever in governing, preferring petty Twitter campaigns to the quiet dignity of his office. Donald Trump is not capable of destroying America – but he is not going to improve it.

His time in office has become an exercise in damage control for the adults in professional politics. The Republican Party is now saddled with an extraordinarily divisive figurehead for whom we must answer. Unfortunately, most of us have been left speechless by the gross incompetence on display. His casual relationships with fact and propriety have produced an endless litany of gaffes and scandals, all perfectly avoidable and all ruinous to the Republican legislative agenda.

This week brought fresh scandal, wrapped in an old scandal’s clothing. News emerged of a meeting last summer between senior members of the Trump campaign and Kremlin-connected Russian nationals who landed the meeting by promising incriminating evidence about Hillary Clinton’s campaign. If true, that meeting could well have been in violation of campaign finance law – which makes it all the more incredible that Junior voluntarily released evidence of the meeting online, and stumbled his way through a Fox News interview.

Those whose lives do not revolve around professional politics probably heard something akin to a Boeing 747 taking off – enough noise to drown out conversation at a reasonable volume. Those “inside the bubble” rent their garments and predicted weeping and gnashing of teeth for Trump Jr and Jared Kushner, who also attended the meeting in question.

We may well remember this as the moment when Donald Trump Jr posted evidence on his own Twitter account that led to his indictment; we may well forget it, if this episode, weighed down by complexity and the liberal bias of The New York Times, sinks back into the primordial ooze of Trump’s Washington. I do not believe that this latest sideshow spells the

at telegraph.co.uk/ opinion end of Trump’s presidency; nor is it the main reason that people like me can no longer defend the president. It is simply one more twig on top of a bonfire of evidence that the next three years of our lives are going to be a three-ring circus.

The Republicans made a deal with the devil: that we would take this man, who is morally and ideologically anathema to our core beliefs, in order to accomplish our legislative agenda. What we got in return is stalled healthcare reform, stalled tax reform, a chaotic budget process, and Mephistopheles with a Twitter account. Enthusiasm for Trump in economically depressed parts of the country stemmed from his promise to make everything better. How should we expect those people to react when they realise that they bought a four-year supply of snake oil?

The party cannot wait for indictments to be handed down to distance itself from this calamitous presidency. As the party in power, Republicans have a responsibility to govern. As humans, we have a responsibility to ensure that our fellow man does not suffer needlessly. Since the GOP controls 32 state legislatures, we have the ability to legislate on everything that the constitution does not specifically delegate to the federal government (eg, treaty-making power). Much can be done on the sub-federal level to alleviate the opioid epidemic, failing schools and access to quality healthcare.

This president is not going to be part of those solutions, and should not be allowed to become a problem in and of himself. Someone else must step in as the leader of the party, as a purveyor of ideas. The ship cannot go down for a New Jersey casino operator.

Those eager for our fragile Government to forge a consensus with Labour, on Brexit and on other issues, should remember the disastrous results of such cosy, cross-party unity in other areas of policymaking.

Everyone seems to agree that it’s fine for a tiny number of taxpayers to pick up the tab for vast chunks of public spending. As the Office for Budget Responsibility detailed this week, squeezing the rich has left Britain dangerously vulnerable to these ultra-mobile taxpayers fleeing abroad. On energy, an obsession with renewables has pushed up prices and signed us up to Hinkley Point, an extortionate white elephant that may even be too risky to build.

But it’s transport policy which really explodes the myth that consensus politics is a good thing. Pockmarked by potholes, clogged with congestion and cut up by bus lanes, since Blair our roads have been betrayed by politicians too embarrassed to admit that driving might still be necessary for millions of Britons. And when they do get around to doing anything about this, the result is measures that do little to fix years of neglect: a bit of cash to curb bottlenecks, a touch more for A-roads.

Then there’s HS2, originally a Labour idea, now co-opted by Tories imagining it might win them a few votes in the North. Billions later, we’re likely to be left with a railway 25 years

We may well remember this as the moment when Donald Trump Jr posted evidence on his own Twitter account that led to his indictment

Wolfson couldn’t have chosen an issue in more desperate need of attention

at telegraph.co.uk/ opinion