This week in the saga

The long winter opens with the machine at full speed and the ground perfectly still. Thirty-nine statements go out in seven days — more than any week of the exile so far — and not one of them changes anything. The first quarrel is with his own side: the Senate leader gave the Democrats a two-month delay on the debt ceiling, and the exile wants the ceiling used as a weapon. The second is with television, which he says needs his ratings to survive and still will not put anyone on a stage to argue the election with him; the challenge has been standing for weeks and nobody has taken it. By the fourth of December the argument has worn down to its shortest form — anyone who disagrees is stupid or corrupt — and by the sixth he is back at the only lever that still answers: a former senator will run against the governor who certified Georgia, and the endorsement goes out that night.