Europe prepares to vote: Right relies on apathy and anger

Those who believed that Donald Trump might not be a good president for America or an inspiring, reliable partner in the alliances that have sustained the West for decades may feel vindicated. Those who opposed the inevitable chaos of Brexit equally so.

Those affirmations, not by any means universal, lead to some reflection and the conclusion that voter apathy played some part in both votes. Once upon a time, the idea of President Trump or Britain quitting the EU seemed so implausible, so counterintuitive that some of those who might have voted against those proposals stayed at home and left the heavy lifting of democracy to others.