Unlike Donald Trump, I am a fan of George Will. Not only am I a fan, I just might owe my career to him. Almost 25 years ago, he gave a speech at the American Enterprise Institute — where I was a junior policy gnome — in which he made his case for congressional term limits. During the Q&A I asked whether a better solution might not be to return to the will of the Founding Fathers. Instead of even more restrictions on voter choices, why not go the other way? Why not expand Congress? The Founders would be appalled by how large congressional districts are today.
Mr. Will looked at me with sovereign contempt and, in effect, said that only a fool would want more congressmen in Washington. The audience laughed — at my expense. Rage coursed through my veins. If I’d had the gift of telekinesis like that old Gypsy had promised (that’s a story for another day), the AEI conference room would have looked like the prom scene in Carrie. But, being the wet-behind-the-ears mailroom striver of the Establishment (the one Donald Trump will finally tear down) that I was, I forwent my right to blood vengeance and instead went home to furiously peck out a response to Mr. Will gleaned from the fine print of the Federalist Papers and the minutes of the Constitutional Convention. Eventually my Unabomber-like magnum opus became a short op-ed that ran in the Wall Street Journal, the day after the 1992 election. It was my first professionally published piece of writing. I caught the bug. And Will was my muse.
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