Not until 2016 was there ever a more flamboyant, ostentatious, and pretentious S.O.B. in American politics. Huey P. Long proved that if you can buffalo the barely literate into thinking you have their best interests at heart, you can go quite far in this country—even if you have the scruples of a vole and the soul of an ashtray. Long was the state-level template that accurately foretold our future. Had he not met such a violent and untimely end he might very well have ridden his horse of autocracy all the way to the White House.