America, what has become of you?

And so, at long, long last, the end approaches. In fact, as millions of Americans have voted before election day, the end has begun already. Thank heavens for that. Like Paradise Lost, no-one ever wished this election longer.

It has been a gruelling time, in which patience has been of the essence. For months, members of the reality-based community – in the United States and across the world – have waited and waited and waited for Donald Trump’s campaign to fizzle into deserved nothingness. That patience has been tested time and time again; with luck and the good conscience of America it will finally be rewarded tomorrow.

But to think it came to this at all. Trump’s rise to the Republican nomination was bad enough, his staying power much worse. It’s fashionable, at least on the British left, to now argue this shows the weakness and inadequacy of Hillary Clinton. Perhaps it does, though the wistful suggestion an Elizabeth Warren or a Bernie Sanders would have thumped Trump strikes me as a powerful piece of comfortable confirmation bias, unsupported by any strong evidence to bolster its claims.