Benjamin Disraeli wrote in praise of “Tory men and Whig measures”. Almost a century and a half since he was Britain’s premier, that mix remains the surest way to electoral glory, and not just there. It is, come to think of it, a serviceable definition of populism.

Lots of Americans admire the left’s economic “measures” more than the cultural instincts of its leaders. A conservative who offers the first without the second stands to prise them away from the Democrats.

The oddity is not that Donald Trump intuited as much in 2016. It is that no other Republican had got there first. It is too late for the US president to have a good crisis. He cannot go back to January and take Covid-19 with due seriousness. What there is still time for — just — is the most lavish possible mitigation of the economic effects. What there is still time for is a Republican man and Democratic measures.