When my editors at The Philadelphia Inquirer Opinion section asked me to write this short essay on my hopes for 2024, one colleague joked that I could probably keep it to just two words: “Trump. Jail.”

Have my columns become that predictable? (Don’t answer that.) Sure, it’s true that justice for an ex-and-possibly-future president who repeatedly broke the law, most famously in plotting an attempted coup that resulted in a deadly insurrection on Capitol Hill on Jan. 6, 2021, is an outcome that I would absolutely love to see.

But that’s the thing: There are a lot of outcomes I’d be thrilled to witness over the next 12 months, including a humiliating defeat at the ballot box for Donald Trump by a President Joe Biden who got wiser at age 81 and listened to America’s young people about peace in Gaza and phasing out fossil fuels. But then, I’d be nearly as excited if my beloved Philadelphia Union finally stopped being so cheap and signed a world-class striker and midfielder in order to win the MLS Cup.

But soccer is a spectator sport. Democracy isn’t supposed to be.

My hope for 2024 is that the silent majority of Americans who still believe in freedom will stop wallowing in despair and waiting for the worst.

It’s easy to hope for outcomes. In fact, I think too many of us are doing exactly that—sinking deeper into our couches, open-mouthed and dumbfounded, as America gets ready to toss the principles that were forged right here in Philadelphia in the late 1700s right down the memory hole.

Many of us know people who are so resigned to........

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