“What’s truly shocking is how much petty graft has sprung up,” Chait notes, but not all of it is petty and none of it is shocking. The tone is set at the top, by a boss who maintains serious conflicts of interest, glories in nepotism and treats the presidency as a gilded marketing opportunity. Trump’s example is a green light for corruption.

A leader knows whose counsel to seek and whose to be wary of. Trump knows only the siren’s song of sycophants saying what he wants to hear. He’s not interested in a diversity of input and information. One obsequious, affirming channel will do.

As the Daily Beast just reported, he has let the Fox Business host Lou Dobbs participate by speakerphone in White House meetings. He golfed with a Fox News host, Sean Hannity, over the weekend. And he raptly follows the Fox News show “Fox & Friends.”

He doesn’t do what a leader should and challenge himself — and the rest of us — to be bigger. He exploits his privilege to be as small as possible. With all the world watching and potentially taking cues from him, he crassly insults just about anyone who crosses him. It’s equal parts pathology and sport.

A leader tells the truth. I needn’t extend that thought by so much as a syllable.

Other presidents had their fictions. Their flaws. Trump is hardly soiling some pristine tradition. To suggest so is to validate his belief that he’s persecuted.

But to pretend that he’s an unremarkable link in the chain is crazier, and that’s not merely because of his unconventional résumé and attachment to Twitter. He lacks the flashes of valor and moments of inspiration that immediate predecessors had.