That fear can drive reform, while also limiting and marring it, is what we need to consider once again. What Democrats are afraid of best explains what they are doing, and where they will stop — and that may be the problem. Mr. Biden's foreign policy staffers have been the most cleareyed about their challenges. Secretary of State Antony Blinken acknowledged that "Americans have been asking tough but fair questions about what we're doing, how we're leading — indeed, whether we should be leading at all." Brian Deese, the director of the Council of Economic Policy, is also entirely open that the prospect of alienating voters in a closely divided country keeps him up at night: "Your ability to sustain good policy is connected to your ability to sustain political support for that good policy." With a higher minimum wage on hold (Mr. Biden did order a $15 minimum wage for federal contractors) and the fate of Mr. Biden's proposed increase in the corporate tax rate unknown, much of the history that the Democrats write is now up to Congress. The red meat of Mr. Biden's proposals will look very different after the sausage grinder of the legislative process. Editors' Picks The W.N.B.A. Strikes an Uneasy Silence Over Brittney Griner Everything You Need to Know About the Met Gala 2022 Why Critics of Angry Woke College Kids Are Missing the Point But both the generosity and the limits of the reformism of fear always depend on what exactly reformers find terrifying — and what they think will lead to safety. The threat of electoral loss will wane as soon as it seems less credible that Donald Trump or someone like him can capitalize on elite failures. Even as long as that fear lasts, it can as easily lead to optical or rhetorical change as it can drive structural reform. And fear conditions the kind of government investments chosen from the policy menu. It is not just politicians angling to stay in power whose fear we need to realistically assess. Much depends, too, on the fear levels of the donors to whom politicians answer. In the 20th century, the carnage of war and masses enraged by depression — and pushing for labor rights through street action and union politics — once led the rich to redistribute to the rest of the country more willingly.