From The Mendacity of Hope: Barack Obama and the Betrayal of American Liberalism (HarperCollins). Hodge is the former editor of Harper’s Magazine.

As we prepare yet another round of offerings to the demigods of America’s political religion, we would do well to remind ourselves of what our electoral votives truly signify. Ideally, our ballots purport to be expressions of political will, which we hope and pray will be translated into legislative and executive action by our pretended representatives. Through hard and painful struggles, against daunting odds, our forebears and elders fought so long for voting rights—for unpropertied men, for…