All last weekend, Staties past and present hyperventilated over a PDF bouncing around Washington: a 16-page draft of an executive order that would radically transform the State Department. The document was breathtaking in its sweep and vindictiveness: The two bureaus overseeing democracy, human rights, labor, and refugees would be entirely eliminated, as would the Office of Global Criminal Justice and the special envoy for climate, John Kerry’s old position. The American embassy in Ottawa would be reduced to “no more than 10 consular officers.” Much of the U.S. diplomatic presence in sub-Saharan Africa would be narrowed to focus on counterterrorism, monitoring contagion, and the “strategic extraction and trade of critical natural resources”—an entire continent written off as nothing but a cauldron of violence and disease to be pillaged for raw materials.