Remember “Infrastructure Week”? Donald Trump declared it in his first year as president to build support for fulfilling his pledge to spend prodigiously to fix America’s roads and bridges. Within the political class, at least on the left, Infrastructure Week became shorthand for his haplessness as, year after year, he failed to persuade Congress to commit the funds.

PAM BONDI did not kidnap a dog, exactly. But the 20-year-old custody battle, fought over a St Bernard named Noah (né Master Tank), did not look great for America’s probable next attorney-general. In 2005, during Hurricane Katrina, the dog was separated from its family in Louisiana. Ms Bondi, then a Florida prosecutor, adopted the mutt from a charity that rescued him. When Noah’s original family found him in 2006, she refused to part with him until a 16-month legal fight forced her hand. She had suggested that the dog had previously been neglected. The story attracted local attention when Ms Bondi ran to be Florida’s attorney-general. She lost the dog, but won the election and served for eight years.