When future historians seek to pinpoint exactly when it was that the Republican Party stopped being a legitimate political entity promoting a coherent set of principles and was transformed fully into a cult of personality organized around a would-be autocrat, Feb. 4, 2022, might be in contention. That date — last Friday — was when the Republican National Committee formally censured two Republican House members, Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger, for clinging to genuine conservative ideals while refusing to promote the toxic populism and contempt for democracy that now defines their party. The RNC’s unprecedented sanction against both of them...