From the opinion pages of the Wall Street Journal, this is Free Expression with Jerry Baker.

Hello and welcome to Free Expression. I'm Jerry Baker from the Wall Street Journal editorial page.

I'm really pleased you're joining us this week. If you're not already a subscriber, then please do sign up wherever you get your podcasts.

This week, the 2024 Republican presidential primary field

is suddenly abloom with hopefuls. On Monday, Senator Tim Scott launched his bid with a powerful

telling of his extraordinary American story. And on Wednesday, we have the long-awaited

and much-ant-a-witted arrival into the race of Florida Governor on DeSantis. We are recording

this Wednesday morning a few hours ahead of DeSantisantis campaign launch, which he's doing through the unusual medium

of a Twitter appearance with Elon Musk. These latest arrivals into the field, of course,

are challenges to the man, the opinion polls and the betting markets currently make the

prohibitive favorite, former President Donald Trump. These other candidates join Nikki Haley,

who's been in the race for a few months already, along with former Arkansas Governor Asa

Hutchinson, and political ingenue and tech entrepreneur turned scourge of wokeness, Vivek Ramoswami.

Now, they are likely to be joined, further joined in coming weeks by, among others, perhaps former

Vice President Mike Pence, maybe former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie and New Hampshire Governor Chris Sununu. Now, as I said, among others, perhaps former Vice President Mike Pence, maybe former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie

and New Hampshire Governor Chris Sununu.

Now, as I said, the polling puts Trump way ahead of all the others.

The latest real clear politics average has him at 56%.

That's 37 points ahead of DeSantis, with no one else in double digits.

But do these national polls really matter at this stage?

Or is the race over

already before it starts? How can we expect it to unfold over the next few months before the first

...