NICHOLAS CONFESSORE

As the Republican Party collapses on itself, conservative leaders struggling to explain Trump’s appeal have largely seized on his unique qualities as a candidate: his larger-than-life persona, his ability to dominate the airwaves, his tough-sounding if unrealistic policy proposals. But the story is also one of a party elite that abandoned its most faithful voters, blue-collar white Americans,

Donald J. Trump once boasted that he could someday be the only person to turn a profit running for president. He may be closer than anyone realizes.

Through convoluted accounting required by law — so that Trump’s companies do not make illegal corporate contributions directly to his campaign — Trump is in effect taking millions of dollars out of one pocket and depositing it into another.

In the Republican and Democratic primaries alike, upstart candidates shunned by their parties' major donors are now financially competitive with opponents who have spent months or even years wooing the big-name donors and fundraisers who have traditionally dominated the money race.

Republicans or Democrats control both the legislature and the governor's office in 36 states, the most in 60 years. Twenty-three states are now solely controlled by Republicans, and 13 solely by Democrats. The result has been what amounts to a vast, real-world experiment in lawmaking: Elected officials in one-party states have aggressively reshaped government policy, whether legalizing same-sex marriage and marijuana, abolishing taxes and regulations, or restricting guns or labor unions.

As the government shutdown grinds toward a potential debt default, some of the country's most influential business executives have come to a conclusion all but unthinkable a few years ago: Their voices are carrying little weight with the House majority that their millions of dollars in campaign contributions helped build and sustain.

Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, in a sharp escalation in the battle over gun control, is seeking to punish Democratic senators -- including Alaska's Mark Begich -- by taking away the one thing they most need from New Yorkers: money.