At an evening traditionally given over to laughter and self-deprecation, Donald Trump used the White House Correspondents' Dinner to announce a 2028 presidential campaign — a bid that would require rewriting the Constitution itself. The declaration, met with scattered applause rather than enthusiasm, placed a man of eighty at the center of a question older democracies have long wrestled with: when does ambition outpace the institutions designed to contain it? The room's silence may have said more than any speech could.