Trump’s America First becomes America expands

President-elect Trump’s imperialist tendencies ahead of his second term are begging a question that dominated his first term: Should he be taken seriously, or literally?

Trump during a Tuesday press conference declined to rule out using military force to gain control of Greenland and the Panama Canal.

He said he would use economic force to merge the U.S. with Canada, shrugging off the border between the countries as an “artificial line.”

He threatened to tariff Denmark...