CHAPTER 13Making sense of the patterns in the chaos
Scenarios provide the essential context for anticipating the future
‘You’ve called women you don’t like fat pigs, dogs, slobs and disgusting animals …, ’ began Fox News moderator Megyn Kelly during the first televised debate among Republican candidates at the start of their primary campaign in August 2015.
‘Only Rosie O’Donnell,’ Donald Trump interrupted deadpan.
And with that remark, the rules for the 2016 US presidential election were thrown out the window.
As I watched the debate on 6 August 2015, it was clear that Donald Trump was on a winner, that he was the ‘event’ to give voice to the latent political disaffection of millions of US voters.
On stage with nine other candidates representing ‘politics as usual’, Trump stood out like a beacon as his opponents delivered contrived, scripted responses, rolling out what they thought the public wanted to hear. Yet these men succeeded only in demonstrating a tin ear with regard to the public’s mood for political change. Against this backdrop, Trump dominated the debate. He dominated the stage, and the subsequent headlines.
On the Democratic side, a similar phenomenon was occurring. As soon as you knew anything about Bernie Sanders or his political views you knew he was a genuine candidate who was in it for the long haul. The fact that he described himself as a Democratic Socialist, a label that was anathema to much of the US media, was irrelevant. The people wanted authenticity. ...
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