Five Lessons for Trump’s Success: What It Has to Do With Anger?

Donald Trump’s steady lead among other Republican Party presidential contenders (the recent polls show he is well ahead of the closest chaser, with 39% of the votes) in advance of the party’s 2016 presidential candidate nomination prompted many to muse so what is it that makes him so special and how to make a better use of it.

American magazine The National Interest has offered what it calls five lessons for the Republican Party on their leading contender Donald Trump. And has advised the party to examine them while “planning for the aftermath of the 2016 election cycle, which may become a defining event”.

Voter Anger

Unexpectedly, voter anger comes the first on the list. The outlet explains that voter anger is the “essential prerequisite for Trump’s rise and for the simultaneous popularity of other anti-establishment candidates like Ben Carson and Senator Ted Cruz”.

“The GOP has systematically cultivated this anger for decades and has correctly recognized that it is a powerful force in mobilizing donors and voters.”

The magazine however warns that the party leaders might be wrong in “assuming that they could control the passions they stoked”.

Accountability

The magazine notes that being “a billionaire presidential candidate with significant personal popularity”, Trump is “almost wholly unaccountable”. He does not need to fear losing a governorship, a Senate seat, or another political post because of what he says. He does not need to fear being fired by his current employer or making himself unemployable.

“As a result, Trump is able to exploit the anger the GOP has cultivated more fully than any other candidate and to thwart the party’s partially successful efforts to channel it.”

Reputation

Trump’s pre-existing national reputation for verbal extravagance, developed over a decade on television, is his best merit. His supporters apparently “take what they like seriously and dismiss what they don’t like, telling themselves that it’s just the way he talks and may not mean anything.”

Media Coverage

As it turns, Trump is a brilliant showman, the magazine notes, who is able to “deflect unwelcome or even hostile media attention as biased, taking advantage of his supporters’ predispositions as well as the declining trust in many media organizations”.
He was able to turn it such a way that “political or media establishment criticism only enhances his image among his supporters.”

And Finally, Conservatism

This point seems to be the weakest, the magazine says.

“In fact, Trump’s record provides little evidence that he is either a solid economic conservative or a genuine social conservative. He may be a national security conservative—and is clearly a strong American nationalist—but is significantly out of step with conservatives’ definition of what the Republican Party is and should be.”

“This should raise some profound questions about the party’s future and about the idea that greater conservative purity will lead to greater electoral success.”

It has already called into question whether Republicans will be able to unite around the GOP’s eventual nominee, the magazine says.

“The Republican National Committee’s apparent contemplation of a brokered convention is unlikely to solve this problem, in that if Trump wins a plurality of delegates and is passed over for the nomination, his anti-establishment supporters could easily be alienated rather than mobilized.”

“Notwithstanding the party leadership’s reservations about Trump, that won’t help to win the election.”