How I Learned to Start Worrying and Hate the Pundits
As a South African who lived in the US for most of a decade (and who arrived there already-obsessed with the vagaries of American politics), this past year I’ve found myself on occasion asked to (ok fine, I would interrupt people mid-sentence and) pronounce on the significance of Donald Trump’s candidacy. Having absorbed what I believed was the most rigorously-informed, right-thinking opinion on offer, it went something like this:
June 2015
It’s just name recognition. He’s a celebrity, and the average person being polled doesn’t really know anything about the other candidates yet.
July
He’s benefiting from all the free media coverage, especially in this crowed field — just wait until the race really gets going.
August
He’s way too reckless for a serious campaign. Just look at his foolish war with Fox News — it alone may well derail the whole thing.
September
Like the protest candidates of previous years, he’s one gaffe away from flaming out as fast as he ascended.
October:
He’s got zero support within the Republican establishment, and can’t win without them — we all know ‘The Party Decides’.
November:
He has no ground game. It takes real organizational acumen to win primaries, and Trump doesn’t have it.
December:
National polls tell us nothing — let’s see what happens with state polling closer to the primaries.
January 2016:
He has a natural support ceiling — he can’t win evangelicals and moderates.
February:
Wait until the field winnows — as soon as an anti-Trump emerges and the party rallies, he’ll have a real challenger.
March:
The delegate selection process is geared towards hardcore conservatives like Cruz.
April:
A united anti-Trump coalition might yet deny him the 1237 delegates, and then the party will surely maneuver against him at the convention.
May:
Conventional wisdom isn’t really wisdom, and political science isn’t really science.
