This is only the beginning: Nate Silver explains how Donald Trump has “hacked the system”
This is only the beginning: Nate Silver explains how Donald Trump has “hacked the system” and created a roadmap for future political con men
by Sean Illing at Salon
http://www.salon.com/2016/03/31/this_is_only_the_beginning_nate_silver_explains_how_donald_trump_has_hacked_the_system_and_created_a_roadmap_for_future_political_con_men/
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On Wednesday, Nate Silver of FiveThirtyEight.com dove a little deeper into the Trump coverage, trying to understand how this happened. “Trump has been able to disrupt the news pretty much any time he wants,” Silver wrote, “whether by being newsworthy, offensive, salacious or entertaining. The media has almost always played along.”
Of course, the press has played along – it can’t do otherwise. A corporatized media has turned citizens into consumers, and politicians into products. Trump understands this and he acts accordingly – it’s really quite simple. His whole career has been about brand management, which is now all the training a national politician needs.
Trump’s media-centric strategy has been wildly successful. He’s received what amounts to $1.9 billion in TV coverage despite having spent only $10 million on paid advertising. “By contrast,” Silver notes, “Trump’s Republican rivals combined have received slightly less than $1.2 billion worth of television coverage, meaning that Trump has been the subject of the clear majority (62 percent) of candidate-focused TV coverage.”
Silver’s broader conclusion is that Trump has “hacked the system,” which is to say he’s exploited a broken process with a perverse incentive structure. He writes:
“Put another way, Trump has hacked the system and exposed the weaknesses in American political institutions. He’s uncovered profound flaws in the Republican Party. He’s demonstrated that third-rail issues like racism and nationalism can still be a potent political force. He’s exploited the media’s goodwill and taken advantage of the lack of trust the American public has in journalism. Trump may go away – he’s not assured of winning the GOP nomination, and he’ll be an underdog in November if he does – but the problems he’s exposed were years in the making, and they’ll take years to sort out.”
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