First off, I'm not an American, I'm a Canadian. I have also clearly stated that I consider Trump to be extremely dangerous, and that I thought that Clinton was a better candidate for the office. While I did not take any position in the article, I am very much hoping that Trump doesn't come within a hundred miles of winning this race. Second, you are free to disagree with me if you wish. You are free to attack my ideas to your heart's content. Do not EVER attack my person, or put words in my mouth (frankly, you are exceedingly bad at mind-reading). Now, onto your points. You are correct about Trump probably alienating core Republicans. What makes him dangerous, however, is that his appeal is to those who have lost faith in the system as a whole, hence his repeated systemic attacks in place of solid policy statements. This means that people who would probably not come out to vote if an established politician had won the nomination may very well come out to vote this time. Consider this: Congress' approval rating in August was at 18%, and it hasn't broken past 24% since 2011...and these are sustained historic lows (source: http://www.gallup.com/poll/1600/congress-public.aspx). The American voter turnout in 2014 was the lowest in over 70 years, with a national average of 36.3% (source: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/12/opinion/the-worst-voter-turnout-in-72-years.html). These are signs of a massive loss of faith in the political system, including a loss of faith that the people inside that system can turn it around. Trump isn't trying to appeal to the 36.3% of voters who still have enough faith in the system to vote - moreover, he probably doesn't care about the Republicans in that number who will stay home in 2016 because he has alienated them. He's gambling that he can mobilize enough of the 63.7% who stayed home to win the election by presenting himself as the clever outsider who can tear down a broken system. If he succeeds in that, this election will be quite winnable for him. Also, I don't think you understand what "disruption" means in this context. "Disruption" in this context means forcing your opponents to abandon their own ground and try to compete with you on yours in such a way where they lose if they don't. When McGuinty did it in Ontario, the Eves Conservatives looked out of touch by relying on their tried and true negative campaign strategy, which had won at least two prior elections (oh, and by the way, just because Ontario doesn't have a huge population doesn't mean there aren't lessons to be learned from its elections - we have a democratic system up here too, you know). Clinton is waging a standard political campaign, pitched at mobilizing her core base of Democrat voters - Trump is NOT. He's pitching his message at an entirely different group of people.
Wow. Chill the fuck out, cowboy. Nowhere did I say that you supported Trump, nor "put words in your mouth." I said that your argument was facile, and that you wanted your argument to be true. Devil's advocacy? Don't care. My point is you didn't make your point. Which is very much the position you took in the article - you titled it "Why Donald Trump may have won the first Presidential Debate." One assumes the argument you're making is that Donald Trump may have won the first presidential debate. My position is that you have not successfully argued that Donald Trump may have won the first presidential debate. Are we clear on this? Is it now abundantly obvious that I don't give the first fuck where your ideology lies, but where your arguments are made? Great. Let's move on. Because the bulk of your argument above is that voters are disenfranchised, not that voters are energized. Here's a quote: Okay, he's trying for that. The argument you need to make, therefore, is that his performance thus far is doing that. Which it is not. Previously, by the way, you defined "disruption" thusly: That's very different from So shall we debate whether Trump is making Hillary compete on her strengths? Or shall we debate whether Trump is making Hillary abandon her strengths to compete on Trump's? Because those definitions are polar opposites and you've used both. Don't get me wrong - I welcome the discussion. And I'm interested to hear your thoughts. But if you're going to post them where I can reply to them, I shall reply to them and if I see weakness in your arguments, I will point them out. So far you've argued that Trump won the debate because he didn't debate and people will vote for him for president because he's unpresidential. When discussing Trump's "disruption" you chose an example that more closely mirrored the Democratic National Convention than Trump's behavior or policy and when you were questioned on that you redefined "disruption" to mean the opposite of what you initially asserted. Hectoring me and resorting to condescension does not resolve this rhetorical shortcoming.He's gambling that he can mobilize enough of the 63.7% who stayed home to win the election by presenting himself as the clever outsider who can tear down a broken system. If he succeeds in that, this election will be quite winnable for him.
Another word for this strategy is “disruption,” and it’s a long-standing and effective campaign tactic. For example, Karl Rove specialized in campaigns that would attack an opponent’s strengths rather than their weaknesses, on the grounds that somebody was prepared to defend their weaknesses, but would be taken by surprise if they had to justify their strengths. Donald Trump’s campaign, in which he is constantly sending up flak attacking the political establishment, is all about disruption.
"Disruption" in this context means forcing your opponents to abandon their own ground and try to compete with you on yours in such a way where they lose if they don't.
"Nowhere did I say that you supported Trump, nor "put words in your mouth."" You know what? You kind of did - you took a straight-up exploration of strategic messaging with a number of nuanced pointed and reduced it to "the winning strategy for political office is to play up one's unsuitability for public office." I've been strawmanned before - I didn't like it then, and I don't like it now. If you want to damn me, then do it for what I said, not a caricature of what I said. That said, you're right - there are a couple of things you said that I interpreted in the worst possible manner. So, I do owe you an apology, and it is offered gladly. That further said, I think you're wrong, and the evidence you're using is outdated - the article is from May, and this is now September, further Trump has actually closed the gap between him and Clinton in a number of polls (source: http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2016/president/us/general_election_trump_vs_clinton-5491.html#polls). Either way, clearly it's time for both of us to back away from each other, so I'm done replying to you. Please do not take this as a demand to stop commenting or discussing in this thread - I simply won't be replying to you anymore.
Apology accepted. Thank you. I'll leave you with this, however: Your argument remains unmade. That Trump is closing in the polls in no way indicates that he is energizing formerly-reticent voters. I did a quick scan for research that backs up that allegation and I find none.
Disruptive marketing means going after a target audience who isn't being targeted by the mainstream groups. Where did you get your version of "disruption" for this piece ? It seems like you switch back and forth from understanding that disruptive means going after the non-voters nobody else cares about and thinking it has something to do with positivity vs. negativity. The conservatives in Ontario have won most elections. Mcguinty won because he was able to make them crash and burn by being charismatic. He lost previously because he wasn't charismatic. It's the same reason Trudeau did so well this election. Every time he messes up he handles it so well that he gains more followers as his opponents get dramatic and come across as childish. If you checked the NDP's facebook page after the whole Elbow thing you would see comment after comment of NDPer's denouncing their party for being so ridiculous.