Branding, like Trump's campaign, focuses on creating, promoting and selling consumers an image rather than the specific attributes of a product or service. To an oldster like me, this is all just smoke and mirrors.
But "Only I can fix it...as an Outsider...where I'll drain the swamp" created a powerful image of a hegemonic, self-determining ("rugged individualist"
, vibrant masculinity long popularized on screens big and small, a vision that most Americans see as natural, eternal, universal and, frankly, superior.
While there's no question these voters didn't dig deep enough, they were only thinking that they were voting for a hero in a movie--an archetypal American hero--rather than understanding that the work of government is far, far different from what some cinematic whiz bang can pull off in just about 2 hours.
They were lazy, they were duped and many are biased. But they also had been well-conditioned to swallow the latest lifestyle brand (sans details), especially one using the most powerful (and abused) of all the terms used to sell us things, "new and (by implication) improved)."
But it's Pete Townsend who's right ("old boss, same as the new boss" , although this may be even harder to see these days as we watch the Ryans, Mulvaneys and Putins of the world manipulate our "Useful Idiot In-Chief" who, along with his voters, think he's actually in charge.
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