He has certainly demonstrated that he can be a bit of a thug. He is comfortable in the company of anti-white racists. He is friendly with people who lean toward the extreme left, socialist, Marxists, and so froth. He is eloquent (Mugabe for example used to be considered very eloquent when he first hit the scene). He can draw large crowds of people who think he is a savour (see video in Kate's post). He is educated well-above the level of his brethren (Mugabe has how many degrees again?), and is quite happy to put as much distance between himself and those he claims to support (no public Chicago schools for his kids, no sir, private school only).
Note too that his campaign has spent a small fortune trying to get him elected. It's all about image. The game of propping him up can only go on for so long, and I'm pretty sure in the next 72 hours his team will desperately try to keep the momentum going. You can only prop up a fake for so long.
Those voting for him are blind to what really lies behind the glamour and rhetoric. I find him more and more creepy by the day."
RICH HAILEY: The Politics of Power: Are You a Citizen or a Subject? "If a man owns your house, your bank account, your job, and your health care, he owns you. Period. Just ask a coal miner from West Virginia about the company store."
Some related thoughts here: "The more expensive housing is, the more politicians can buy votes by offering to make it more affordable (via cheap credit, lower down payment requirements, etc.); same with education. Notice a pattern? Government distortions increase costs of living, and politicians run for government on promises not to remove those distortions, but to add new distortions that will supposedly ameliorate those high costs."
FROM DAVE KOPEL: A Second Amendment Voter Guide.