Let us assume that Trump is a self created media creation-a plausible assumption-but it is irrational to deny that the host of the Apprentice is a media creation. The point of identifying Trump as a media creation is not to invoke the old saw, that which the media creates the media can destroy, rather it is to identify the dynamic by which a media creation continues to live or dies in the national consciousness. Please consider what I said in post #57 of that thread:
"Oh for Pete's sake, the point of the vanity is not whether Trump is the passive creation of the media or rather that Trump's candidacy is a joint venture of interaction between Trump and the media, the point is that the Trump phenomenon is a media phenomenon and as such it will live or die. Trump supporters have got to deny that the Trump phenomenon is something other than a media phenomenon (however created) so they can deny the conclusion of the vanity. They do this by nitpicking whether Trump controls the media or the media created Trump.
They do not want to consider the distinction between a grassroots candidacy and the media phenomenon. They do not want to consider the implications of a media defined and driven candidacy."
In Trump's case, the dynamic is that it must become ever more outlandish or it fails its own reason for being. We saw that in focus last night. It came in focus because Trump was not operating sui generis he was operating in comparison to nine other highly competent debaters among whom were successful governors, popular Senators, a popular television personality as well as former governor, and two doctors against whom he would be compared and who supplied yardsticks of both performance and substance.
Was Trump's appeal that he said it better than anyone else? No! He was over the line on several occasions and near the line on several more occasions. His exchange with Megan Kelly is an example. This idea that the Fox interrogators were set up to destroy Trump is fanciful but, even if true, they got him or rather he got himself. His personal attack on Kelly lost for him all the points he had gained by damning political correctness. But the point is the world saw Donald Trump's unattractive side. His performance failed.
Was Trump's appeal that he was saying something no one else was saying? No! It is clear that many candidates up there were making the same arguments on the same issues as was Trump. If Trump's entry card or key to entering the debate was his position on immigration, he shows no substantive advantage to a conservative voter over Cruz or Walker (new edition-but which edition of Trump are we talking about?). Cruz did not differentiate himself on substance over, for example, Cruz.
Did Trump utter substance better than Cruise uttered substance? No! The electorate can see a coherent, comprehensive statement on immigration from Cruz without being embarrassed.
To Limbaugh's point that the media cannot destroy Trump as they destroyed the viable political force of Sarah Palin. That is silly. The media will destroy whom the media pleases among the unwary or vulnerable otherwise we would have Republican president after Republican president. Sarah Palin was undone by the media because, like Richard Nixon she handed them a sword and Donald Trump is doing the same. The media will only twist it.
I believe my point stands, indeed the whole point of the vanity to which you were referred remains valid.
We shall see whether the arc of Donald Trump's popularity is topping.
One last point which is rank conjecture on my part. I believe Trump's popularity was a response to frustration, anger and, above all, fear. The American people believe in Ronald Reagan's vision of a great nation, a city on the Hill they know what America can be and should be but instead they feel their country disintegrating under their feet. They are quite rightly frightened and a frightened populace can be desperate. In their fear and desperation they were eager to overlook Donald trumps flagrant flaws of character but what they saw on the stage last night tells them that there are other men of better character in whom they can reliably put their trust and who can bring us through. They are his equal or his better in performance and substance.
It will be interesting to see the next round of polls.
