David Pakman

This is a bigger question than Trump.

This is about how do these charismatic authoritarian leaders

Suck people in and rope them in in the first place.

It is not a process that starts with policy.

It mostly is about identity and charisma.

If you go back to the beginning, Trump did not ask voters, nor did he give them the opportunity, by the way, to evaluate detailed policy proposals.

He would go, oh, yeah, we're going to replace Obamacare with something big and beautiful.

Oh yeah, no one understands trade better than me and China screwing you and I'm going to fix it.

But what Trump did that all of authoritarians do is he framed this as an opportunity for people to be part of a movement bigger than themselves, which is very cult like and you sometimes see it in religious belief as well.

It is a fight against the elites, against the system that's screwing you against forces that are responsible for why you're not doing well or you're frustrated.

Or the point is, the emotional connection is often the first thing with these authoritarians.

And so when you say, here's who I'm supporting and we saw this early when it was like two to three percent for Ted Cruz in 2016, 2015 and two to three percent for Trump.

The people supporting Ted Cruz were like, listen, I'm evangelical.

Abortion is important.

Ted Cruz is the choice.

The people supporting Trump overwhelmingly were already borderline cultists who had gotten sucked in by the cult of personality.

Once you lock in support of an identity or you see a candidate as a symbol more than a set of policies, everything just accommodates to that.

The promises don't have to be consistent.

Remember, with Trump, it was like, yes, you got to punish the woman if she gets an abortion the next day.

No, actually, you don't pick whichever one you like.