Trump understands... "fanning resentments is fundamental to his appeal to a large chunk of voters"
"It's a lot easier to act presidential than to do what I do. Anybody can act presidential!" Trump declared, before tottering across the stage in a parody of a presidential walk, mocking the Oval Office conventions he has shredded since his inauguration, and admitting he likes to be a "little wild, have a little fun" at rallies.
It was an anarchical moment that highlighted the comedy that is an underestimated ingredient of Trump's demagogic technique. It helps bind him to supporters who feel bitter about Washington institutions they believe have cast them cruelly aside.
But it was also a flash of self-awareness by an idiosyncratic politician who intimately understands his own method as one of the great political entertainers, whose skill at fanning resentments is fundamental to his appeal for a large chunk of voters.
Going out on the road, where Trump shatters taboos and dodges accountability for his wild misrepresentations, offers him more than the chance to draw energy from those who love him.
The Tampa rally was a reminder that Trump -- the man, the President and his entire political project -- can be sustained only with the anger, the adulation and the chance to tear at the nation's most irritated political divides that he can find only in a campaign context.
https://www.cnn.com/2018/08/01/politics/donald-trump-midterm-elections-2020-tampa-rally/index.html
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