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Defying the Odds
Read the indicated chapters and answer the questions. Your questions or
answers should be either neatly hand written or typed. These will be going in your
“Gov is Fun” folder when completed. It is perfectly acceptable to write your answers
as a series of bullet points. Do not just simply copy from the book. I want to see your
own words to make sure you understood what you read.
Preface
1. (a) Identify the six critical assets of successful campaigns listed by the authors, and
(b) explain their arguments regarding Donald Trump’s deficiency.
a. Critical Assets: a record of public service, a professional, well-structured campaign
organization, money, political endorsements, favorable media, and support from intellectuals
and agenda-setters.
b. Deficiencies: Unlike every president before him. Donald Trump never held appointed or
elected office. Additionally, throughout the election, he was outspent by his opponents, and his
campaign lacked the professional organization of his rivals. His endorsements were few – by
political leaders, intellectuals, and newspapers. His media coverage, while ample, was mostly
negative.
2. On page ix, the authors argue, “Trump ran against the assets (or establishments)
that normally contribute to success, and he turned these deficiencies into
advantages.”
a. Four ways that Trump turned his shortcomings into advantages:
i. Claimed politicians don’t solve problems and just want favors.
ii. Didn’t have to act upon will of donor by self-financing his campaign.
iii. Ran against the media to build his support.
iv. Developed a relationship with his supporters instead of hiring professionals.
3. The authors examine “the numbers” of the presidential races throughout history.
Explain two of their findings.
a. Trumps’ proclaimed “landslide” in the Electoral College was an exaggeration.
b. President Bush is the only modern president to be elected even after losing populous vote.
Chapter 1 – Twenty-Four Years Later
1. On pages 1-4, the authors compare the “upside down and inside out” elections of
1992 and 2016. Explain the comparisons.
a. Comparisons:
i. Bill Clinton:
1. Used their personal lives into an advantage.
2. Their wins rallied Caucasian white-collar workers.
ii. Opposite Party of last president:
1. After the president holding the office for their 2 consecutive terms, trends
show it is almost as though the people want a change of party in the office
and as such the next president is usually that of the opposite party.
2. Define “outsiderism”, and summarize the outsider campaign of George Wallace.
Then select one of the following campaigns to summarize: Jesse Jackson, Pat
Buchannan or Toss Perot.
a. Outsiderism:
i. Ideology in which a thing, a person, or some sort of organizational group comes from
outside the usual cliques, such as the relative society, or some system.
b. George Wallace:
i. Ran an anti-civil rights campaign in 1968, the time when it became really popular to be
pro-civil rights after the Watts Rebellion of 1965 and the Civil Rights Act of 1964 with
the assassinations of Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcom X.
ii. Used this as a ploy to get people to vote out of emotion over rational logic.
3. Explain Trump’s views on affirmative action and “American exceptionalism”. Why
do the authors posit that Trump’s ideas “put him at odds with a major strain” of
conservatism and “appeal(ed) to ‘alt-right’ activists?
a. Trump’s views:
i. Affirmative Action
1. His view was to keep working systems as they are, as he did not want to mess
