''FIRST DAY OF THE WORLD(FIRST SUNRISE)''

''Mount Hikurangi'' peak is traditionally regarded as the first land in the world to catch the rays of the new day's sun, although this claim, like any such claim of its type, is open to interpretation. Certainly it is not true at any time of the year other than the Southern Hemisphere summer, as both Fiji and Tonga are to the east. In summer, however, because of the tilt of the Earth's axis, it does receive the sun's rays earlier than these places. It does not receive them earlier than the Chatham Islands (or, of course, Antarctica), however. This did not stop the mountain gaining world prominence in the celebrations for the new Millennium, However the mountain is "recognised and accepted as the first point on the mainland to greet the morning sun". 

The traditional greeting of South Island iwi Ngāi Tahu to North Island visitors, "Haere mai, e te Rāwhiti!" (Welcome, O Sunrise!), references this fact. Celebrations by Ngāti Porou to commemorate the first dawn of the new millennium in 2000, including karakia led by Tamati and Amster Reedy, took place on the summit of the mountain. In addition, nine massive whakairo depicting Māui's story and his whānau were erected on the mountain as part of the celebrations.They were carved under Derek Lardelli's guidance by students from Toihoukura, the Eastern Institute of Technology's School of Māori Visual Arts. 

The summit of Mount Hikurangi is the northernmost place where New Zealand's alpine vegetation can be seen. Among the alpine shrubs and delicate herbs found there are large buttercups , and prickly wild SpaniardsMount Hikurangi is about 130 km north of Gisborne by road. 

Visitors to the mountain are asked to contact Te Rūnanga o Ngāti Porou before arriving, as the track crosses their private land, which is sometimes closed for short periods for cultural or farming reasons.

While there is no public vehicle or bicycle access beyond the car park near the bottom, four x four tours to the carvings can be organised through Te Rūnanga o Ngati Porou, who also offer a summit guide and an overnight guide. From the car park, it is about a 7-hour walk to the summit. There is a hut for public use 4–5 hours up the mountain, but visitors must bring their own cooker and water. Bookings for the hut are also made through Te Rūnanga o Ngāti Porou. Visitors are advised to be cautious of the mountain's unpredictable weather, and to bring clothing suitable for all weather conditions. 

“WORLD BLACK FRIDAY HISTORY”

                                    

Black Friday, the day after Thanks giving, is regarded by many as the beginning of the Christmas shopping season. While not a federal holiday, several states observe the day after Thanksgiving as a holiday, which means many state and school employees have the day off. Therefore, the number of potential shoppers greatly increases.

In fact, since 2005, Black Friday has been the busiest shopping day of the year. With retailers extending their hours and deals every year, the crowds and chaos show no signs of decreasing. Here's a look at the history and evolution of Black Friday. 

Though retailers wanted a holiday shopping season that lasted longer than 24 days before Christmas, none wanted to break the tradition of waiting until after Thanksgiving to advertise their reduced holiday prices. FDR, trying to end the country’s depression by stimulating spending, agreed to the idea and changed the date of the holiday. On December 26, 1941, Congress passed a law setting the fourth Thursday in November as the official date of the Thanksgiving holiday.

Black Friday is the day following Thanks giving Day in the United States (the fourth Thursday of November). Since 1932, it has been regarded as the beginning of the Christmas shopping season in the U.S., and most major retailers open very early (and more recently during overnight hours) and offer promotional sales. Black Friday is not an official holiday, but California and some other states observe "The Day After Thanksgiving" as a holiday for state government employees, sometimes in lieu of another federal holiday such as Columbus Day. 

Many non-retail employees and schools have both Thanksgiving and the following Friday off, which, along with the following regular weekend, makes it a four-day weekend, thereby increasing the number of potential shoppers. 

It has routinely been the busiest shopping day of the year since 2005, although news reports, which at that time were inaccurate, have described it as the busiest shopping day of the year for a much longer period of time. Similar stories resurface year upon year at this time, portraying hysteria and shortage of stock, creating a state of positive feedback.

In 2014, spending volume on Black Friday fell for the first time since the 2008 recession. $50.9 billion was spent during the 4-day Black Friday weekend, down 11% from the previous year. However, the U.S. economy was not in a recession. Christmas creep has been cited as a factor in the diminishing importance of Black Friday, as many retailers now spread out their promotions over the entire months of November and December rather than concentrate them on a single shopping day or weekend.

The earliest evidence of the phrase Black Friday applied to the day after Thanksgiving in a shopping context suggests that the term originated in Philadelphia, where it was used to describe the heavy and disruptive pedestrian and vehicle traffic that would occur on the day after Thanksgiving. This usage dates to at least 1961. More than twenty years later, as the phrase became more widespread, a popular explanation became that this day represented the point in the year when retailers begin to turn a profit, thus going from being "in the red" to being "in the black".

For many years, it was common for retailers to open at 6:00 a.m., but in the late 2000s many had crept to 5:00 or 4:00. This was taken to a new extreme in 2011, when several retailers (including Target, Kohl's, Macy's, Best Buy, and Bealls) opened at midnight for the first time. In 2012, Walmart and several other retailers announced that they would open most of their stores at 8:00 p.m. on Thanksgiving Day, prompting calls for a walkout among some workers. In 2014, stores such as JC Penney, Best Buy, and Radio Shack opened at 5:00 PM on Thanksgiving Day while stores such as Target, Walmart, Belk, and Sears opened at 6:00 PM on Thanksgiving Day. Three states, Rhode Island, Maine, and Massachusetts, prohibit large supermarkets, big box stores, and department stores from opening on Thanksgiving, due to blue laws.

Abraham Lincoln made Thanksgiving an official national holiday during the Civil War, establishing it as the final Thursday in November – a designation that lasted for 70 years. But in 1939, for the second time in six years, the last Thursday in November fell on the 30th. Distraught over a shorter Christmas shopping season, retailers approached President Franklin D. Roosevelt and asked him to change the date.

''JOURNEY FROM ZERO TO BILLIONAIRE(WORLD FAMOUS PERSONALTIES)''

1: BILL GATES(Microsoft founder)::

Bill Gates grew up in an upper middle-class family with two sisters: Kristianne, who is older, and Libby, who is younger. Their father, William H. Gates Sr., was a promising, if somewhat shy, law student when he met his future wife, Mary Maxwell. She was an athletic, outgoing student at the University of Washington, actively involved in student affairs and leadership. The Gates family atmosphere was warm and close, and all three children were encouraged to be competitive and strive for excellence. Bill showed early signs of competitiveness when he coordinated family athletic games at their summer house on Puget Sound. He also relished in playing board games (Risk was his favorite) and excelled at Monopoly.

It was at Lakeside School that Bill me PAUL ALLEN, who was two years his senior. The two became fast friends, bonding over their common enthusiasm for computers, even though they were very different people. Allen was more reserved and shy. Bill was feisty and at times combative. Regardless of their differences, they both spent much of their free time together working on programs. Occasionally, they disagreed and would clash over who was right or who should run the computer lab. On one occasion, their argument escalated to the point where Allen banned Gates from the computer lab. On another occasion, Gates and Allen had their school computer privileges revoked for taking advantage of software glitches to obtain free computer time from the company that provided the computers. After their probation, they were allowed back in the computer lab when they offered to debug the program. During this time, Gates developed a payroll program for the computer company the boys hacked into and a scheduling program for the school.

In 1970, at the age of 15, Bill Gates went into business with his pal, Paul Allen. They developed "Traf-o-Data," a computer program that monitored traffic patterns in Seattle, and netted $20,000 for their efforts. Gates and Allen wanted to start their own company, but Gates's parents wanted him to finish school and go on to college where they hoped he would work to become a lawyer.

Bill Gates graduated from Lakeside in 1973. He scored 1590 out of 1600 on the college SAT test, a feat of intellectual achievement that for several years he boasted about when introducing himself to new people.

Though their rivalry is legend, Microsoft and Apple shared many of their early innovations. In 1981 Apple invited Microsoft to help develop software for Macintosh computers. Some developers were involved in both Microsoft development and the development of Microsoft applications for Macintosh. The collaboration could be seen in some shared names between the Microsoft and Macintosh systems. 

2:LARRY ELLISON(Oracle founder)::

Larry Ellison was born in New York City to an unwed Jewish mother. His father was an Italian American US Air Force pilot. Ellison contracted pneumonia when he was nine months old and his mother gave him to her aunt and uncle for adoption. His adoptive mother was warm and loving, while his adoptive father was unsupportive and distant.

He was a bright but inattentive student. He left the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign after his second year without taking his final exams because his adoptive mother had just died. Later, he attended the University of Chicago for one term, where he first encountered computer design. In 1966, aged 22, he moved to northern California.

In 1977, he founded Software Development Laboratories (SDL) with two partners and an investment of $2,000. In 1982, the company became Oracle Systems Corporation after its flagship product, the Oracle database. Currently, Ellison owns stakes in Salesforce.com, NetSuite, Quark Biotechnology Inc. and Astex Pharmaceuticals. In September 2011, Ellison was listed on the Forbes List of Billionaires as the fifth richest man in the world. Ellison is still the third richest American, with a net worth of about $36.5 billion.

3: LI KA-SHING(Entrepenure)::

This Hong Kong business magnate, investor, and philanthropist is the richest person in Asia, with a net worth of $31.9 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, as of April 16,2014.

4: INGVAR KAMPRAD(Ikea founder)::

Kamprad began to develop a business as a young boy, selling matches to neighbors from his bicycle. He found that he could buy matches in bulk very cheaply from Stockholm, sell them individually at a low price, and still make a good profit. From matches, he expanded to selling fish, Christmas tree decorations, seeds, and later ballpoint pens and pencils. When Kamprad was 17, his father gave him a cash reward for succeeding in his studies.

IKEA was founded in 1943 at Kamprad's uncle Ernst's kitchen table.In 1948, Kamprad diversified his portfolio, adding furniture. His business was mostly mail-order.The acronym IKEA is made up of the initials of his name (Ingvar Kamprad) plus those of Elmtaryd, the family farm where he was born, and the nearby village Agunnaryd.

In June 2013, Kamprad resigned from the board of Inter IKEA Holding SA and his youngest son Mathias Kamprad replaced Per Ludvigsson as the chairman of the holding company. Following his decision to step down, the then-87-year-old founder explained, ”I see this as a good time for me to leave the board of Inter IKEA Group. By that we are also taking another step in the generation shift that has been ongoing for some years.” Mathias and his two older brothers, who also have leadership roles at IKEA, work on the corporation's overall vision and long-term strategy.

5: STEVE JOBS(Apple inventor)::

The American businessman and technology visionary who is best known as the co-founder, chairman, and chief executive officer of Apple Inc, was born on February 24, 1955. His parents were two University of Wisconsin graduate students, Joanne Carole Schieble and Syrian-born Abdulfattah Jandali. They were both unmarried at the time. Jandali, who was teaching in Wisconsin when Steve was born, said he had no choice but to put the baby up for adoption because his girlfriend's family objected to their relationship.

Jobs's youth was riddled with frustrations over formal schooling. At Monta Loma Elementary school in Mountain View, he was a prankster whose fourth-grade teacher needed to bribe him to study. Jobs tested so well, however, that administrators wanted to skip him ahead to high school—a proposal his parents declined. Jobs then attended Cupertino Junior High and Homestead High School in Cupertino, California. During the following years Jobs met Bill Fernandez and Steve Wozniak, a computer whiz kid.

Following high school graduation in 1972, Jobs enrolled at Reed College in Portland, Oregon. Reed was an expensive college which Paul and Clara could ill afford. They were spending much of their life savings on their son's higher education. Jobs dropped out of college after six months and spent the next 18 months dropping in on creative classes, including a course on calligraphy. He continued auditing classes at Reed while sleeping on the floor in friends' dorm rooms, returning Coke bottles for food money, and getting weekly free meals at the local Hare Krishna temple

In 1976, Wozniak invented the Apple I computer. Jobs, Wozniak, and Ronald Wayne, an electronics industry worker, founded Apple computer in the garage of Jobs's parents in order to sell it. They received funding from a then-semi-retired Intel product-marketing manager and engineer Mike Markkula.

Jobs died at his California home around 3 p.m. on October 5, 2011, due to complications from a relapse of his previously treated pancreatic cancer.

He was born in Guangdong province, China. After his father’s death, he was forced to leave school to support his family before he turned 15. He found work at a plastics trading company where he laboured 16 hours a day. After years of back-breaking work, he was able to start his own company, Cheung Kong Industries.

''TOP TEN RICHEST PERSONS OF THE WORLD IN 2016''

            ''Top ten forbes of the world ''

The list has been published annually in March since 1987.
Microsoft founder Bill Gates has topped the list 17 of the past 22 years, including the 2016 list.In 2015, there was a record of 1,826 people on the list that included a record 290 newcomers with 71 from China, 57 from the US, 28 from India and Germany with 23. People under 40 had 46 join the list. A record of 197 women were on the list. The average net worth of the listed came in at US$3.86 billion, down US$60 million from 2014. Added together, the total net worth for 2015's billionaires was US$7.1 trillion, up from US$6.4 trillion in 2014.

1::Bill gates total worth $75.0 billion

2::Omancio Ortega worth $67.0 billion

3::Warren buffett worth $60.8 billion

4::Carlos slim total worth $50.0 billion

4::Jeff bezos total worth $45.2 billion

5::Mark Zuckerberg total worth $44.6 billion.

6::Larry Ellison total worth $43.6 billion

7::Michael Bloomberg total worth $75.0

 billion.

8::Charles Koch total worth $40.0 billion

9::David Koch total worth $39.6 billion

10::Liliane Bettencourt total worth $36.1 billion

The United States has the largest number of billionaires with 526. Russia went down to 88 from 111 in 2014. Russia is now placed behind China, Germany and India by the number dollar billionaires. Iceland has a billionaire Thor Bjorgolfsson in the list after a gap of five years. Guatemala has a billionaire, Mario Lopez Estrada, for the first time in its history. 

'' NATURAL FOODS WHICH BOOST HUMAN IMMUNE(increases white blood cells) SYSTEM BETTER''

‘’Natural Foods which boost human immune system(white blood cells) better ‘’

GARLIC:

It seems as if garlic shows up on every “top 10” healthy list, doesn’t it? Well, there are plenty of good reasons why. Garlic promotes the ability of white blood cells to fight off the bad guys and stimulates other immune cells into action.

A study in 2002 showed that when rats were fed garlic, they had significant increases in their overall white blood cell count. The properties in garlic that seem to improve the immune system lie in its sulfur compounds such as sulfides and alllicin.

Garlic is also an antioxidant that cuts down on the build-up of free radicals in the blood. Cultures that have garlic rich foods have lower rates of intestinal cancers.

Yogurt:

First off, let us not forget that yogurt comes from milk. So yogurt eaters will get a dose of animal protein (about 9 grams per 6-ounce serving), plus several other nutrients found in dairy foods, like calcium, vitamin B-2, vitamin B-12, potassium, and magnesium.

A morning dose of yogurt can help keep your immune system strong.

It contains probiotics – which are essentially good bacteria – that help boost your immune system.

And, it also helps support healthy gut flow, Ms Moss said.

Nearly 70 to 80 per cent of your immune system resides in your gut, according to the nutritionist.

‘You actually have to have a really good, balanced gut to have the most fighting power,’ she explained.

Because when bacterial imbalance occurs in the gut, it can throw your system out of whack.

Walnuts:

Researchers are convinced—more than ever before—about the nutritional benefits of walnuts when consumed in whole form, including the skin. We now know that approximately 90% of the phenols in walnuts are found in the skin, including key phenolic acids, tannins, and flavonoids. Some websites will encourage you to remove the walnut skin—that whitish, sometimes waxy, sometimes flaky, outermost part of shelled walnuts. There can be slight bitterness to this skin, and that's often the reason that websites give for removing it. However, we encourage you not to remove this phenol-rich portion.

The form of vitamin E found in walnuts is somewhat unusual, and particularly beneficial. Instead of having most of its vitamin E present in the alpha-tocopherol form, walnuts provide an unusually high level of vitamin E in the form of gamma-tocopherol. Particularly in studies on the cardiovascular health of men, this gamma-tocopherol form of vitamin E has been found to provide significant protection from heart problems.

Helps weight loss 

Induces sleep

Great for your hair

Prevents heart disease 

Prevents diabetes

Boosts your sperm quality

Makes your skin glow

Prevents pancreatic cancer

Great for pregnant women

Reduces breast cancer risk

Bunch of Bnanas:

Bananas are among the most widely consumed fruits on the planet and, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Americans' favourite fresh fruit. The curvy yellow fruits are high in "potassium and pectin, a form of fiber," said Laura Flores, a San Diego-based nutritionist. They can also be a good way to get magnesium and vitamins C and B6. "Bananas are high in antioxidants, which can provide protection from free radicals, which we come into contact with every day, from the sunlight to the lotion you put on your skin,"

Nutrition Facts

Serving size:

1 medium banana

(4.5 oz / 126 g

Calories 110

Calories from Fat 0

High Fiber Content

bananas can lower risk of both cardiovascular disease (CVD) and coronary heart disease (CHD).

supporting digestion and helping in building up metabolism.

Banana is loaded with essential vitaminsand minerals such as potassium, calcium, manganese, magnesium, iron, folate, niacin, riboflavin, and B6.

The high content of potassium in bananas makes it a super fruit.

Due to the high iron content in bananas, they are good for those suffering from anaemia.

Almond:

Botanically, they are the fruits obtained from medium size tree belonging to the family of Rosaceae, in the genus: Prunus. The plant is a deciduous tree, probably originated mineral-rich West-Asian mountain ranges that provide fertile conditions favorable for their growth. In recent years, it is being cultivated in many regions of the world, including the USA, as an important commercial crop.

Scientific name: Prunus dulcis

Almond nuts are rich sources of vitamins, and minerals and packed with numerous health promoting phyto-chemicals. These nuts compose of well-balanced food principles that are essential for optimum health and wellness.

Almonds are one of the complete sources of energy as well as nutrients. The nuts, especially, are rich in mono-unsaturated fatty acids like oleic, and palmitoleic acids that help in lowering LDL or "bad cholesterol" and increasing HDL or "good cholesterol" in the human body. Research studies suggest that Mediterranean diet, which is excellent in monounsaturated fatty acids, help to prevent coronary artery disease and strokes by favoring healthy blood lipid profile.

The nuts are packed with many important B-complex groups of vitamins such as riboflavin, niacin, thiamin, pantothenic acid, vitamin B-6, and folates. Altogether, these vitamins work as co-factors for enzymes during cellular substrate metabolism inside the human body.

Furthermore, almonds are also an incredible source of minerals such as manganese, potassium, calcium, iron, magnesium, zinc, and selenium.

.

'' 33 Most interesting facts of living things everybody must know''

1:It is impossible to lick your elbow.

2:A crocodile can't stick it's tongue out.


3:A shrimp's heart is in it's head.


4:People say "Bless you" when you. sneeze because when you sneeze,your heart stops for a mili-second.


5:In a study of 200,000 ostriches over a period of 80 years, no one reported a single case where an ostrich buried its head in the sand.


6:It is physically impossible for pigs to look up into the sky.


7:A pregnant goldfish is called a twit.


8:More than 50% of the people in the world have never made or received a telephone call.


9:Rats and horses can't vomit.


10:If you sneeze too hard, you can fracture a rib. If you try to suppress a sneeze, you can rupture a blood vessel in your head or neck and die.


11:If you keep your eyes open by force when you sneeze, you might pop an eyeball out.


12:Rats multiply so quickly that in 18 months, two rats could have over a million descendants.


13:Wearing headphones for just an hour will increase the bacteria in your ear by 700 times.


14:In every episode of Seinfeld there is a Superman somewhere.


15:The cigarette lighter was invented before the match.


16:Thirty-five percent of the people who use personal ads for dating are already married.


17:A duck's quack doesn't echo, and no one knows why.


18:23% of all photocopier faults worldwide are caused by people sitting on them and photocopying their butts.


19:In the course of an average lifetime you will, while sleeping, eat 70 assorted insects and 10 spiders.


20:Most lipstick contains fish scales.Like fingerprints, everyone's tongue print is different.


21:Over 75% of people who read this will try to lick their elbow.


22:A crocodile can't move its tongue and cannot chew.


23:Its digestive juices are so strong that it can digest a steel nail.

24:Money notes are not made from paper, they are made mostly from a special blend of cotton and linen.



25:In 1932, when a shortage of cash occurred in Tenino, Washington, USA, notes were made out of wood for a brief period.


26:The Grammy Awards were introduced to counter the threat of rock music.
In the late 1950s, a group of record executives were alarmed by the explosive success of rock ‘n roll, considering it a threat to "quality" music.


27:Tea is said to have been discovered in 

28:37 BC by a Chinese emperor when some tea leaves accidentally blew into a pot of boiling water. The tea bag was introduced in 1908 by Thomas Sullivan of New York.


29:Over the last 150 years the average height of people in industrialised nations has increased 10 cm (about 4 inches).  30:In the 19th century, American men were the tallest in the world, averaging 1,71m (5'6"). Today, the average height for American men is 1,75m (5'7"), compared to 1,77 (5'8") for Swedes, and 1,78 (5'8.5") for the Dutch. The tallest nation in the world is the Watusis of Burundi.


31:In 1955 the richest woman in the world was Mrs Hetty Green Wilks, who left an estate of $95 million in a will that was found in a tin box with four pieces of soap.   32:Queen Elizabeth of Britain and Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands count under the 10 wealthiest women in the world.
31:Joseph Niepce developed the world's first photographic image in 1827. Thomas Edison and W K L Dickson introduced the film camera in 1894. But the first projection of an image on a screen was made by a German priest. 

33: In 1646, Athanasius Kircher used a candle or oil lamp to project hand-painted images onto a white screen.

''United States elections history''

The election of President and Vice President of the United States is, technically, an indirect election in which citizens of the United States who are registered to vote in one of the fifty states or Washington, D.C. cast ballots for members of the U.S. Electoral College, known as electors. These electors then in turn cast direct votes, known as electoral votes, in their respective state capitals for President and Vice President. Each of the states casts as many electoral votes as the total number of Senators and House Representatives in Congress, while Washington, D.C. is represented by the same number of votes as the lowest-represented state, currently three.

 In modern times, almost all electors are pledged to vote for a particular presidential candidate, thus the results of the election can generally be determined based on the state-by-state popular vote. The candidate who receives an absolute majority of electoral votes for President or Vice President is then elected to that office. If no candidate receives an absolute majority for President, the House of Representatives chooses the President; if no candidate receives a majority for Vice President, then the Senate chooses the Vice President.

These presidential elections occur quadrennial. Registered voters cast their ballots on Election Day, which since 1845 has been the Tuesday after the first Monday in November, coinciding with the general elections of various other federal, state, and local races. The Electoral College electors then schedule to formally cast their electoral votes in mid-December at their respective state capitals. Congress then certify the results in early January, and the presidential term begins on Inauguration Day, which since the passage of the Twentieth Amendment has been set at January 20.

The Electoral College and its procedure is established in the U.S. Constitution by Article II, Section 1, Clauses 2 and 4; and the Twelfth Amendment (which replaced Clause 3 after it was ratified in 1804). Under Article II, Section 1, Clause 2, the manner for choosing electors is determined by each state legislature, not directly by the federal government. Originally, many state legislatures selected their electors directly instead of using any form of popular vote, but the political parties in the various states currently conduct their own separate elections to help choose their slate of electors. The Twenty-third Amendment, ratified in 1961, then granted electoral votes to Washington, D.C. Electors can also technically vote for anyone, but unplugged electors or faithless electors have since been rare in modern times.

The nomination process, consisting of the primary elections and caucuses and the nominating conventions, was never specified in the Constitution, and was instead developed over time by the states and the political parties. The primary elections are staggered generally between January and June before the general election in November, while the nominating conventions are held in the summer. This too is also an indirect election process, where voters from each U.S. state and Washington, D.C., as well as those in U.S. territories, cast ballots for a slate of delegates to a political party's nominating convention, who then in turn elect their party's presidential nominee. Each party's presidential nominee or the convention may then choose a vice presidential running mate to join with him or her on the same ticket, and this choice is often rubber-stamped by the conventions, depending on that convention's rules. Because of changes to national campaign finance laws since the 1970s regarding the disclosure of contributions for federal campaigns, presidential candidates from the major political parties usually declare their intentions to run as early as the spring of the previous calendar year before the election (almost 18 months before Inauguration Day).

US ELECTIONS 2016 BIG UPSET MYSTERY .

'' Traditional American elections unbelievable''. 

Trump has eagerly led a mass abandonment of civility and reason, breached social proprieties and political protocols, and normalised prejudice and brazen dishonesty.

The nation is now so divided that Democrats and Republicans are unable to on what constitutes factual reality. Dark rhetoric implying violent retribution against “certain groups” courses through the air. How did it come to this? When historians look back at this election what will they make of of the Trump campaign and its legacy? Will it be remembered as a one-off, or will they pronounce him an agent of a revolution in the Republican Party – or indeed, in America at large?

It’s over: Donald Trump will be the 45th president of the United States. The election that elevated him to this office has been brutal, ugly and bizarre. It has poisoned the well of American democracy, and the toxins it has introduced are unlikely to disperse anytime soon.

 truth, the sickness this election has brought to the surface has been brewing for a long time. Trump is a symptom, not just a pathogen. He has shown a genius for channelling the grievances and insecurities of those disaffected by economic and social changes in the US – primarily, though not solely, working-class whites. With this uncanny skill, he has magnified a form of identity politics the Republicans have long been using to appease and mobilise their base.

This experiment in political engineering began in earnest back in the early 1990s. It was until recently an insidious thing, usually advanced via dog-whistle tactics. Trump has picked it up and turned into a blunt instrument as he doubled down on his pursuit of a core white vote and eschewed any serious appeals to minorities.

But on a structural level, Trump’s victory is every bit of a piece with the way American politics now works. There’s abundant evidence that the choices of the US electorate are increasingly shaped by demographics, but there are underlying cultural dynamics at work too. This picture of extreme divisions is why getting out the core vote, rather than changing wavering voters’ minds with earnest appeals, is the ultimate device for winning an election.

The resulting focus on polarised core groups has exacerbated the crippling polarisation that wracks the US today – and the increasingly intense contempt in which Democrats and Republicans hold each other. Again, Trump did not create this divisive partisanship, but he has eagerly inflamed and manipulated it to his own ends.

None of this means he will in fact serve the interests of the people who’ve elected him. Trump embodies that most American of American archetypes: the huckster or “confidence man”, a figure with a long history in American culture, dating from at least the early 19th century. He is a charlatan whose schemes invariably fail. In the end he skips town, leaving those he has scammed to learn their lesson.

The confidence man is often a comic figure. He crops up in Herman Melville and Mark Twain’s satirical depictions of a rampantly commercial republic. Sometimes he’s no more than a fast-talking, comic disrupter – think Sergeant Bilko or even the. 

But the confidence man comes in darker manifestations too. He not only plays with other people’s trust, he abuses it to rob or demean them. Tricksters like Trump tell people what they want to hear, articulate desires not commonly expressed, and capitalise on their gullibility.

The Trump campaign was just such a trick. The disaffected and angry among the American electorate are Trump’s mark, his suckers. All he asked was that they trust him.

To his supporters, enraged by a dishonest, manipulative “Washington”, Trump “tells it like it is”. Many of them have lost faith in public institutions, and despise the country’s elites – and yet, in their search for an honest champion, they have gladly invested their confidence in Trump.

Never mind the gridlock that has dogged the government during the Obama administration – what’s coming now will be deeply ugly. Trump’s campaign has radically upped the ante for distemper and dysfunction. The Republicans, who apparently still hold both the House and the Senate, will continue to throw red meat to Trump’s angry base. They might do well to recall Trump’s own idea: “You’ll have to have riots to go back to where we used to be, when America was gre. 

Trump is an opportunist, not an ideologue – and he certainly isn’t driven by deep political convictions. Some claim he didn’t actually intend to make a protracted and successful run for the presidency, that he was seeking to promote his brand on the cheap, and that his ego simply took over once he was hijacked by his own success. Perhaps – but this overlooks the fact that he several times considered a tilt at the presidency, and it probably overstates just how much his campaign relied on improvisation and happenstance rather than something genuinely knowing.What’s the lesson of all this? The historians will one day be able to offer a longer view on that one. Right now, I suggest that Trump’s victory should remind us just how fragile the social and political order we take for granted is – and how quickly an advanced democracy can be dragged into barbarism. 

POLITICO

• PRO
  • Already a Pro?
  • Why Go Pro?
• Search
• Login
  • Account Details
  • Log In
• U.S. Edition
  • Europe Edition
  • POLITICO Media
  • POLITICO Florida
  • POLITICO New Jersey
  • POLITICO New York

Menu

Sections

Events

Multimedia

Blogs & Colu

Facebook

• Twitter
• Goo

Obama hits two-year popularity high on eve of election. 

On his last day of barnstorming to preserve his legacy, President Barack Obama is approaching peak popularity.

Obama’s approval rating hit 56 percent in Gallup’s tracking poll on Monday, a reminder of his power as a surrogate as he travels to Michigan, New Hampshire and Pennsylvania to drum up the vote for Hillary Clinton. It’s rare for two-term president to be in such high demand on the trail, and that level of popularity has been rare in Obama’s tenure. He last hit it in October 2014, and the only time it’s been higher in Gallup’s survey was early in his first term. Other polls over the past month have shownsimilarly high ratings – all vastly better than those for either Clinton or Donald Trump.

“Whatever credibility I've earned after eight years as president, I am asking you to trust me on this one,” Obama said on Monday in his appeal for Clinton at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. It’s a pitch his numbers show he can safely make.

En route to Michigan, White House press secretary Josh Earnest told reporters that Obama’s “aggressive schedule” on the day before the election is a bid to fight complacency among his own hardcore supporters.

"He's urging people not to give into the temptation to not be as focused on this election just because he's not on the ballot,” Earnest said. “As you've heard him say many times, his agenda, his legacy is on the ballot.”

If Obama were on the ballot, he’d fare much better against Trump, according to a Bloomberg poll out Monday that showed him beating the Republican real estate mogul by 12 percentage points. That’s a big jump over the 4-point edge that Clinton is gripping to in national polls on the eve of the election.

Obama contrasts Clinton, Trump approach to race relations

By CRISTIANO LIMA

Then again, since Obama hasn’t been on the ballot, there hasn’t been the same focus on his persistent weak spots, like the carnage in Syria and spiking Obamacare premiums. While those matters have been issues, Trump and Clinton have mostly spent the waning days trading barbs over her emails and his misogyny.

That’s given Obama the space to take a broader, loftier view of the election.

"The greatest country in the world decides who its leader will be based on the preferences of the people,” Earnest said, “and that's a rather profound thing, when you consider how we've been sort of focused on polling numbers and charges and counter charges and counter charges between the campaigns."

Obama asked the cheering, youthful crowd of 9,000 to indulge him as he began his remarks on Monday.

“I’m a little sentimental,” Obama said. “This is gonna be my last – probably my last day of campaigning, for awhile.”

Joining him for that last day are longtime senior aides who don’t usually go on such trips, including Brian Deese (who went from helping with the auto bailout, which is key to Obama’s “credibility” in Michigan, to shepherding the president’s climate agenda) and national security adviser Susan Rice. Senior adviser Valerie Jarrett and political director David Simas were also along for the ride.

Earnest said that Obama is “100 percent focused” on the election. But after it’s over, he’ll have the chance to try to drive his approvals up even higher.

“There’ll be time for him to think and talk a little bit more about his own presidency and his own perspective on the last eight years in two months that remain in his own presidency,” Earnest said. “There’ll be plenty of time for that.”