#23 Adam Tooze on 'Crashed: How a Decade of Financial Crises Changed the World' (Part 2)

Great interview. It's a bit of a side comment in the interview, however, I would take issue with the suggestion that there isn't "anti-New York sentiment in the American story." In the American context, it may not be disqualifying for a politician to be from New York. However, I would tend to view this as a net negative. The reasons for the resentment are complicated -- tied up in history and culture, regional and urban/rural differences. The nexus of media, financial, and political power in the U.S. is divided between NYC and DC, which is perhaps one difference between NYC and London. But I'm sure if we did a regional survey of attitudes towards "New York politicians" -- on balance the views would tend to be negative. Trump's case is unusual for a number of reasons. e.g. unlike most years, the GOP donor class failed to consolidate its support early behind one candidate; evangelical voters in the south and the west also coalesced around their own candidate. So Trump was able to make it through on the basis of a consistent plurality of support of around 35%-40% of the primary voters through the first half of the primary season. In the general election, Trump's NYC associations were obscured by the fact that his opponent was so closely identified with both NYC and Washington, DC. If Clinton had been matched up against almost any other Republican, other than Ted Cruz, she likely would have lost in part because of the NYC/DC negative perception factor. In Trump's case, if he had the misfortune of being matched up against pretty much any national Democratic politician from some place other than New York, I suspect he would have also lost. e.g. polling seemed to suggest this as well with respect to Biden / Sanders / Obama. Obviously gender bias was a factor in the 2016 general election in a manner that likely hurt Clinton's candidacy as well.

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