US election 2016: Result shows it was the economy, stupid

People hold up a signs supporting Donald Trump at his election night event at the New York Hilton Midtown. Picture: Getty Images/AFP

There is a resounding message that echoes through the US election result: that the economic security of people trumps royalty and razzmatazz.

Hillary Clinton threw everything at her campaign — she could deliver two presidents, Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, whenever she wanted to — and call on Lady Gaga and Bruce Springsteen as warm-up acts.

But that was not enough to guarantee her a strong win.

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Whatever the result of the US poll — it is still too close to call — the fact that Donald Trump has taken the contest to the wire proves that in the end “it’s the economy, stupid”.

It was James Carville, the eccentric adviser to former president Bill Clinton, who first coined that phrase.

In fact he insisted that those words be plastered across the campaign headquarters when he helped Bill Clinton become president.

Hillary Clinton would have done well to have recalled the advice of her husband’s former adviser.

In some ways Donald Trump was the horror candidate from central casting — if Hollywood wanted to develop a candidate who was unelectable then Trump was the model.

He insulted almost every constituency possible.

He had a year-long war with Megyn Kelly from Fox News after suggesting that she had asked tough questions because she was having her period.

He insulted Latinos, he cast aspersions on African-Americans, he insulted Muslims, he offended US war veterans, including one of the country’s most senior Republicans, John McCain.

McCain’s mistake, Trump argued, was having got caught during war — which of course also insulted all those American veterans who had been captured by the Vietnamese or others.

The media focused on all of these sound-bites.

But they missed the message that Trump kept repeating between all these insults: that the economic future of Americans was being stolen.

Once, when I was based in Washington for The Australian, I travelled to Detroit for a conference.

Detroit had once been the engine room of the American century — the jewel in the crown of the nation’s car industry.

Driving through Detroit from the airport to the hotel was like travelling through a war zone.

As I checked in and asked the hotel staff where was a good place to go for dinner, I was surprised by the response of the staff: it was safer not to leave the hotel.

These types of no-go zones are repeated through America, desperate monuments to the grand era of a manufacturing powerhouse.

By attacking Bill Clinton’s NAFTA — the North American Free Trade Agreement — Trump was telling Americans that he would stop “exporting” jobs to low-wage countries.

He also played into a fear among Americans that their might and empire is fading as China takes supremacy.

Anyone who travels into the inner-city parts of major American cities these days can see the abandonment, the barrenness, the fear, the poverty.

Trump, of course, may not be able to do anything about this- it’s possible that globalisation dwarfs the power of any president.

But Trump connected to the real fears of Americans.

Fearful of becoming homeless or not being able to feed their children, millions of Americans were prepared to forgive Trump almost anything.

Hillary Clinton was able to draw on the royalty of politics and entertainment.

Her final rally was extraordinary in its star power — Michelle and Barack Obama, Bill Clinton, Gaga, Bon Jovi, Springsteen among others.

But for the unemployed parents who see no prospect of their children ever getting work all this mans nothing.

The Clinton royalty forgot this, if they ever knew it.