Thumbs up…Donald Trump basks in the glory of his victory.

World of Politics with Harry McGee

There’s usually an avalanche of stuff to read in the days after a US election, but this time it’s positively Himalyan. Donald Trump’s election immediately sparked street protests in American cities – in contrast to the reaction of his opponents who have been numbed with disbelief.

It’s like a boxer who’s been floored by a haymaker staggering back unsteadily to their feet, putting the fists up as if ready to fight when you know their legs will buckle and give way any second.

Hillary supporters have been KO’d; it’s the end

For the rest of us, it’s like being part of the TV advert from some years back about a soft drank. We’ve been Tangoed by an orange person.

So why did it happen; why did the world get it so wrong?

Hindsight is a wonderful thing – but, on reflection, there have been a number of predominant themes.

The first one has been about the angry white working class men – even if, equally, lots of well-off white people in good jobs voted for Trump too.

They all voted viscerally. Like the Brexiteeers they hankered after an America that doesn’t exist anymore, that was predominantly white, socially conservative, and based on traditional industries.

The world has moved on. The rust belt can’t be buffed into gleaming chrome, just as the coal mines and ship-buildings can’t be returned to the North of England.

The new Americans who have come from developing and poor countries can’t be deported en masse, irrespective of Trump’s bombastic hyperbole.

Other big talking points: how the polls (and simplistic interpretation of them) got it so disastrously wrong again; how Trump’s campaign was the antithesis of everything that’s come before.

He did not have the money. His campaign was in disarray. His speeches were all over the place. He would not stay on messages.

When we found out he likes going straight for women’s crotches, it wasn’t the end of Donald, it was yet another notch on the Totem pole.

In the last few days of the campaign, Trump’s team banned him from Twitter in case he said anything more egregious than he said in the past. It didn’t make any difference.

If he had tweeted that Hillary was a witch who would ditch Air Force One in favour of a broomstick, or that he’s prefer Vladimir Putin in the White House than Barack Obama, it’s likely that another few votes in the electoral college would have gone his way.

For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.