This one trope helped get both Trump and Mamdani elected.
For what it’s worth, it also got me to run up a mountain.
NOTE: I post weekly rhetorical pieces in my free Substack newsletter. Only a few end up here.
Rhetorical rule #1: Never marry a Democratic socialist and Donald J. Trump in a single sentence.
Sorry.
But the fact is, both candidates used a particular rhetorical device to win over voters at a time when the electorate was in a terrible mood. That device—the greatest, most mesmerizing, The One Big Beautiful Trope—is the hyperbole.
The word comes from the Greek meaning “throw beyond.” The political hyperbole throws beyond policy, budgets, statistics, compromises—beyond even reasonable possibility. It literally promises the moon.
Trump’s moonshot promises included ending inflation, slashing electricity bills by 50%, bringing the price of gas below $2, and cutting the cost of a home in half, all on “day one.”
Zohran Mamdani—who came out of practically nowhere to dominate the Democratic mayoral primary in New York—promised universal childcare, free buses, rent freezes, and city-owned groceries. While he neglected to say he planned all that on his first day as mayor, no New Yorker in her right mind thinks he could possibly achieve all those promises.
Charismatic hyperbolist Zohran Mamdani. (I photoshopped this image all by my un-AI-aided self.)
But a great many voters believe he could do some.
This is the genius of the hyperbole: It leads to a glorious kind of failure. Meanwhile, the trope throws beyond the unhappy present, in the right (or left) direction. Of course Trump won’t cut the cost of housing in half. But that promise made people believe that housing might be made more affordable. It’s extremely unlikely that Mamdani will magically provide childcare for every kid in New York; but maybe he can expand childcare. He’s throwing in the proper direction, and voters believe he will chase after that goal.
Every hyperbole of ambition contains a hidden, winking promise to fail up. Falling short of the goal still counts as a triumph. Cheaper, faster buses instead of free fast buses? Bravo! Gas at $2.50 a gallon rather than the promised $1.99? Maga-mazing!
Every hyperbole of ambition contains a hidden, winking promise to fail up.
In my next book, which definitely will sell in the millions on day one (July 15), I ginned up a capital-H hyperbole of my own: to become the first person over 50 to “run his age” up a classic mountain, reaching the top in fewer minutes than I was old in years. When I started, I was suffering from a debilitating hip problem. If I came short of my big, beautiful, silly goal, I still would fail up—literally in this case. I’d go from limping to running, and from running to running up a mountain, however slowly.
Moderates in both political parties consistently fail to understand the power of hyperbole. They flame the renegade candidates’ ballooning promises as “unrealistic policies.” But that critique commits two classic rhetorical errors:
Most people don’t care about policy. They care about direction.
Impossibility is a feature, not a bug.
Free buses and half-price housing are way more concrete and sexier than Let’s win this! (Harris), Stronger Together (Clinton) and Reform, Prosperity, Peace (McCain). Sure, Make America Great Again is another dumb slogan. But it promises a direction, not a value. And it’s certainly not a policy.
Of course, hyperbole alone didn’t produce wins for Mamdani and Trump. Both New Yorkers campaigned against deeply unpopular parties, and they benefited from their opponents’ terribly run campaigns. Both gathered a core of passionate followers. Both gained political juju from triggering the moderates. And both benefited from the Democratic Party’s habit of blowing most of their budgets on television advertising—the twentieth-century equivalent of the torchlight parade. If only trains could be made great again; then they could hold state-of-the-art whistle stop tours!
Actually, I would love to see trains made great again. On day one.
