While I completely agree that Trump is merely a disgusting symptom of a systemic malaise, I fear the analysis presented in this article is too superficial. The hard fact is that representative democracy is without merit, being based upon premises that are wholly mistaken. Most people are ignorant and foolish; the idea that they will vote on the basis of policy (or even less likely, factual evidence) rather than on the basis of irrelevant elements ("yeah, I'd have a beer with that guy") is delightfully charming but entirely without basis in reality. We get Brexit, Trump, Modi, Bolsonaro, Duterte, Erdogan, Putin, et al because representative democracy is a perpetual train-wreck. Like communism, it could work if absolutely everything about human nature were completely different. Like communism, democracy is an unmitigated disaster in practice.