In 2016, I was one of the fools who thought people wouldn’t vote for Donald Trump. As I explained to readers before the Republican primaries, “The electorate generally just wants a leader who appears sane, which is why Republicans almost certainly won’t nominate Trump.” I was taking my lead from so-called experts. “If you want to know the future,” I wrote in May that year, “the best forecasters are betting markets . . . The Oddschecker website, which compares odds offered by different bookmakers, indicates a chance of just over one in four that Brits will opt for Brexit. The chances of Trump becoming American president or Marine Le Pen French president are judged a tad smaller.”
2016年，我是那些認爲人們不會投票給唐納•川普(Donald Trump)的傻瓜之一。正如我在共和黨初選前向讀者解釋的那樣，「選民通常只想要一個看起來理智的領導人，這就是爲什麼共和黨幾乎肯定不會提名川普。」我聽從了所謂專家的建議。「如果你想知道未來，」我在那年5月寫道，「最好的預測者是博彩市場……Oddschecker網站比較了不同博彩公司提供的賠率，顯示英國人選擇退歐的機會略高於四分之一。川普成爲美國總統或馬琳•勒龐(Marine Le Pen)成爲法國總統的機會被認爲稍微小一些。」