MANCHESTER, NEW HAMPSHIRE–It is somehow deeply satisfying that Donald Trump held his penultimate election rally in the same venue where he first publicly uttered the word "pussy," in reference to Ted Cruz.

Thousands of Trump supporters lined up hours in advance for access to Trump's Monday night event at the newly re-christened Southern New Hampshire University Arena. It was at the same place–then called the Verizon Wireless Arena–that a quietly confident Mitt Romney gathered 11,000 supporters for his final 2012 rally. The next day Romney would lose New Hampshire by six points.

The wait was long and cold, but very few people abandoned their posts. Three people dressed in orange prison suits wearing Hillary Clinton masks roamed the line encouragingly, while across the street, in what could be misinterpreted as an encouraging gesture, a pickup truck with a giant flat screen TV mounted in its bed continuously looped Don and Bill's Excellent Access Hollywood Adventure.

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Inside, the area was dimly lit, and vapor struggling aloft from strategically placed blocks of dry ice enhanced the impression of a second-rate hell. Trump has become overly proud of the fact that, unlike his opponent, he does not rely on entertainers to draw a crowd. Supporters were gifted instead with opening acts from Mike Pence, who draws his inspiration from God, and Rudy Giuliani, who appears to draw his from Grappa.

The stage was constructed so that Trump could gather his disciples directly at his feet. The crowd was well-primed, chanting "Lock Her Up!" but Trump had precious little fresh meat to throw them–no pending criminal charges, no righteous investigations. Instead, he gamely offered up the claim that he received the votes and endorsements of New England Patriots Coach Bill Belichick and star QB Tom Brady.

Oddly, the crowd began to disperse before Trump even finished speaking. First by ones and twos, and then in a steady stream they made for the exit doors, as if they were at a hockey game and the Manchester Monarchs (RIP) were down 7-2 in the third period. There were cars to be retrieved from parking lots, after all, and tomorrow was a work day.

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Win or lose–or, God forbid, draw–on Election Day, Trump has catalyzed something long neglected in the American psyche, something that will remain long after Trump hits his personal self-destruct button. Some of Trump's supporters are, as Hillary Clinton has rightly observed, truly deplorable. There are those one simply wants to ask, "So you kiss your mother with that mouth?" But there are others, many others, who were drawn into Trump's tractor beam by a particular type of longing. Out of the mouths of babes and the senile come great truths, and Giuliani may have identified it best Monday night when he introduced Trump by saying: "Nobody owns him. Nobody controls him. He's his own man."

Trump is the perfect fantasy superhero for people who are owned by banks and credit cards, time clocks and bosses; who are controlled by life and circumstance and the fecklessness of fate. People who have Trump's freedom to "tell you what he thinks," but only in the freedom of their backyards with a case of Bud and a Saturday afternoon to spin out into the summer dusk. People who need someplace to go. The question is, can the next president bring them all home?

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