The end confirms the sense of gravity and foreboding that has been the dominant mood of the speech.

His tone contrasted with what has become the dominant mood: never mind prudence, let the spending rip.

But the dominant mood was a lighter one.

This gives the stories powerful traction, but also makes the worlds that they construct relatively thin: colours, textures, weather and noise are rarely noted unless they reinforce the dominant mood.

The dominant mood among the political and media establishment was that such incidents happen.