posted
So Donald Trump is planning on running for President. He's all but announced already. The only reason he's waiting is that he doesn't want to screw NBC over by making them pull his show, which would be the case if he announces.
He was on the Today Show this morning, and he had a lot of good things to say. He's tied for second place among Republican potential candidates, and he's leading the Tea Party potentials.
For all of his faults, the guy knows business. He's more likely to be able to deal with the country's economic problems than Obama. As he pointed out, Obama doesn't know how to get people to work together. He didn't point out that Obama almost never compromises on anything, but it's true.
This is going to be a very interesting ride.
Posts: 12266 | Registered: Jul 2005
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posted
He's a joke candidate who's servicing his own ego and giving the media something to exclaim about. He's also a social liberal who's on his 4th way too young trophy wife, and even if the Tea Party can overlook that the rest of the Republican party won't.
This is kinda like when you thought Ron Paul had a chance in hell, Lisa.
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On one hand, at least with other candidates the ties to big business aren't so blatant and out in the open.
On the other hand, he's rich enough to not be beholden to anyone (theoretically).
I'd rather have Trump than Palin, though. But at this point, that's still a choice between two turds.
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quote:Originally posted by Lisa: For all of his faults, the guy knows business. He's more likely to be able to deal with the
Yes, he's the special kind of businessman it takes to succesfully bankrupt a casino.
What I'm really looking for in a president is someone who managed to waste loads of capital egregiously and get himself to be worth millions of dollars less than the average homeless person.
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Maybe a presidential campaign would finally get him to change his hairdo. That alone would be worth it.
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Lisa, this will sound like a shot but I really don't mean it that way. But reading your praise of Trump, it made me think that it's pretty impressive what people will overlook when someone says the kinds of things they like. Because I could be wrong, but if someone who wasn't saying a bunch of things you liked but nevertheless had identical business qualifications as Trump...well, I just very much doubt you'd be saying 'he knows business'.
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This is a bit more of a shot, because it's really a pretty silly remark you made: you're absolutely right that Obama almost never compromises. His base, for example, particularly from the campaign, is thrilled with the way he's absolutely stuck to his guns on issues across the board.
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On Trump: "The last thing this country needs is a showboat, I would hope we could get serious candidates who could shake things up by not saying provocative things, just by stating the truth of what's going on." - Glenn Beck
Man, if you're too out there for Glenn Beck...
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A joke candidate servicing his own ego polls second among republicans.
Good news for the republicans, though: if you understand polls beyond a superficial level, you know these polls might as well be considered a glorified name recognition test.
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Blayne Bradley
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posted
Trump would make a terrible president, I'm skeptical that he has any experience with the constitution or even views it with anything less than contempt as an obstacle to his own profits.
That and his blatant tea party pandering like asking for Obama's birth certificate despite it being a dead horse trope at this point makes me believe he lacks the substance to carry on a campaign based on the issues or public trust.
I still tentatively have high hopes for Mitt Romney (we both like Battlefield Earth!!!) as he has the same "business credentials" but less of the pompous baggage.
He even looks presidential. Trump looks like a banana republic dictator with a bad hair day.
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Birtherism is alive and well within the GOP ranks, and their 2012 nominee preferences tell a story about the difficulty Mitt Romney faces in trying to appeal to an electorate that's a whole lot further out there than he is.
Birthers make a majority among those voters who say they're likely to participate in a Republican primary next year. 51% say they don't think Barack Obama was born in the United States to just 28% who firmly believe that he was and 21% who are unsure. The GOP birther majority is a new development. The last time PPP tested this question nationally, in August of 2009, only 44% of Republicans said they thought Obama was born outside the country while 36% said that he definitely was born in the United States. If anything, birtherism is on the rise.
How does this impact Romney? Well, among the 49% of GOP primary voters who either think Obama was born in the United States or aren't sure, Romney's the first choice to be the 2012 nominee by a good amount, getting 23% to 16% for Mike Huckabee, 11% for Sarah Palin, and 10% for Newt Gingrich. But with the birther majority he's in a distant fourth place at 11%, with Mike Huckabee at 24%, Sarah Palin at 19%, and Newt Gingrich at 14% all ahead of him. That pushes him into a second place finish overall at 17% with Mike Huckabee again leading the way this month at 20%. Palin's third with 15%, followed by Gingrich at 12%, Ron Paul at 8%, Mitch Daniels and Tim Pawlenty at 4%, and John Thune at 1%.
There is really a remarkable divide in how the birther and non-birther wings of the GOP view Sarah Palin. With the birthers she is a beloved figure, scoring an 83/12 favorability rating. Non-birthers are almost evenly divided on her with 47% rating her positively and 40% unfavorably.
This is yet another poll where we find Palin with the highest favorability among Republican primary voters but still lagging in the horse race. 65% have a positive opinion of her compared to 58% for Huckabee and 55% for Romney and Gingrich. Her problem is that even though they like her, few GOP voters think Palin's qualified to be President. Asked whether she's more qualified to be President or Vice President, only 29% of voters place her in the top spot compared to 46% who say she'd be a more appropriate number 2.
On the President/Vice President qualification question only Romney reaches a majority on the qualified to be President card with 50% saying he's most equipped for that position to 24% who think he'd make a better Vice President. Huckabee has 44% who think he's suited to be President to 28% who think he'd fit more in the VP slot, and Gingrich has 27% who consider him more Presidential to 37% that think he's more Vice Presidential.
It's a clear sign of weakness for the GOP field that only one of its leading potential candidates is considered to be Presidential material even by a majority of the party base.
posted
Trump is old money. It is easy to make millions when you start from millions. He is entirely trumped (get it?) by people half his age (the Google guys Brin and Page) etc.
He is, completely, a mediocre businessman at best. The NYC real estate market was a gem at the time and he still managed to hurrrrrrrrrrr his way down to being the holder of tens of millions of dollars of debt.
Yes, EXACTLY what I'm looking for in my new corporate overlords.
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quote:Originally posted by Lisa: So Donald Trump is planning on running for President. He's all but announced already. The only reason he's waiting is that he doesn't want to screw NBC over by making them pull his show, which would be the case if he announces.
He was on the Today Show this morning, and he had a lot of good things to say. He's tied for second place among Republican potential candidates, and he's leading the Tea Party potentials.
For all of his faults, the guy knows business. He's more likely to be able to deal with the country's economic problems than Obama. As he pointed out, Obama doesn't know how to get people to work together. He didn't point out that Obama almost never compromises on anything, but it's true.
This is going to be a very interesting ride.
Is this ride you are talking about the ride of you coming to understand that trump has a 0% chance of winning?
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The good news about Republican primary voters (I think and I hope) is that it's a self-correcting problem. By that I mean that the situation as it stands right now-the primary voters being just wacky as hell overall in significant numbers-puts me in mind of the film Other People's Money, and Danny Devito's character's speech at the end. The relevant quote, "What's the best way to go broke? Get an ever-increasing share of a shrinking market."
Voters get LESS far right and wacky over time, usually. So this brand of the problem solves itself.
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Maybe its self correcting in that the conservative base that powers the gop candidates into office is growing really, really old.
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I'm hoping that Trump doesn't get the nod - I want it to go to Palin.
Yes, Palin.
I want her to get so trounced in the Obama/Palin race that she's never taken seriously again. Heck, I think I'll even vote Obama if she does (as an anyone but Palin vote).
The Republicans are full of rotten wood that needs to be culled, for the good of the party and the nation.
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posted
Between catchy campaign slogans like "takin care of business" and "you aint seen nothing yet" it's like it was meant to be!
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Wow. And here I thought there might be some intelligent or mature responses. I guess I should have known better.
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Blayne Bradley
unregistered
posted
In a thread about Donald Trump!? Mr "Why hasn't Obama showed his birth certificate?"
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quote:Originally posted by Lisa: Wow. And here I thought there might be some intelligent or mature responses. I guess I should have known better.
You got plenty of intelligent responses. And they approach your original post with about all the maturity you've earned.
Do all your political threads follow the same theme? Do you really believe trump is going to be a serious contender who can win the nomination?
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I used to think that being a businessman was a great preparation for being president. My 6th grade class voted Ross Perot president in our mock election, and I was one of his supporters.
Now that I'm a bit older, I think that at best it is a neutral qualifier. I don't think the federal government should be run like a business in most respects. So I think having lots of experience in business management may actually work against someone being a good president.
The list of past presidents by occupation shows that only Bush I and II have had a primarily business background, and both of them had previous government experience that were presented as their primary qualifications.
Looking over the list, it seems that being a lawyer is the best way to get elected president, though both good leaders and bad were such. I'm a little shocked at how many of them have a background as such, I would have guessed much lower.
This is of course ignoring the fact that Trump really isn't a very good businessman, as others have alluded to. The federal government can't very well declare bankruptcy.
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Lisa, your primary two points - that Trump 'knows business' and that Obama never compromises - are about as close to factually inactivate as an opinion question in politics can get, and judging by your lack of response to those points when you're usually quite willing to go head to head in spite of all sorts of direct unpleasantness (to or from you), it really looks like you know it, but don't want to admit it.
I could be wrong, but that would involve somehow demonstrating what a good businemann Trump is, and how Obama almost never compromises. Rather than simply stating it and getting huffy when people respond with laughter.
To a Republican candidate liked by the Tea Party that *Glenn Beck* thinks is bad. You're right-when people laugh at at that, theyre being immature.
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Trump is, as the moment, being a painfully stereotypical Republican. He's tacking hard to the right - really hard to the right given that he's courting birthers - and then once he wins the primary, he'll pretend that none of it ever happened to try and court Hispanics and centrists.
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I'd like to question the entire premise that a candidate who "knows business" would make a good choice for president.
It's an assumption of a sort I've seen made all over the place. For example, some of my friends who've been successful in business treat their success as a marker of understanding about the economy as a whole.
In fact, running one successful business won't teach you all that much about a system as large and complicated as the US economy. Instead, what you get is a very small (and therefore most likely very biased) sample of observations of economic activity. Really, you become good at running your business and dealing with the good and bad fortunes that have arisen for that particular business. This is not reliable information about the whole economic system.
To say that a successful business person must "understand the economy" is kind of like saying that a healthy person must understand medicine. For my part, although I have concerns about some aspects of economics, I'd much sooner trust a trained economist who's studied the big picture than a business person who's likely to generalize from a very limited set of experiences.
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to be sure, there's a degree of understanding in law and business (not to mention, of course, politics) which is pretty vital to being a competent representative, but this doesn't have to be paired with actually being a business owner or lawyer, or anything of the sort. In the case of persons like Trump or GWB, their business history and the 'acumen' it presents through example are more like a warning flag. A demonstration of why not to elect them.
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quote:Originally posted by Lisa: Wow. And here I thought there might be some intelligent or mature responses. I guess I should have known better.
This is ridiculous. Expected of you, I guess, but ridiculous. You have plenty of intelligent responses. They include good countercharges to your propositions that you apparently want to shy away from.
quote:The list of past presidents by occupation shows that only Bush I and II have had a primarily business background, and both of them had previous government experience that were presented as their primary qualifications.
Bush's business history was ... remarkably terrible, when you look at it. Arbusto, Spectrum 7 Energy Corp., Harken Energy — man, check out what happened.
quote:Originally posted by Xavier: The list of past presidents by occupation shows that only Bush I and II have had a primarily business background, and both of them had previous government experience that were presented as their primary qualifications.
What about Coolidge and Hoover?
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Coolidge's history is much more of a nod to the importance of law/lawyering. Hoover, for all his experience, came off poorly in trying to handle the economic crisis.
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Blayne Bradley
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posted
He felt Rugged Individualism could solve the depression!
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Part of me thinks Trump is just talking about running to give himself a popularity boost. Fighting with Rosie O'Donnell worked, so why not try to run for president? I don't really believe he thinks he could win.
If President Obama wins a second term I don't think it will because he has led well, it will be because the Republicans couldn't find someone better. None of the candidates have the charisma or swagger that Obama does, and like it or not that matters.
I wouldn't mind seeing Paul Ryan as a VP candidate though. I haven't read his budget yet, but I have to give him credit for actually putting in the work to write his proposal up and present it.
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I think Trump IS serious about running. But I also think he realizes he's going to have a tough time selling the Republican base, particularly the religious right. So what he's doing is actually a very smart move...embrace the tea party and ride it for all it's worth. Whether he actually believes all the birther nonsense I'm not sure, but he's certainly playing it up well.
Posts: 8741 | Registered: Apr 2001
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posted
A poster named Ratiocinative presented this theory, which at least deserves some discussion (even if it can't necessarily be perfectly verified):
quote: Trump is filling a vital role right now for the Republicans. He is serving as the "belligerent candidate" - the guy who can stir up dissent by directly appealing to the ignorance that permeates the lowest common denominator base of the party, doing so while at the same time isolating himself from the other Republican candidates who may actually have a chance of winning.
Notice how Trump has become the birther mouthpiece now? That is all by design. The reason he is doing that is because his task as a candidate is not to win the election. His job is to appeal directly to the racist beliefs that a large portion of the Republican demographic suffer from by further selling the idea that Obama is an African muslim non-American.
You see, the Republicans need someone right now who they know is not going to win the election for them but who will still stand there in front the cameras and pander to the idiots out there and enforce their inherent prejudices about Obama. This is not something that a real viable Republican candidate could typically get away with, so instead, Trump is filling that role for them. His task is to do exactly what he is doing - keeping the birther conspiracy front and center. The Republican party knows that if they want to beat Obama, they are going to have to really push the racist agenda to stir up their voter base and get people to the polls, but they have to tread carefully when doing so, lest they risk it backfiring on them. Trump, who they know is not going to win, is perfect for the task, because not only is he an arrogant loudmouth, he is also enough of an outsider that the other Republican candidates can appear to separate themselves from his racist birther rhetoric while at the same time still capitalizing on the dissent that rhetoric stirs amongst their base.
It is all a game. This is how upper echelon politics works. Trump is a patsy - there to say the shit that the later more viable candidates cannot say.
combine this with the musings of public policy polling above (the difficulty Mitt Romney faces in trying to appeal to an electorate that's a whole lot further out there than he is) and it really creates something for thought.
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posted
They can't seem to find their butt with both hands - this may be a bit past their ability. I won't say it's past their ethics, though.
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How long are we talking? I guess I base a lot of that "meh" on the recent elections. The national Republican party didn't seem to know what to do.
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It's always effective to attribute racism to a political position; many people won't want to have that kind of accusation apply to them, so they will often abandon the position as a result. I'm sure many birthers hold their position out of a deep dislike for president Obama, whether because they are actually racists or because they disagree with his politics. However, questioning where the president was born is not in itself a trivial manner, to be dismissed out of hand. It all depends on the evidence. I haven't researched the matter myself much, but it seems any legitimate questioning of the president's birth country would be ended by the presentation of an actual birth certificate. Trump, for example, believes there is an important distinction between a birth certificate and a certificate of live birth. Any legal mavens here know if there is an important distinction?
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quote:Trump, for example, believes there is an important distinction between a birth certificate and a certificate of live birth. Any legal mavens here know if there is an important distinction?
No, there is no legal distinction. It's just arbitrary nomenclature. A state may keep an original record (but is no obligation to do so) or they may just keep an electronic record. All that legally matters is the document produced when requesting proof of birth from the state.
The document produced by Obama is what any normal citizen would get if they asked for their birth certificate and meets any sane standard (and ALL legal standards) of evidence for his Hawaiian birth.
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quote:Originally posted by Lisa: Wow. And here I thought there might be some intelligent or mature responses. I guess I should have known better.
Lisa: Why do you feel he could handle our economic issues?
I think the fact he has had to declare bankruptcy thrice, as well as indicating that he wouldn't pay back a loan Deutsche Bank gave him because the 2008 financial crisis was an "act of God", as good enough reasons to doubt his technical skill when it comes to economics, and suspect his early success (and a rich father), coupled with a lot of charisma and name recognition has allowed him to go as far as he has.
Note, I'm not trying to defend Obama's economic credentials, merely indicate that Trump is not somebody I would see especially desireable when it comes to managing a government as a business. I think Mitt Romney is far stronger when it comes to that sort of business acumen.
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Blayne Bradley
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posted
And Romney likes Battlefield Earth, he'ld get my vote if Obama wasn't the Dem candidate.
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