Is Trump's real agenda to monetize the fringe right wing base?

[Final-Fan]

fatslob-:O said:

Final-Fan said:

1.  I didn't say he was poor, I'm saying he might not be quite as rich as he claims to be.  There is a fairly significant difference between "merely wealthy" and the $10 billion or whatever Trump claims.  Not that income tax returns show net wealth but you get the point:  IIRC he claims most of his wealth by his brand name; how much does that make him?  How much does he actually get from selling "real estate" as you believe? 

2.  Flip-flopping isn't really corruption.  I have no idea what you are thinking with this comment.  And Trump has done plenty of flip-flopping, or rather his claims vary widely (even wildly) and the only reason it wouldn't count as flip-flopping is if his position wasn't seriously held in the first place. 

3.  Even with all the bad reputation many politicians have, "you can't trust them without a literal legally binding contract" is a pretty low bar.  That is the bar your defense of Trump's participation in Trump University sets. 

4.  I stand corrected on Schwartz not being a biographer.  Art of the Deal may not be an autobiography but it certainly does have a lot of autobiographical information as I have been led to believe.  As for his agenda, clearly he does have one, the explicit agenda of he does not think Trump is mentally prepared for the rigors of the office of POTUS.  If you think he would say the same thing about any Republican to try to make them lose the election, I think you need a little more than "he's a liberal" to make a serious claim.  As it is he seems to me like a person who actually knew Donald Trump, closely interacting with him for months, and has a very strong opinion about how well he can do the job. 

1. His main business is being a real estate developer. Literally, evidence is EVERYWHERE to show for it. Seriously you can't be implying that his whole entire business was a lie ... 

2. No but it's a sign of corruption as it shows a conflict of interest. Clinton is a BLATANT example of corruption since she curries favours for the Clinton Foundation donors ALL THE TIME when political donations are known for being conflicts of interests! 

3. It is a low bar and there's nothing anyone can do to change that. Trust itself is a low bar altogether for politicans so we can't be bothered to put trust in them, only confidence and I place mine in the Don when he's a non-politican ... 

4. The Art of Deal doesn't say a whole lot about Trump's autobiography, in fact it's mostly about how he does business so it belongs in that genre. Yes, Tony Schwartz has a very strong opinion, at least strong enough to tweet his every last ad hominem attack on Trump for the past month ever since the RNC convention. In fact he knew Donald Trump so much so that he twisted Ivanka Trump's own thought for implying that she had a better judgement of her father despite never meeting her, if that isn't FUD from him then I don't know what is. He's so much of the for the establishment typical democrat that he acts as with the mentality that "if your not with us then your against us" to the likes of deriding JILL STEIN so even he's not immune to alienating his own common beliefs and I bet he would grit undecided voters too. He even does damage control for Hillary Clinton by averting a conspiracy theory that turned out to be true by creating conspiracy theory for Trump despite not showing any physical health complications in public! Not only did he appeal to Clinton's comment about "basket of deplorables" but he went on doubling down by generalizing them as being dishonest so what exactly makes him unique from the rest of the DNC defense force that he'd offer aside from the 18 months of watching his enemy when he too will distort his view for his goals ? 

He's not just driven by personal bias, he shows stereotypical political bias going by the above and self proclaims it too so I have every reason to question that his view is not perverted ... 

1.  You are correct; the real estate portion of his empire (which he largely inherited) seems from skimming through that article to be significantly larger than his licensing and other ventures, which I was alluding to.  For the record, I was never implying that he did not have such interests. 

2.  Are you saying that flip-flopping is a sign of a politician's opinion being bought?  That's the only way I can make sense of how you got from what we were talking about to the Clinton Foundation.  In that case, I will agree that Trump won't be susceptible to that kind of bribery but surely you can admit that he has a strong incentive to bend policy for personal gain.  I wonder whether the EPA (which he proposed abolishing) ever gave him grief about one of his developments...

3.  But why do you put that confidence in him when your DEFENSE of his conduct in the Trump University deal is that he will lie his ass off for personal gain if you don't have him nailed to a legal contract? 

4.  Links 1 and 2:  he never met her 30 years ago when the book was being written.  Possibly he has met her since (like after it was written and he and Trump were going to book signings), and anyway he doesn't have to meet her to know about her secondhand and form an opinion of her intelligence and judgment.  Link 3:  Third party candidates being "spoilers" is a sad result of our current electoral system (not just electoral college).  Whether his claim is true depends on how many of Stein's voters would vote Democratic if they weren't voting for her.  I agree that he is stating his point insensitively.  Link 4:  Hyperbole, I agree.  I don't care for that myself, but doesn't make him wrong about Donald Trump.  Even if he's exaggerating what he's told us about that time as well Trump can't pay attention to topics that don't interest him.  If his account of that time period was entirely fabricated I'm sure Trump's lawyers would have followed through on their threat to sue.  Links 5, 6, 7:  I don't like the man much more than you do, but I don't care about what he's saying in his capacity as third-rate talking head.  I care about what he can tell us about Donald Trump as someone who, while not quite being a member of his inner circle, had comparable access to him for a long period of time.  Am I satisfied that his account of that time is 100% correct?  No.  Do I believe that it has some truth to it?  Yes.  And if what he said was so much as 20% true I think we can seriously question Trump's willingness to engage intellectually on topics that do not particularly interest him, regardless of their objective importance.  That is a pretty dangerous thing to have in a president.  (P.S.  Are you aware that Schwartz's deplorables comment was referring to Trump's media surrogates and not popular supporters?)  In summary:  if you want to discredit Tony Schwartz, stop trolling his Twitter feed and find me something that can either independently vouch for Trump's intellectual chops (when his own self-aggrandizement isn't on the table), or some evidence that Tony Schwartz's account of his observations of Trump is a fabrication.