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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsDonald Trump Really Doesn’t Want Me to Tell You This, But …
http://www.vanityfair.com/news/2015/12/donald-trump-mark-bowden-playboy-profile#9I spent a long, awkward weekend with Donald Trump in November 1996, an experience I feel confident neither of us would like to repeat.
He was like one of those characters in an 18th-century comedy meant to embody a particular flavor of human folly. Trump struck me as adolescent, hilariously ostentatious, arbitrary, unkind, profane, dishonest, loudly opinionated, and consistently wrong. He remains the most vain man I have ever met. And he was trying to make a good impression. Who could have predicted that those very traits, now on prominent daily display, would turn him into the leading G.O.P. candidate for president of the United States?
His latest outrageous edict on banning all Muslims from entering the country comes as no surprise to me based on the man I met nearly 20 years ago. He has no coherent political philosophy, so comparisons with Fascist leaders miss the mark. He just reacts. Trump lives in a fantasy of perfection, with himself as its animating force.
...
As Ive watched his improbable political rise, it is clear that he hasnt changed. The very things that made him so unappealing apparently now translate into wide popular support. Apart from the comical ego, the errors, and the self-serving bluster, what you get from Trump are commonplace ideas pronounced as received wisdom. Begin registering all Muslims in America? Round up the families of suspected terrorists? Ban all Muslims from entering the country? Carpet-bomb ISIS-held territories in Iraq (killing the 98-plus percent of civilians who are, in effect, being held hostage there by the terror group and turning a war against a tiny fraction of the worlds Muslims into a global religious crusade)? Using nuclear weapons? The ideas that pop into his head are the same ones that occur to any teenager angry about terror attacks. They appeal to anyone who cant be bothered to think them throughcant be bothered to ask not just the moral questions but the all-important practical one: Will doing this makes things better or worse? When you believe in your own genius, you dont question your own flashes of inspiration.
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Donald Trump Really Doesn’t Want Me to Tell You This, But … (Original Post)
ashling
Dec 2015
OP
newfie11
(8,159 posts)1. Listening to him is terrifying
God help this country if he somehow becomes president.
Wellstone ruled
(34,661 posts)2. So true.
1StrongBlackMan
(31,849 posts)3. The,sense I get of trump ...
Is what terrifies me ... his ego would lead him to push the button., just because he felt some insult
wheniwasincongress
(1,307 posts)4. Great read
It was hard to watch the way he treated those around him, issuing peremptory ordersPolish this, Tony. Today. He met with the lady who selected his drapery for the Florida estateThe best! The best! Shes a genius!who had selected a sampling of fabrics for him to choose from, all different shades of gold. He left the choice to her, saying only, I want it really rich. Rich, rich, elegant, incredible. Then, Dont disappoint me. It was a pattern. Trump did not make decisions. He surrounded himself with geniuses and delegated. So long as you did not disappoint himand it was never clear how to avoid doing soyou were gold.
niyad
(113,336 posts)5. pretty well covers it.