Debate Now The Donald Says He Is Serious About Running in 2016

[Foxfyre]

This thread is in the Structured Debate Zone.

In recent interviews and in his recent CPAC presentation, Donald Trump says he is 70 to 80% sure he will declare his candidacy for the 2016 Presidential election. He has formed an exploratory committee, has people on the ground in Iowa and New Hampshire, and has told NBC he won't be doing "The Apprentice" this year as he has other stuff going.

So what do you think? De ja vu all over again? Or will he make a serious effort this time? And if he does, are you at all interested in what platform and skill sets he would bring to the debate? Does he have too much personal baggage to be viable? Does he have enough personal charisma to be viable? What would a Donald Trump campaign look like?

RULES FOR THIS DISCUSSION:

1. No ad hominem. Address the member's post and not who or what the member is or opinions about the member.

2. No bashing of left, right, Republican, Democrat, liberal, conservative etc. Criticism of specific legislation or stated opinion presented is okay so long as it is related to a discussion of a possible Donald Trump presidential campaign.

3. Please stay on the topic of a Donald Trump presidency as much as possible so that we don't get sidetracked with discussions of other possible candidates or other issues or aspects of politics in general. Please provide your explanation of how a link applies to the topic if you post it.

THE QUESTION TO BE ADDRESSED:
Would you be interested in a Donald Trump candidacy? Please give your reason, thoughts, or explanation for your 'yes' or 'no' or 'possibly' or 'maybe' or 'other' answer.

 

[Foxfyre]

Donald Trump Mini Biography

Donald John Trump Sr. (born June 14, 1946) is an American businessman, investor,[7] television personality and author. He is the chairman and president of The Trump Organization and the founder of Trump Entertainment Resorts.[1] Trump's extravagant lifestyle, outspoken manner, and role on the NBC reality show The Apprentice have made him a well-known celebrity who was No. 17 on the 2011 Forbes Celebrity 100 list. . . .

. . . Trump attended Fordham University for two years before transferring to the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania because Wharton had then one of the few real estate departments in American academia.[24] He graduated in 1968 with a Bachelor of Science degree in economics . . . . (Wiki)

His business dealings over a lengthy career have been some of the most closely scrutinized, applauded, and demonized, justly or unjustly, over the years. And that will almost certainly come under closer scrutiny, as will his personal life, once he formally declares his candidacy.

 

[JoeMoma]

He may be serious about running, but not enough people are going to take him seriously for him to win the nomination, much less the presidency!

I personally think that his running is mostly a way of increasing his own name reconition because he is an attention whore and because it well help his reality show continue to be successful.

 

[Foxfyre]

He may be serious about running, but not enough people are going to take him seriously for him to win the nomination, much less the presidency!

I personally think that his running is mostly a way of increasing his own name reconition because he is an attention whore and because it well help his reality show continue to be successful.

You aren't the first to speculate about that. But if he was doing it to boost his TV ratings, wouldn't he have left his options open about hosting "The Apprentice" this year and next year? Or maybe he really did and just isn't saying that. Who knows?
We are still most of two years out from the election.

Personally I am curious about what somebody like him could offer. He certainly has experience in overcoming adversity and extremely complicated difficult problems. He knows what makes the economy work and what hurts it. He knows how to recruit good people for the job to be done. He knows what making mistakes and even failure looks like and how to overcome that.

I'm wondering if there isn't a lot of substance other than the celebrity tycoon and TV personality that we all now. In other words I'm not at all convinced he is the candidate I could ever support, but I'm curious.

 

[Luddly Neddite]

His qualifications are that he was smart enough to be born to wealth but he's actually not very bright and has no clue how to stay out of bankruptcy. He knows he can't win but he keeps tripping over his hugely self-inflated ego.

Like Sarah Palin, Trump is right where he belongs - continuously making a fool of himself on "reality" TV and/or Fox not news.

Republicans in general ... IMO, the more the merrier and this general is likely to be just fractured, disjointed and downright silly as the last one.

Let's hope the low rent guy runs again - he's a lot more serious and qualified than some.

 

[Derideo_Te]

In order to win enough support to be elected as POTUS you need way more than just name recognition and a big bankroll.

Trump lacks political experience in every single area. He has never held any elected office or even run a successful campaign for office. He has zero experience working with legislators and all of his dealings with the law have been adversarial. He has zero foreign policy experience and would be a disaster as a diplomat.

Which just leaves his executive experience. Guess what? That is null and void too because running the government is not the same as running a business. Enough others have tried that and failed miserably. Trump lacks the brains to do any better IMO.

So if by some miracle he outspends everyone else to become the GOP candidate he would have to bankrupt himself to outspend his way into the Whitehouse.

Assuming the long shot case comes true and Trump does make it into the Oval Office there will be political scandals within 6 months centering on corruption. He will be impeached at some point in his administration and ignominiously removed from office with a bipartisan vote in the Senate.

Anyone who has ever observed Trump in action knows that outcome is inevitable because he overreaches and fails, time after time. The smart move is get up there in the primaries and have some fun and then leave with his tail between his legs when the real politicians make a mockery of him on stage and off.

 

[dblack]

I would be interested only in the comic aspects. That man is an ass clown.

 

[pismoe]

trump would be better that j boush but I hope that both just shut up !!

 

[Gracie]

What WQ said....which is better than I could have.

 

[Delta4Embassy]

Donald Trump: Presidential candidate

...Pretty sure threatening other users is against the rules.

 

[Luddly Neddite]

Just heard new poll numbers showing Hillary ahead of all the Rs with Rand Paul far behind. Jeb has more who distrust him than trust him and Trump didn't even register.

But, its early ...

 

[Foxfyre]

I haven't run across anybody who thinks Trump could win. But what I think he would bring to the table is that he could change the debate. He isn't afraid to say what he thinks and, in the world of 'nothing to lose' he is likely to say it.

 

[dblack]

I haven't run across anybody who thinks Trump could win. But what I think he would bring to the table is that he could change the debate. He isn't afraid to say what he thinks and, in the world of 'nothing to lose' he is likely to say it.

Only in the most irrelevant ways. Do we really want to go down the birther hole?

 

[Foxfyre]

I haven't run across anybody who thinks Trump could win. But what I think he would bring to the table is that he could change the debate. He isn't afraid to say what he thinks and, in the world of 'nothing to lose' he is likely to say it.

Only in the most irrelevant ways. Do we really want to go down the birther hole?

He has conceded the birther issue and that is highly unlikely to come up in his campaign if he actually does run.

I could be wrong, but I would expect his campaign to focus like a laser beam on economic issues and I think he would likely articulate that a whole lot better than his GOP competitors do that.

 

[jillian]

He may be serious about running, but not enough people are going to take him seriously for him to win the nomination, much less the presidency!

I personally think that his running is mostly a way of increasing his own name reconition because he is an attention whore and because it well help his reality show continue to be successful.

You aren't the first to speculate about that. But if he was doing it to boost his TV ratings, wouldn't he have left his options open about hosting "The Apprentice" this year and next year? Or maybe he really did and just isn't saying that. Who knows?
We are still most of two years out from the election.

Personally I am curious about what somebody like him could offer. He certainly has experience in overcoming adversity and extremely complicated difficult problems. He knows what makes the economy work and what hurts it. He knows how to recruit good people for the job to be done. He knows what making mistakes and even failure looks like and how to overcome that.

I'm wondering if there isn't a lot of substance other than the celebrity tycoon and TV personality that we all now. In other words I'm not at all convinced he is the candidate I could ever support, but I'm curious.

Somebody like him offers nothing. He only wants the spotlight. He doesn't care how he gets it. And if I'm not mistaken, his corporations have filed bankruptcy at least four times. Ask the vendors he's stuck for the bill what kind of money manager he is. Not to mention the wacko birfer thing.

So no. The Donald isn't someone who would bring anything but a laugh to the presidential race.

 

[Foxfyre]

He may be serious about running, but not enough people are going to take him seriously for him to win the nomination, much less the presidency!

I personally think that his running is mostly a way of increasing his own name reconition because he is an attention whore and because it well help his reality show continue to be successful.

You aren't the first to speculate about that. But if he was doing it to boost his TV ratings, wouldn't he have left his options open about hosting "The Apprentice" this year and next year? Or maybe he really did and just isn't saying that. Who knows?
We are still most of two years out from the election.

Personally I am curious about what somebody like him could offer. He certainly has experience in overcoming adversity and extremely complicated difficult problems. He knows what makes the economy work and what hurts it. He knows how to recruit good people for the job to be done. He knows what making mistakes and even failure looks like and how to overcome that.

I'm wondering if there isn't a lot of substance other than the celebrity tycoon and TV personality that we all now. In other words I'm not at all convinced he is the candidate I could ever support, but I'm curious.

Somebody like him offers nothing. He only wants the spotlight. He doesn't care how he gets it. And if I'm not mistaken, his corporations have filed bankruptcy at least four times. Ask the vendors he's stuck for the bill what kind of money manager he is. Not to mention the wacko birfer thing.

So no. The Donald isn't someone who would bring anything but a laugh to the presidential race.

I've seen no evidence that Donald Trump ever stiffed anybody. Even those who had deferred payments during his reorganization bankruptcies did get paid. He has never taken a Chapter 7. And I'm pretty sure he has a top notch credit rating and nobody is afraid to go into business with him. I would bet a good steak dinner that there is a long line of investors who would jump at a chance to go into business with him.

I also don't claim any special clairvoyance to look into Donald Trump's heart and mind and know what his motives are or how sincere he is.

I do know he has a reputation for being generous to a fault. He doesn't flaunt that and shrugs off questions about it, but those who have researched it conservatively estimate he gives away $100 million a year or more to worthy causes. Those organization recently reporting substantial contributions from Donald Trump are:

Arnold Palmer Foundation
Celebrity Fight Night Foundation
Children with AIDS
David Foster Foundation
DoSomething.org
Friends of Scotland
Jimmy Fund
Los Angeles Police Memorial Foundation
Make A Child Smile Appeal
Make-A-Wish Foundation
Mississippi Animal Rescue League
Muhammad Ali Parkinson Center
Neurofibromatosis, Inc.
Operation Smile
Paralyzed Veterans of America
Pediatric Epilepsy Project
Raising Malawi
Reef Relief
Smile Train
St. Francis Food Pantries and Shelters
The Doe Fund
UNICEF
Wounded Warrior Project

Causes he has been hands on involved in or has lent his name to:
Adoption, Fostering, Orphans, AIDS & HIV, Animals, Bullying, Cancer, Children, Conservation, Emergency services, Environment, Family/Parent Support, Health, Homelessness, Human Rights, Hunger, Miscellaneous, Oceans, Parkinson's Disease, Philanthropy, Physical Challenges, Poverty, Slavery & Human Trafficking, Veteran/Service Member Support

Source: Look to the Stars World of Celebrity Giving

In addition, I read recently that he employs something like 22,000 people in his various business enterprises and has provided venture capital loans for many an entreprenour starting up their own business.

Nobody can be in involved in as many high profile business deals as Donald Trump has been and not incur a lot of criticism, accusations, and deep pockets always attract a lot of opportunistic lawsuits. And Trump certainly incurs his share of those.

Is he a saint? I don't see him that way. Is he a sinner? Aren't we all?

Again I don't think he has a prayer to get very far in the nomination process, much less to be President, but I do find people like him interesting. And I think we sell ourselves short when we fail to understand what people like him can bring to the conversation.

 

[Moonglow]

I haven't run across anybody who thinks Trump could win. But what I think he would bring to the table is that he could change the debate. He isn't afraid to say what he thinks and, in the world of 'nothing to lose' he is likely to say it.

He knows he has no chance either, he's just buying some PR time for Trump.........

 

[westwall]

The problem with Trump, is he cares far too much about the Trump brand. He is not a credible candidate based on prior history IMO.

 

[Derideo_Te]

I've seen no evidence that Donald Trump ever stiffed anybody. Even those who had deferred payments during his reorganization bankruptcies did get paid.

Plenty of people have been stiffed by Trump.

Page 3 Donald Trump s Companies Filed for Bankruptcy 4 Times - ABC News

LoPucki said it was very unusual for anyone to have that many large businesses go through bankruptcy. Most of the debt Trump incurred was through bonds that were sold to the public.

"People knew who Donald Trump was and for that reason were willing to trust the bonds, and they got burned," LoPucki said. "The people who invested with him or based on his name lost money, but he himself came out pretty well."​

 

[Foxfyre]

Other sources would disagree with that. There are those who will believe just about anything negative they hear or read about somebody they've decided to hold in contempt or resent or feel superior to. And such people aren't interested in researching for the whole story and being fair to those they dislike. Such is the fate of those who live their lives in the public eye.