Hmmm (emphasis mine, reformatted):
Many commentators are convinced they know the real Donald Trump. He is, they think, so obviously shallow, insecure and garish that single descriptive words or phrases are all that is needed. He is, take your pick: “the Last of the Great Vaudevillians,” the “king of bad taste in a country that loves bad taste,” a “comic-opera demagogue.” Or, more seriously, a “con artist,” “a fascist,” “the latest in a long line of demagogues,” or a “bullying thug.”
Most of these characterizations are little more than name-calling masquerading as analysis. . . .
Business conducted at his level of play requires ambition, risk-taking, resilience, and the capacity to fight back — just like national politics.
Trump’s broadsides are a signal that if attacked, he will not go quietly into the night. And his outlandish policy perceptions like the mass deportation of illegal aliens and a possible trade war with China are best seen as reflecting the direction of his thinking– opening bids as it were, not deeply held and entrenched policy positions.
Empathy for the left out, ignored little guy? Trump has built his campaign on it. Ordinary Americans are looking for a fighter, someone who considers “cares about people like me” to mean that a candidate will fight for them. His reflects a much keener diagnosis of the public he hopes to lead than Jeb Bush’s idea of campaigning as a “joyful tortoise.”
Critics have conflated the by-products of Trump’s branding strategy with his character. He engineered a successful repositioning of his highly leveraged building empire to one increasingly built on his brand name. Big, bold, brash and successful are its sales themes.
Is there an element of hype in the pitch? Of course there is, and it carries over to his “Make America Great Again” theme. Yet note that the object of his ambitions is not himself, the mark of a true narcissist, but his country. And note too the word “again” that speaks to restoration and reform.”
Interesting take.
I have not been on the “bash Trump wagon” although I have watch his campaign intently (again, I’ve endorsed Ted Cruz) as both TMEW and The Youngest voted for him in the Primary. I do think he has both been given a bad rap and brought it upon himself for his demeanor on the trail but having been to a couple of his rallies, it is clear that he has made a connection with the electorate with an intensity that may only be rivaled by Bernie supporters – but certainly he has connected across a “yuger” broad swath of possible voters where Bernie’s seem to be either the aging 60s radicals or the under or mid 20s progeny of the Democrat Leftists Educational-Industrial complex: brainwashed proto-socialists.
He certainly is the master of earned media (about $2 Billion worth of that political oxygen sucking attention) and has used his positioning in the pop culture stage like a nina weilding a katana – just ask his former opponents who stood up to him and then got sliced to ribbons. It really is the political replay of Sherman’s scorched earth march during the Civil War – take no prisoners and destroy everything to keep the enemy from waging war in return.
I guess, overall, I haven’t made ready to throw myself into a pit should he will the nomination and then go on to beat either the closet socialist harridan that belongs in a gated community (where she can lovingly stare at her Alinsky altar while her husband will require surgery to remove the smile from his face) or the aging open socialist (stealth communist) that has made his living sucking off the government teat for decades). While many are already making plans for Canada, I’ll watch to see what happens when the marketing phase goes away and then the hard part of the actual project / building will have to begin.
And for all his bluster, he does know how to build. And for that, you have to have a plan – let’s see what that plan holds. Maybe.
(H/T: Instapundit)
