So billionaire Donald Trump is now flirting with the idea of running for US president. A new NBC/Wall Street Journal survey has Trump running second to former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney among Republicans for the party's 2012 presidential nomination.
So how seriously should we take it? Khelil Bouarrouj at the Examiner linked above has some doubts. "It is necessary still to be skeptical. Trump has never run for office and recently stated that a campaign would have to wait till the end of his NBC reality show "The Apprentice", reflecting a sense of priorities which would suggest he is not serious about the presidency. Trump is a skilled show man who knows how to keep the media's focus and the recent political declarations may be solely to boost the ratings of his show. This may all still be an entertainment stratagem with no real political intent."
Still, Trump is going flat out. He is flirting with the Tea Party and he is sending a team of investigators to Hawaii to get to the bottom of whether or not Obama was born in the US. He has even secured a domain name: www.trump2012.com
This doesn't make sense at all. Trump has never run for office at all, he has no experience in politics. But he is a show man, and he knows this is a sure way to attract free publicity for his business ventures. It's all about self-aggrandizement, totally cynical.
But what does all this say about America? The prospect of having Trump as the actual president, living in the real White House, making fateful decisions about war and peace says something about the weakness of the Republican field and also that people out there feel the system is broken. They want a knight in shining armour. The fact that the richest most powerful nation on earth is half way through the fiscal year without a budget tells us how broken the system is. So what would the Donald do if he couldn't get a budget through Congress?
no comment untill now