The Art of the Deal?
President Trump declared that he was “not happy” about the bipartisan compromise on border security, but said he did not think the government would shut down on Friday. The deal includes just $1.375 billion for new fencing along the U.S.-Mexico border, much less than in the proposal he rejected in December.
So he’s getting less than he would have gotten if he’d approved the first deal?
He’s getting 55 miles of fencing, which is just a tad shy of the 1,000 miles of a wall that he proposed.
And who is Trump blaming? Even I couldn’t have come up with this one.
A few weeks ago, in a meeting with restrictionist immigration group leaders, Mr. Trump faulted former Speaker Paul D. Ryan, a fellow Republican, for repeatedly deferring action on the wall, with promises of doing it down the road. “Now he’s out fishing!” Mr. Trump declared, according to an attendee.
Paul Ryan? You mean the guy that had Nancy Pelosi’s job? Remember that guy? Yeah, blame him.
Hell just froze over with IQ45 having it almost half right for the first time. Of course we didn’t expect Donnie to accept any responsibility, and he doesn’t dare throw shade on Old Scratch McConnell, the guy who could collect enough votes to squash a veto. Yeah, almost half right, but still true to form stabbing at the guy now out fishing.
1“but said he did not think the government would shut down on Friday” … does he think the government shuts itself down? Nice way to avoid responsibility again, boy.
2“So he’s getting less than he would have gotten if he’d approved the first deal?”
It’s his pattern: even if (a big if) his net worth is as great as he claimed during the campaign it’s less than he’d have if he’d stuck his inheritance in an index fund. The only times he takes the first deal (which happens frequently in his business dealings) he wildly overpaid – for the football team and players, the airline, the casinos. Even for the book, “Art of the Deal”, the ghostwriter tossed out an outrageous offer (great for the ghostwriter) and Trump jumped at it. Trump is certainly one of the world’s worst negotiators.
3If Trump publishes a new edition of his book, he might change the title:
The Lost Remnants Of The Deal.
4JDM, Don’t forget Comrade Donnei’s trophy yacht ‘deal’, the “Trump Princess”.
He bought it for $29 Million in 1989 (on credit), spent at least half again that on a refit (yacht refits are usually at least half the purchase price, often more, no telling if the refit vendor(s) got ‘trumped’ too).
Then, a year or two later, ~1990-1, Trump’s (many) creditors repossessed* the vessel, and it was sold off for only $20 Million; probably a $24-25M loss for Donnei.
A brilliant dealmaker indeed.
(note that tRump’s dealings were also with Saudis, including a ‘Khashoggi’ (who had the yacht built for $100M) presumably no kin to the guy recently butchered by MBS).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingdom_5KR
* “After Khashoggi ran into financial problems, he sold the yacht in 1988 to the Sultan of Brunei, who in turn sold her to Donald Trump for $29 million. After a refit, Trump renamed her Trump Princess.
5***The yacht was handed over to creditors after Trump was found to be $900 million in debt.[3]*** Then she was sold in 1991[4] to Prince Al-Waleed bin Talal for $20 million.[5]”
The Wharton School of Business would like its diploma back.
6Sandridge,
7You left out the best part.
Trump never sailed on the yacht.
He threw a couple of parties on it, but it never left the dock when he was on it.
Yeah, there he goes again acting as if he were an only child. A lot like the guy behind me lined up at the drop off mail boxes at the post office late this afternoon. I threw in two rubber banded bundles of mail and just as I was going to drive off, the guy behind me started roaring, “Oh, c’mon!!!” I guess it was my ladylike takeoff from the service drive into the street. What a boor!
8@JDM: One of the perils of being born disgustingly rich seems to be that you never learn the value of money until it’s gone. He always had it, but nobody ever taught him how to spend it intelligently. His only criterion seems to have been, and still to be, “I want that!” He has no idea what things should actually cost, which makes him terrible at bargaining for anything.
@Sandridge: I think the Khashoggi in question in Trump’s yacht “deal” was Adnan Khashoggi, The Saudi arms dealer who died in 2017. He was Jamal Khashoggi’s uncle.
9Buttermilk Sky, Comrade Donnei didn’t get a coveted Wharton MBA, he just attended the undergrad school and (somehow) got a BSc in Econ (daddy basically bought it for him, IIRC).
10.
Arakasi, I figured that the TP was just a status symbol (trophy) dock queen, but had no knowledge of it. He coulda bought a pontoon boat and kept it on a lake. Kind of a waste of refit time and money, but in his case that was probably just bling interior and furniture work, not anything do do with seaworthiness or navigation (which is where I’ve spent a bundle on mine).
.
maggie, I’ve thought of inventing a flashing ‘flip off’ screen/device for the back window (but around here it would probably get you blown away by some road rage nutcase).
.
thatotherjean, That’s the name (Adnan) the Wiki article used, but I didn’t dig into it. Interesting that they were kin. But then I reached my fill of ME skulduggery about 4 decades ago (all sides), screw them all.