The Art of the Trump
Let me preface this in a big way: I think the fact that Donald Trump is a serious contender to the presidency of the United States is a major problem. (Yet, in a weird way, what’s also great about America.) It’s farcical. I’m not 100% sure I disagree with him on everything, but only because I don’t know his stance on everything. Most of what I hear is sheer buffoonery.
And yet, here we are.
What fascinates me about Donald Trump is the psychology behind his presidential run. I’m not even sure he knows what he’s doing or tapping into, but I have to believe someone working with him does. Because there are some flashes of brilliance here. Again, not in message, but in execution.
We live in a United States that could not be less interesting, politically. In all likelihood, we’re about to see a Bush square off against a Clinton for their respective family’s right to be President for a third or second time, respectively. Think about that for a minute. It’s insane. Are we really to believe that the two best people to run this country happen to be directly related to those who ran it recently? What a coincidence! Again, insane.
“Politics as usual” is a phrase that gets bandied about too often these days. But here, it’s apt. And that’s exactly what Trump stands in stark contrast to. Love him or hate him, he won’t be politics as usual, he’ll be the exact opposite. Which, again, probably isn’t a good thing either. But sometimes it takes a dose of insanity to shake us free of redundancy.
Trump is running a campaign that is effectively Ross Perot meets Howard Dean meets Ron Paul meets Bulworth. But he’s taking the timidity of those actual candidates when things “got real” and replacing it with more of the crazy shit of the fake Bulworth candidate.
It’s brilliant — again, not the message, the strategy– because it’s refreshing to many. And at just the right time in our political calcification.
Reading this post on Trump recently, perhaps I shouldn’t be surprised all of this is happening. He’s literally made a career of talking others into who he wanted to become. He’s the biggest real estate developer in New York City, after all. Except he’s not. At all. But call him out on that and he’ll just keep saying it. Because, why not?
Trump is a mirror in a house of mirrors. He’s the American so many people want to be — or think they do, because he’s told them they do. Even though he’s not even that person. Doesn’t matter. His perception of himself is our reality.
And I shouldn’t be surprised by this. Growing up in Ohio, if you had asked me the first name that popped into my head when you said “rich person,” I absolutely would have said “Donald Trump.” I recall a trip to NYC when I was a teenager with my parents where we simply had to visit Trump Tower, with all its gold leaf tackiness and phallic overload, because, well, Trump!
This is what he’s tapping in to. Trump may not be the American dream we should want, but he stands for the American dream we deserve. And this, in my mind, is directly reflected in the polls. It’s equal parts terrifying and exhilarating. And I have no idea how it will end — except that I know it will be with a Bush or a Clinton in the White House.
And Donald Trump more popular, even if not necessarily richer, than ever.
