Donald Trump Struts in His Own Pageant

The New York Times Sunday Review ^ | August 22, 2015 | Maureen Dowd

[2ndDivisionVet]

SOME blondes have all the fun.

As Hillary Clinton and Jeb Bush get more testy, Donald Trump gets more chesty. And more blond.

It’s mind-boggling to contemplate a President Trump trying to make peace between North and South Korea, even as we watch the pugnacious Candidate Trump trolling poor Jeb on Twitter and predicting that poor Hillary would have to run the country from Leavenworth.

But, as Trump would say, deal with it.

The pol who refused to identify himself as a pol on his jury duty questionnaire has utterly scrambled American politics. And he has trademarked the phrase “Make America Great Again.”

“I was surprised it was available,” he told me.

Certainly, Trump could explode at any moment in a fiery orange ball. But meanwhile, he has exploded the hoary conventions, money-grubbing advisers and fund-raising excesses of the presidential campaign, turning everything upside down, inside out, into sauerkraut.

It is a fable conjured up in several classic movies: A magnetic, libidinous visitor shows up and insinuates himself into the lives of a bourgeois family. The free spirit leaves, but only after transforming the hidebound family, so that none of them can see themselves the same way again.

That is the profound metamorphosis Trump has wrought on the race. The Don Rickles of reality shows is weirdly bringing some reality to the presidential patty-cake.

The Donald’s strange pompadour and Hillary’s strange server have eclipsed all the usual primary permutations.

Because Trump is so loud, omnipresent, multiplatform and cutting, he’s shaping the perception of the other candidates. Once he blurts out the obvious — Jeb is low energy, Hillary is shifty, Mitt choked — some voters nod their heads and start to see his targets in that unflattering light as well....

[2ndDivisionVet]

Don Rickles is my favorite comedian of all time.

[sparklite2]

” He’s tapped into a hunger among those who want to believe that America is not a shrinking, stumbling power passed like a pepper mill between two entitled families.”

__________________________________________________

The elderly school girl crafts a wicked barb.

[Southack]

Trump is: Bulworth, the movie

[IAMNO1]

“Don Rickles is my favorite comedian of all time.”

I love Don Rickles! I was just thinking about him last week during a walk, and thought that when he dies, I'd love to go near his funeral, or thereabouts, to pay homage to him. A funny, in your face, completely un-PC, old school comedian, that is certainly missed this day and age. It would be refreshing to see another one like him one day, but alas, probably not possible.

[DoughtyOne]

The Donald’s strange pompadour and Hillary’s strange server have eclipsed all the usual primary permutations.

I can't imagine someone being stupid enough to put those two things in the same sentence. What strange things to couple...

One was a crime, endangering our nation. The other is a simple hairstyle.

Is Trumps hair now a crime, or are Hillary's criminal acts now no more important than a hair style?

Maureen, this is beyond the normal idiocy even for you.

[2ndDivisionVet]

He’s still touring!

http://www.donrickles.com/

[2ndDivisionVet]

Obama is “Idiocracy.”

[vette6387]

“Don Rickles is my favorite comedian of all time.”

Mine too! A few years ago we were in Vegas (my wife was raised there) and her brother (who runs the family business there) called to say that he had some reservations for us for the midnight show at the Sahara to see Don. Evidently he had generously tipped the Matre’d because we were seated directly in front of the microphone. Well, after a warmup act, Don came out and promptly got my wife up on stage. I won’t describe what happened except to say that we’ve never forgotten that night! He “got” us and just about everyone in the room and it was the best show I’ve ever attended! And after two hours of entertainment, he sat down on the edge of the stage and was just himself for about another hour talking to all of us and sharing his philosophy of life. My wife reminded me the other day that as a teenager, she used to go watch Don (through the bars) when he was just a lounge act. What a wonderful career he’s had.

[IAMNO1]

Great story!

[Kirkwood]

Considering the thousands of hours that Trump has spent negotiating deals in business, I think he would be a great choice for dealing with Korea. What experience did Obama have? None.

[eggman]

Because Trump is so loud, omnipresent, multiplatform and cutting, he’s shaping the perception of the other candidates. Once he blurts out the obvious — Jeb is low energy, Hillary is shifty, Mitt choked, and the NY Times is full of has-been, liberal hacks like Ms. Dowd — some voters nod their heads and start to see his targets in that unflattering light as well....

[dragnet2]

You sure post a lot of hit pieces. But I must admit they seem to become more humorous all the time.☺

[nathanbedford]

Unlike Donald Trump, Barack Obama got our entry into Iraq right for all the wrong reasons. What were the wrong reasons that prompted Barack Obama to oppose the Iraq war? His leftist ideology which impels him to deny America as a superpower and render it into the very thing that Maureen Dowd claims it is, "a shrinking, stumbling power." Nothing reveals how wrong was Obama's ideology about the Iraqi War and America's proper place in the world more than his mismanagement of America's exit from Iraq. On this occasion, Obama was wrong for all the wrong reasons.

Dowd wants to reduce every historic occasion to pop culture, she would be happiest when she can define the presidential race as Hillary's hairstyle versus Trump's pompadour. From that is easy to denigrate the people who would choose the pompadour over the hairstyle as she has, for example, by describing America's yearning for a strongman.

Donald Trump was right about the Iraqi war and for all the right reasons. His objections to the war were of the kind never to cross the mind of a "strongman." He started his analysis with an assessment of our national interest, probable success, cost, and concluded with downside risk. In other words he thought the removal of the real "strongman" in the picture, Saddam Hussein, would unleash malevolent forces often described as unintended consequences. He looked at the costs and thought that it would be frightful and thought that at least we ought to be compensated by obtaining the oil in exchange for blood and treasure, and the points out today that instead Isis and Iran are grabbing the oil and the power.

Dowd would have us believe that Obama is the reasoned statesman and Trump the loose cannon but the facts show that Trump can point, like Winston Churchill, to his warnings at the time of going to war which have been so "terribly vindicated" and he can point to the reasons which hardly are the kind one expects from a strongman. I do not put Trump in the same category as Churchill, but I do say he had it right and he said it right at the time. That hardly supports the image of a loose cannon or an empty head topped by a pompadour.

We have never seen Obama act to defend his ideology as commander-in-chief. That is not to be confused with his duty as Commander-in-Chief to protect the nation, that conception is entirely different from his ideological worldview. I believe that if and when Obama's ideology is directly challenged he will not hesitate to deploy the power of the United States to the hilt. An ideologue is easily the strongman, if he can.

We did not elect Brack Obama because he was deliberate while the Bush administration was precipitous, we elected Barack Obama because of the color of his skin, and the content of his party affiliation.

Maureen Dowd hates Trump's politics so she distorts his record and points to his pompadour. There is much in Trump's record to criticize from the right but there is no justice in criticizing Trump when he got it right for the right reasons.

[T-Bird45]

Or maybe it’s just a simple case of Trump Derangement Syndrome spreading like a virus through the MSM. Good comment, especially the part about Trump’s analysis of the Iraq War leading to his objections. Our national inability to learn from hindsight is a failing at least as great as electing Obama for all the wrong reasons.

[hosepipe]

Trump is: Bulworth, the movie

---

———NOPE——— wrong movie..

Trump—>> Fool we’re talking about Fools.... and it starts with F and ends in an L.. we got trouble in River City.. right HERE..

The boy is doing Robert Preston and Buddy Hacket to a tee... brilliant rendition as a republican Music man, con man..
very nice act... The democrats must be getting a charge out this.... republicans are totally FooLed..

Anyone thats been watching knows the next President will be elected by VOTER FRAUD.....
you know like the last “ FEW”.. except voter fraud on an enormous scale.. like last time..
ONLY BIGGER..

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LI_Oe-jtgdI

[RKBA Democrat]

The stench of fear is very strong in the political class.

[PhilDragoo]

It’s mind-boggling to contemplate a President Trump trying to make peace between North and South Korea

Do you have a mind, Maureen?

Is it "mind-boggling" that Bathhouse Barry gives Khamenei the bomb, the green light to attack Israel, and a hundred billion to continue fomenting terrorism?

Maureen Dowd is dowdy, unfashionable, drab--and a perennial whiner.

Trump is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored.

Maureen is yesterday's papers.

[miss marmelstein]

In stand-up comedy, the best seats are NOT at the microphone - they are in the back. That said, glad you had such a great time. I was sitting in a restaurant in LA years ago and the Don made the rounds shaking everybody’s hand! Nice man.

[Liz]

ADORABLE YOUNG DONALD---THE HAIR IS THE SAME.

Born June 14, 1946, Queens, NY

[Liz]

This is for you, Mo.

Looks like he means business.