Good morning,
THE LUCKIEST MAN IN THE WORLD—HOW DOES HE DO IT?
Cats have nothing on Donald Trump. He has demonstrated he has far more than nine lives. Having bankrupted several companies, failed at the casino game, been a laughingstock of the New York real estate establishment, defrauded enrollees in the soon-to-be out of business Trump University, failed at Trump Steaks and any number of other business ventures, he repeatedly has emerged from the ashes. Some of it is bombast; some of it is great lawyers; some of it is the unwillingness of adversaries to descend to the gutter where he is willing to fight; some of it is being savvy enough, as a marketing genius, to figure out how to help people part with their money. And sometimes it’s just plain luck. Trump can brag that, as Carlotta in Stephen Sondheim’s Follies (based in part on Joan Crawford) belts out “I’m Still Here.”
Last week saw Donald Trump thrown three lifelines recently that demonstrate his remarkable good luck:
The bond he is required to post in the “hush money case” has been lowered from over $500MM to less than $200MM. Of additional note, let’s remember that this isn’t a case of hush money. It is his taking actions that involve the use of campaign dollars to silence facts about his past sexual exploits and predation that very well could have turned the 2016 election.
Judge Aileen Cannon continues to defy any sense of judicial impartiality. First, she has failed to set a trial date, thus continuing her effort to delay the trial beyond the election. Second, she is having the parties prepare draft jury instructions at a time such matters are not timely on a subject that can only revisit her bizarre and incorrect reading of the laws regarding presidential records. Nice to have the judges you appoint working for your benefit…
Trump’s best business strategy has been in selling his branding to others, who have big ideas. Last week proved that point again. Truth Social succeeded in coming out to great fanfare through a crazy funding vehicle called a “SPAC” (I’m not going to try to explain that here). Its valuation and subsequent run-up in stock price were fueled by his loyal followers jumping on the bandwagon to purchase shares. The stock isn’t trading based upon profitability, nor is it trading on some future value based upon expansion. It’s trading like Dutch tulips, baseball cards, and BitCoin. There is no “there” there. In the meantime, this Hail Mary scheme, dreamed up by two guys who appeared on The Apprentice (both were fired on that show) has yielded Mr. Trump more wealth on paper than he could ever have dreamed. His stake in the company, which he can’t really access during the six month lock-up period, is over $5 billion, or double the maximum estimate of his current net worth. The ghost of PT Barnum no doubt is impressed…
SWING VOTERS
At this point, I’d venture that most people have established in their minds strong feelings about Donald Trump and Joe Biden. After all, we have been dealing with them and their histories for decades. Yet, there are still some “swing voters.” Who are these people?
I think “swing voters” come in several categories. The first is those who are pretty clearly leaning one direction or another, but who claim to be “swing.” They generally vote for the Democrat or generally vote for the Republican, but like to think of themselves as persuaded by the best candidate. They’ll “come home” in due time to the party for which they regularly vote (if they vote at all). The second is those who might otherwise not vote, but who can be pushed and dragged to the polls by friends and organizers with similar beliefs. The third group of undecided voters is those who truly don’t decide until the bitter end. There is a mistaken belief that these people are more thoughtful and balancing issues, ideas, and candidates. The real fact is that these “fence-sitters” are simply uninformed, uninterested, or both.
Clearly, getting out the vote is a critical strategy to getting the second and third categories to the polls. Could it be that this election—in which American democracy, a free press, the rule of law, the economy, and America’s standing and influence in the world—is determined by those who don’t read a newspaper or even tune in to the news? Oh boy…
Have a great day,
Glenn
Swing voters are also those who are informed and concerned and interested and are looking for some alternative to come along. Certainly when that alternative does not appear, most will fall back to their left of center or right of center choices. But that does not mean that they are satisfied with the lack of choice that they see. It is more of an indictment of the current state of our politics.