Is Trump smart or does his stupidity just play well?

[Echobelly]

DH reckons that, although Donnie Dumptruck is in most ways thick as mince, he has a smartness for how he gets a response from people, that he knows what he's doing when he tweets some aggressive idiocy.

I think he is not intelligent in any way - eg he's not thinking 'If I blame other people for messes I created, that will take attention away from me', which is what DH suggests. I think he is so moronic and childish that he genuinely doesn't believe anything bad is his fault

AIBU for thinking he doesn't know what he's doing, it just happens to play well with people who think Trump represents a successful, smart person? Or is he actually calculating the effects of what he says?

I think we underestimate just how much influence and power money can buy. Trump is 'old money' too and very well connected. Sadly, Obama's second term was rather impotent once he lost the house and along came Trumpy with his massive marketing campaign, witty chants and the feel that he was 'different'. I mean, a megalomaniac is different. Unfortunately, he has shown himself to be completely unqualified for office and is starting to unravel in the face of a global pandemic. The virus has consistently proved him wrong. I wonder how it will all end to be honest.

Smart? No. Extremely self-assured? Yes.

bingo, that study is sponsored by the genesis foundation.

I'm afraid it is indeed a load of complete bollocks.

www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/24/revealed-leader-group-peddling-bleach-cure-lobbied-trump-coronavirus

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miracle_Mineral_Supplement

worse, it's opportunistic, exploitative bollocks.

He is probably the most fluent, persuasive speakers of all the current leaders atm...runs for cover.

Have you ever actually listened to him speak, or read a transcript? Not the edited versions? Unless he's reading from an autocue he can hardly string a coherent sentence together. Persuasive, he clearly is to some but fluent????!

@LunaFabre gosh, he's really got a catch phrase going there!

@nobodyimportant it was sarcasm

He is very intelligent and he knows exactly what he is doing. He is manipulative and he knows exactly how to speak to his base and uses the media to react to his comments, constantly reinforcing the support from his base.

His opponents (and the media) would be much better off just ignoring his comments and reporting a very simplified, non-opinionated version of his comments.

He’s one of those poor little rich kids who seems to always fail upward.
Noone has ever said No to nor let him have to deal with the consequences. Instead he has been bailed out by family money, shady business practices and connections.

This has lead to an Ego needing its own postcode, manipulate nature but little actual smarts (or business sense)

Maryland's emergency hotline had received hundreds of calls in recent days about Mr Trump's comments

In response to people reacting to his comments:

"I can't imagine why," the president said "I can't imagine that."
When asked whether he took responsibility for the increase in calls, Mr Trump replied: "No, I don't."

Well he’s been very successful in business but that might just be down to good time. He inherited a property business late 70s, I get the feeling it was bad public policy rather than his own genius that made him rich.

@Imboredinthehouse bankruptcy is pretty common amongst successful people but trump hasn’t actually gone bankrupt, he’s taken business bankruptcy which means that his business have gone bankrupt. It’s similar to going into administration.

DH has a conspiracy theory that he’s just becone president to avoid being hit with a big tax bill by a Clinton administration. I’m inclined to agree or at least say that of all trump conspiracy theories this is the most plausible, he’s really not taking the whole being president thing seriously.

@Imboredinthehouse bankruptcy is pretty common amongst successful people but trump hasn’t actually gone bankrupt, he’s taken business bankruptcy which means that his business have gone bankrupt. It’s similar to going into administration

It is not a sign of success when your business goes into administration, particularly if you started out with lots of money and then had to be repeatedly bailed out by your father.

Fundamentally he just used it as a way to avoid paying creditors, many of whom were small businesses without access to family funds and lawyers and accountants to get them out of trouble.

He has claimed that tax avoidance and use of chapter 11 is evidence of his financial acumen, but it's doubtful whether he understood the schemes his accountants and lawyers set up.

Nobody knows what his net worth is. Recently he seems to have made most of his income from selling his brand (created by the Apprentice) to dodgy developers whose buildings never get built, and a lot of his property transactions look like money laundering.

I just cannot believe he is still in power.

It’s like he’s been briefed behind the scenes in very basic language
And then can’t remember the big words when he’s in public. So he just carries on with the next bit he can remember

So What comes out of his mouth is an incoherent jumble of incomplete sentences

I wonder if he’s got some form of dementia
I know someone with Alzheimer’s who does exactly this

I don't enjoy listening to him but for those who are highlighting his deficiencies, why do you think he managed to secure the Republican nomination then the Presidency and then somewhat avoid all the trouble when there would appear to be many well-funded, connected, right wing candidates? It's more than the polarisation of the US electorate (they'd vote for any republican in the election) as the Republican machine only swung behind him after he got the nomination.