From Jon Perr at Perrspectives:
From the beginning of his unlikely quest for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination, Donald Trump has enjoyed the strong backing of those GOP voters who say they want a successful businessman in the White House. After only his outsider status, Gallup polling showed earlier this year, backers of the real estate mogul turned reality TV star cited his record as a “good businessman” as the leading factor driving their support. A staggering 64 percent of those surveyed said Trump would be the best Republican candidate on the economy and jobs; 61 percent claimed he would best handle the federal budget deficit.
Anecdotes from the campaign trail support those numbers. While casino magnate and Republican sugar daddy Sheldon Adelson jumped on the bandwagon by explaining, “Trump is a businessman; I am a businessman,” one GOP acolyte boasted “ONLY TRUMP has ever BUILT any REAL THINGS.” Another showed he had completely drunk the Kool-Aid:
“We want to give a businessman the chance to prove that this country can be great again!”
But a recent survey of Fortune 500 CEO’s found that the leaders of America’s largest companies surprisingly prefer Democrat Hillary Clinton over The Donald by a 58 to 42 percent margin.
I have heard more people say that they want someone that is “outside of the political establishment” for president far more than anyone saying they want a businessman.
That said, I am somewhat skeptical about the ethical business practices of Donald Trump regardless.
As for him being an outsider, well that is laughable. He has hobnobbed with politicians and contributed to their campaigns in order to get favorable results for his businesses for decades. Indeed, he is so well connected, that he even had President Clinton and Democrat-nominee-for-president Clinton attend his wedding. (Of course Trump was a Democrat and a fellow political traveller back then.)
Trump’s business acumen is questionable; his status as a political outsider is not. He most assuredly is a part of the corrupt political establishment, which means he is part of the problem, and absolutely not the solution for which we are seeking.