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In the
Art of the Deal, Trump talks openly about how he learned to manipulate the media. “One thing I’ve learned about the press is that they’re always hungry for a good story, and the more sensational the better.”
His example is land he bought in the Upper West Side of Manhattan in 1985, known as Television City. He boasted that he would build the world’s tallest building there. He never did, but the resulting media buzz increased the value of the land, so Trump claims. (In reality, Trump
blew a chance to sell it for $550 million and was compelled to bow out of the project by his lenders.)
Trump has talked big about health care but he’s done little proactively. Yes, he’s made a point of holding rallies as president, but those appear to be more about chasing the adrenaline high and adulation of campaigning than building public support for the bill. Where were the town halls to win over a public skeptical on the health care bill? Why no prime time television address to tout it? The White House press office has followed suit, mainly playing defense on the bill. Trump says he refuses to
‘own’ Obamacare. But did he ever even own Trumpcare?
At some point, Trump concedes in
The Art of the Deal, you have to “deliver the goods”: “You can’t con people, at least not for long. You can create excitement, you can do wonderful promotion and get all kinds of press, and you can throw in a little hyperbole. But if you don’t deliver the goods, people will eventually catch on.”
At one point, in the depth of his frustration last week, Trump flirted with policy—and likely also political—suicide:
let Obamacare fail completely, he said, presumably so the resulting widespread misery will drive Democratic lawmakers to eventually come to him begging for compromise. He then turned around and lectured GOP lawmakers on the perils of
‘inaction.’ Trump is now pressing for a vote on the repeal-only bill before the August recess—and before the American people have more time to catch on.
