Trump's Big CON: He is a Performance Artist (AKA It's All About the Show, Explained, CONt. Part 4)

UPDATE:  "For his entire life, Trump has made grandiose promises and ominous threats — and rarely delivered on any. When he was in business, Reuters found, he frequently threatened to sue news organizations for libel, but the last time he followed through was 33 years ago, in 1984. Trump says that he never settles cases out of court. In fact, he has settled at least 100 times, according to USA Today.

In his political life, he has followed the same strategy of bluster. In 2011, he said that he had investigators who 'cannot believe what they’re finding' about President Barack Obama’s birth certificate, and that he would at some point 'be revealing some interesting things.' He had nothing. During the campaign, he vowed that he would label China a currency manipulator, move the U.S. Embassy in Israel to Jerusalem, make Mexico pay for a border wall and initiate an investigation into Hillary Clinton. So far, nada. After being elected, he signaled to China that he might recognize Taiwan. Within weeks of taking office, he folded. He implied that he had tapes of his conversations with then-FBI Director James B. Comey. Of course, he had none.

Even now, as he deals with a nuclear crisis, Trump has made claims that could be easily shown to be false. He tweeted that his first presidential order was to 'modernize' the United States’ nuclear arsenal. In fact, he simply followed a congressional mandate to authorize a review of the arsenal, which hasn’t been completed yet. Does he think the North Koreans don’t know this? . .


'I think Americans should sleep well at night, have no concerns about this particular rhetoric of the last few days,' Tillerson said on Wednesday. This was an unusual, perhaps even unprecedented statement. The secretary of state seems to have been telling Americans — and the world — to ignore the rhetoric, not of the North Korean dictator, but of his own boss, the president of the United States. It is probably what Trump’s associates have done for him all his life. They know that the guiding mantra for him has been not the art of the deal, but the art of the bluff."

Read the Washington Post, Trump has been making ominous threats his whole life.

"This was Trump in his element: At his luxurious private golf club here in Bedminster, the cameras trained on him, his vice president and national security advisers looking on admiringly, he parried queries — at times even gleefully — like a tennis player.

Engaging with people — journalists, advisers, friends and even foes — is Trump’s lifeblood. . .

The president’s exchanges with a small pool of traveling reporters lacked the formality of a full-fledged news conference. (His last was in February.) After each answer, he made eye contact with a reporter, as if to say, 'Gimme another!'

'It was like he was a dam that had suddenly burst free and he was able to unload a lot that was on his mind,' presidential historian Douglas Brinkley said. . .

“This is what [Trump’s new chief of staff, John F. Kelly, a retired four-star Marine Corps general]  will learn very quickly, which is when you put this guy in a cage and think you’re controlling him, things like this happen,” said one Trump confidant, who requested anonymity to speak candidly.

Also watching it unfold on television was Trump biographer Tim O’Brien. The moment, he said, was vintage Trump.

'President Trump is a performance artist and he loves being on stage. .?.?. He was very much Trump unshackled and unfettered and reveling in this moment,' said O’Brien, author of the 2005 book 'Trump Nation: The Art of Being the Donald.' . .

O’Brien said Trump 'was in his element,' but added, 'I don’t think it’s a good thing. Donald Trump in his element is someone who’s living in his own private Idaho, inside his own head. He’s constantly scripting how he sees the world and his role in it.' . .

Trump lives to be in the arena himself, said Sam Nunberg, a former Trump adviser.

'He realizes that the best way for him to control his message is to be the message,' Nunberg said.

Read the Washington Post, ‘When you put this guy in a cage and think you’re controlling him, things like this happen’.