Does Trump really want to be president?
Lois Cooke writes: I definitely think he does not want the job again. He looks miserable and depleted. He only won in 2016 because Democrats ran a woman, Clinton. Their fatal error.
He is an old man — six years older than I am, and I’m pretty active and healthy. I wouldn’t swap my freedom in retirement for the US presidency for quids. Statistically, he’s about to hit the big equalising finish line and he’s facing it with a decimated reputation, massive legal expenses and no women by his side.
The stress he will face if he loses is the inability of quashing his criminal convictions and pardoning his felonious mates. The stress of winning is the exhausting and interminable line of matters he must daily oversee (even in his dictatorial and criminal fashion).
All in all — for a near 80-year-old — it’s a pretty depressing scenario.
Meanwhile I will enjoy my piano, walking the dogs and keeping up with the grandchildren, family and friends. Eat your heart out, Donald. You could have had it all.
Peter Hannigan writes: I can just see him wandering around the White House saying he can feel godhood coming upon him — just like Caligula used to do in Rome. It did not end well for Caligula.
Gwen Tran writes: Does Donald Trump really want to rule? I reckon, sort of. He wants to win for sure — he’s campaigning pretty hard to achieve victory again. But to do the work required for the presidential post?
Considering his billionaire backers are excessively powerful, workaholic men, he will likely quietly outsource functions of his “duties” to these men to pen legislation and influence policy (domestic and foreign). They’ll likely be given free reign (because overseeing is actual work) to consort with influential lobbyists and equally powerful groups with controlling interests in industries that will potentially add vast profits to their already well-padded bottom line.
No doubt they will use their own legal teams to propose changes to law, and exert their personal influence to ensure their bills will pass the legislative process. Why else would Elon Musk — a guy who shoots satellites into space — be so active in campaigning if there was not the prospect of significant dollars to his businesses and power for himself?
All of these things can happen at the same time Trump is on one of these beaches he keeps referring to.
Dr Smithy writes: To paraphrase, those presidential pardons ain’t going to grant themselves!
Tony Cartledge writes: You can’t judge Trump’s actions like you would a normal person. You have to judge his actions from the point of view of his mental illness: rampant narcissism with a side of psychopathy. He has an unreasonably high sense of self-importance and requires constant, fawning admiration. He expects to be recognised as superior even without any serious achievements. And he inflates these achievements constantly. He believes he’s superior to others and looks down on others and will screw them over every time, as he’s unable to recognize the needs or feelings of others.
I might have believed the notion that he was surprised and unprepared to win, but not any more. Not now that he’s had a taste.
Now that he knows the power of the office and its limitations, he is in it for the whole shebang: authoritarian control of the country. Regarding its limits, I heard in a recent interview with his former chief of staff Mike Kelly that Trump was surprised that everyone, including the military, didn’t just simply obey his every order. Now he has legions of lackeys ready to change all the laws into simply loyalty to “Done Old”.
He is gearing up for the ultimate show of the adoration his mental illness demands: that he is the supreme leader and everyone must fall to their knees before him. Then he can write the rules over how much actual work he does and how much is devoted to just getting people to love him.
I recently read Ruth Ben-Ghiat’s Strongmen: Mussolini to the Present and Trump is repeating the same playbook of all those rulers because he shares their mental illness. It’s a psychological black hole into which he will drag the whole country in his bottomless demand for adoration and control.
And let’s not forget that if he loses he goes to jail. He wants it real bad now.
Anita Lawrence writes: Donald Trump’s ego has always driven him. His situation is complicated by the fact that he’s a seasoned and compulsive liar who lives on the upper-end of the psychopath spectrum. Losing will hurt, but winning might just hurt more! Citizens of the US should be careful what they wish for.
J Lavarack writes: Whether he does or doesn’t, he really doesn’t have much choice now.
He’s the ideal front man for the extreme right to the extent that it really doesn’t matter what he or his court followers say now. Consider the latest rant from Tucker Carlson about “Daddy Trump” and spanking hormonal teenage daughters, which received a rapturous response from his audience. Beyond belief, except it really happened. Sanity and normal cultural values have gone right out the window.
Hard work? What, watching TV to gauge public opinion and playing golf? Nah!
Ego, self protection, emulating Hitler and being seen as a demigod are probably incentive enough to counter any ennui that might have developed.
Fez writes: Trump definitely wants to be president in order to protect himself from facing criminal charges. If he does win (which looks likely — depending if his credulous base outnumber normal US voters), I imagine that he will be sidelined to a ceremonial role while the faceless beings from Project 2025 will do the actual governing. We live in interesting times…
