Among the favorite insults that Donald Trumps throws around at his rivals is that they lack the vigor required to perform the job of President of the United States. He has called Jeb Bush “low-energy” and accuses Hillary Clinton of not having the necessary “strength and stamina.” However, these are adjectives that more accurately describe Trump himself.
Politico published a story today that looks at “Donald Trump’s low-energy campaign.” It goes into considerable detail to prove that it is Trump who is so averse to doing any work that he makes all of the other candidates look like film on fast-forward. In the early paragraphs they report that…
“Trump, who once derided Jeb Bush for lacking energy, has done fewer campaign swings than any of his top-tier rivals — 100, versus, for example, Bush’s 172. […] He has held only 27 events in New Hampshire over the course of 22 visits to the state, according to a tally kept by New England Cable News. By comparison, Christie has held 139 Granite State events.”
So Trump is conducting a fraction of the number of events that other candidates are holding. But it’s even worse than that. The events that Trump holds are large rallies that require almost nothing of him. He flies into town on his luxurious private 757 jet, is driven to the hall in the back of a limousine, delivers a speech that he spent no time writing or rehearsing since it’s all off the top of his head (and largely repeats of previous speeches), and then is whisked back to his plane for the ride back to his Manhattan penthouse. He could literally sleep through all of that except for the speech itself (which we sleep through).
This would also explain the complete lack of substance of his campaign. He has not produced a platform other than sloganeering and hollow blathering about building walls, deporting eleven million immigrants, and bombing the hell out of ISIS. In seven months of campaigning he has not explained how he would accomplish any of those goals. He just expects his glassy-eyed disciples to believe in him and nod in agreement. Fortunately for Trump, most of them are more than ignorant and unquestioning enough to do just that.
Trump’s campaign argues that he is reaching more people with his stadium events. That’s true. However, the process of winning primaries involves reaching out to broad constituencies and persuading them to vote for you. The people attending Trump’s rallies are mainly those who are already committed to him in his capacity as a celebrity and are not necessarily voters or even residents of the community or state where the event is held. There is no evidence that he is persuading new people to support him, which would make his rallies virtually pointless. Meanwhile, his opponents are holding smaller events at restaurants and school gymnasiums where they are shaking the hands of locals and working to make converts among people who actually vote and can influence others to do so.
The Trump people also cite the ridiculous amount of media he gets (ridiculous is his word for it). But he was getting that exposure before he started having rallies. And much of his media comes from his interviews on Fox News or Morning Joe. With respect to that, it is further proof that he is a lazy candidate since he rarely appears in the studio, preferring to phone in from his penthouse, in his silk pajamas, and have his intellectually vacant conversations with equally lazy television presenters.
How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.
This perspective reveals that the facade Trump is promoting is just more dishonesty from a candidate who is breaking all records for lying about himself and others (see the Trump Bullshitopedia). It is an old tactic of accusing your opponents of the things for which you are most guilty (projection). And it takes some real chutzpah to call Clinton or Bush lazy when you have done far less than any of the other candidates. But that’s the Trump brand that consists mainly of insulting others and bragging about himself. He’s a textbook case of Narcissistic Personality Disorder, and a slothful one at that.
