Tag: Donald Trump

Trump Again Triggers the Instinct to Destroy Stuff

Trish

There’s something about Donald Trump that makes people want to beat things, and this ad from a Van Nuys, Calif. Nissan dealer is proof. The ad, which has been condemned by Nissan corporate, shows a sales manager nicknamed, “The Ladies’ Man” beating a pinata of a man in a suit with a generous topping of blonde hair.

After store managers hit the piñata, Van Nuys General Sales Manager Martin Cuevas declares, “Aqui en Van Nuys Nissan, los Latinos mandan.” (Translation: “Here at Van Nuys Nissan, Latinos rule.”)

Nissan quickly condemned the ad.

[…]

Mark Cuban: Trump Is the Best Thing to Happen to Politics

Buck Banks

I don’t care what his actual positions are. I don’t care if he says the wrong thing. He says what’s on his mind. He gives honest answers rather than prepared answers. This is more important than anything any candidate has done in years.

— Billionaire Mark Cuban, telling Business Insider that Donald Trump is “probably the best thing to happen to politics in a long, long time.”

Profiling Trump’s Lieutenants

Buck Banks

Trump’s key lieutenants tend to fit the same consumer profile that his discount luxury brand targets: They are men with middle- and working-class roots; lacking in elite credentials; mesmerized by made-for-TV displays of lavish wealth. They are impressed with brashness and bored by subtlety. They are amused by dirty jokes and averse to irony. They are likely to buy a Trump-branded necktie sometime this year, and if they feel like splurging they’ll get the matching cufflinks, too.

— McKay Coppins writes on Buzzfeed.

HuffPo to Treat Trump as Entertainment, Not Politics

Buck Banks

After watching and listening to Donald Trump since he announced his candidacy for president, we have decided we won’t report on Trump’s campaign as part of The Huffington Post‘s political coverage. Instead, we will cover his campaign as part of our Entertainment section… Our reason is simple: Trump’s campaign is a sideshow. We won’t take the bait. If you are interested in what The Donald has to say, you’ll find it next to our stories on the Kardashians and The Bachelorette.

— The Huffington Post, announcing it would no longer cover the candidate as a political story.

This Quote Is Good for Trump

Buck Banks

Let me be clear: Trump will not be the president of the United States. But I firmly believe that Trump not only knows that, he doesn’t want to be president. Trump is brand-building. This is all free publicity for a salesman in the business of selling himself. … There is a cottage industry among some public people that is breathing new life into the adage ‘all press is good press.’ These people use ignobility as an elevator; they inflame their way to infamy. They get the country talking and their names trending, then they turn that cultural currency into hard currency. … Every minute Trump is on your television screen, it’s good for Trump. Every time Trump’s name is mentioned on social media, it’s good for Trump. Every time someone writes about Trump, it’s good for Trump. This column is good for Trump.

— Charles Blow, in the New York Times.

Cook Looks at a Post-Trump Election

Buck Banks

It’s still a great question how this Republican nomination race will sort out once this Trump nonsense ends. The GOP splits roughly 60-40 these days: 60 percent of its voters are pretty conventional, mainstream Republicans, while the other 40 percent are of a somewhat more exotic variety, up from just a third a decade ago. This latter group is made up of three subgroups: secular, anti-establishment, tea-party adherents; evangelical conservatives driven chiefly by cultural issues; and those who are just really conservative and more ideologically driven than your normal garden-variety Republicans. … Historically, this collection of less-conventional Republicans has loomed large in Iowa, then gradually given way to more-mainstream GOP voters in the final stretch, but the harder-edged Republicans have been on the ascendency and may play an even greater role in choosing the nominee this time around than in the past.

— Charlie Cook