TRUMP, LEADERSHIP AND THE DANGER OF DEAL CHASING

Before I jump into last night’s hostile and canceled Donald Trump for President rally in Chicago — an outcome that’s not surprising, but still amazing, in how The Donald’s $50,000 campaign contribution to embattled Mayor Rahm Emanuel didn’t generate a positive return on investment in the form of adequate police protection to ensure a safe event — I want to talk about the time I bought a case of wine from 2 bankers who owned and operated a wine store, where a dear friend with a business relationship with the store owners recommended that I make a visit.

Just after purchasing 12 bottles of wine on my first trip to the establishment and spending a not-so-trivial amount of money during the transaction, I noticed that the store had convenient, six-pack cardboard bottle carriers — items which other stores provide free of charge when someone purchases a case of wine.

The Banker Twosome didn’t share the same customer service vibe.

Driven by the apparently deep, mental programming from their previous banking gigs, they saw nothing more or less than an add-on sales opportunity to the deal they just closed, and wanted to charge me five dollars for each carrier.

Placed a different way, their focus on closing an incremental deal in that moment, albeit a $10 one, couldn’t help them to see how they placed a few hundred dollars of their most immediate revenue at risk, not to mention the forfeiture of future revenue they could receive from me.

My first instinct was to return all the bottles I just purchased for a refund, but I thought about my friend and then decided to chill. I obviously never went back for more Banking Twosome deals.

The duo couldn’t help it, and neither can Trump. His longstanding deal mentality, which makes him blind or willfully ignorant of nearly all strategic implications in his pursuit of a tactic, exists in many of us. And Trump knows it.

Hell, I know of people whose social roadmaps have been charted by what they’ve learned during business school lectures. They spend their waking moments viewing life as an array of deals.

For example, I listened to two of these hopeless dealmakers brag about how their strategic business planning skills will put them on the winning side of their pending divorce cases.

And I’m saying “Knee-grow. You. Are. Going. Through. A. Divorce … ”

Wouldn’t life be simpler if all complex issues can disappear, and conversely, all upside benefits can be realized, through a deal?

After all — as Trump followers’ logic may go — if getting good deals work for an experienced, billionaire deal maker like Trump, why can’t deals work for the rest of us?

Given that investment in mass belief, Trump’s followers have effectively become enablers to his targeted deal of the moment: clinching the Party of No Brains‘ nomination.

In return, Trump’s followers — many of whom have legitimate reasons for being pissed with the particularly nasty economic transition this country has taken during the past 35 years — also want a deal: to make things like they were.

“Like they were” can mean many things to Trump supporters.

For many, this past can mean full employment, strong wages, domestic production and trade surpluses.

But for many other supporters, thoughts of religious hatred, a Ku Klux Klan renaissance and violently putting all people of color “in their places” are high priorities.

Which means channeling the anger and fears of these Americans who feel disenfranchised into Trump’s deal enablers is much more complex and dangerous than wine bottles.

Last night’s episode, like the serial acts of violence which seem to accompany Trump rallies, should make The Donald think the time has come for a responsible leadership instinct to take over and admonish everyone to assume less belligerent behavior going forward.

But we’re not going to see that kind of leader in Trump, based on the tweet he let fly this morning:

Trump remains all about the nomination deal, even if his supporters have to draw or shed blood, I suppose.

So, let’s say Trump not only gets his deal but also becomes President of the United States.

Again, this is a supposition.

Then what?

His supporters, particularly the most violent racists of the bunch, will feel a sense of empowerment to persecute, sanctioned by the White House.

Then what?

At some point, perhaps after a considerable amount of blood has been spilled, the right wing extremists may sooner or later realize that America’s underlying problem runs deeper than a few immigrants and people of color; that the very people they despise are not the cause of White poverty; that China and Russia are operating on a geopolitical level much higher than estimated during the Presidential campaign; that the President these “patriots” supported has a policy substance as empty as the first time he promised to “Make America Great Again.”

Then what?

Or, what if Trump doesn’t get his deal? Do you think the right-wing extremists, who were drawn into the village, have immediate plans to peacefully return to the castle?

Then what?

Trump will move on to the next deal.

Then what?

song currently stuck in my head: “whatever happened to gus (word to the drums remix)” – medeski, martin & wood feat. guru