Russell Simmons penned an open letter to his friend Donald Trump recently, addressing criticism he has lobbed at the Republican front runner and pleading with his friend to stop traveling down whatever path he has chosen to get to this point:
Stop the bullsh*t. Stop fueling fires of hate. Don’t feed into the rhetoric created by small-minded people. You’re smarter and certainly more loving then you let on. The Republicans in power don’t like you any more than the Democrats in power, as they know you can’t be controlled, because you are your own man. You have been many people’s champ in the past, but now you are becoming a major embarrassment. I know the cheap seats are easy to play to, but you can get them just by being the man I have known for nearly 30 years.
And when you look back over Donald Trump’s career in the spotlight, you see he has rubbed shoulders and befriended many that would likely be at odds with him right now. Even stranger, Trump of the past may very well be at odds with his current self. In fact, it’s a tale of two campaigns and two different strategies when it comes to the road to the White House.
Travel back to 1999, when Trump was running for the seat at the head of the Reform Party as an Independent candidate. This was in the years after Ross Perot and it pitted Trump against the equally loud and politically difficult Pat Buchanan. You probably remember Buchanan as the candidate who garnered some meaningful votes in Florida because confused voters couldn’t read the ballots properly. That also means this story has a poor ending for Trump, but it might explain why we’re at this point in 2015 with a louder, more aggressive Trump.
Back during his 1999 bid, Trump is quoted as saying the following about the GOP and his opponent at the time, Pat Buchanan. Take this excerpt from the New York Times for example:
I really believe the Republicans are just too crazy right,” he said when he disclosed that he would register this week with the Independence Party, the New York version of the Reform Party. He said he would begin meeting with Reform Party officials in the next few months and make a final decision by March about whether to run.
Mr. Trump, who has never been a political candidate, clearly timed his announcement to target Mr. Buchanan, acidly denouncing him on the NBC News program ”Meet the Press” as the candidate of the ”really staunch right wacko vote.”
”Look, he’s a Hitler lover,” Mr. Trump said, alluding to the recent debate over Mr. Buchanan’s view that in World War II Hitler initially presented no serious threat to the United States.
”I guess he’s an anti-Semite,” Mr. Trump said, raising an accusation Mr. Buchanan has repeatedly denied in his career as White House strategist and talk show polemicist. ”He doesn’t like the blacks, he doesn’t like the gays,” Mr. Trump continued. ”It’s just incredible that anybody could embrace this guy.”
He talks about Buchanan in a way that sounds like many of his fellow candidates today talking about him. And he did it all over, like in these clippings of an interview with Trump posted by Andrew Kaczynski at Buzzfeed:
https://twitter.com/BuzzFeedAndrew/status/674783592317341696
It’s something that makes little sense when you look at where we’re at now with Trump and where he was at then in regards to his beliefs in politics. He even toyed with the idea of running alongside Oprah Winfrey at the time according to an article from Independent Political Report, also highlighting the differences and similarities between his beliefs now and his current slate of goals:
During Trump’s exploratory period, he released a book of his political positions entitled The America We Deserve. Those positions were largely adverse to Buchanan, including a pro-choice stance on abortion, tough prosecution of hate crimes against gays, support for bans on assault rifles, a substantial tax on the assets of the wealthy to pay off the national debt, and universal health care. However, for the most part, it shared Buchanan’s views on fair trade, constraints on immigration, and increased military spending.
The oddest part about the current state of Trump and where he’s pandering to is just how long ago it seemed that he was on a different level politically. As recent as 2009, Trump was praising President Obama during the economic crisis and giving his opinion on the bailout to CNBC:
Well I have great respect for President Obama. I think that he sets the right tone, he’s an intelligent guy, it’s about time we have an intelligent guy in that office. He’s an intelligent guy, you look at him, he knows. The one problem we have is no matter how smart, there’s a certain amount of trial and error. It’s never been done before, it’s never been attempted before. What they’re trying to do now is breaking new ground,
Look also at how much Trump supported the Canadian universal healthcare and a “single pay plan” that was unheard of when proposed during the run up with “Obamacare.”
Now yes, people can change their minds and change their ways. But I think what the past shows for Donald Trump is that he loves himself and what can shine light on his person more than anything. Attention is what runs his engine, be it the fanfare of riding down a golden escaltor to announce he is running for office or an appearance hosting Saturday Night Live in the middle of a campaign. Bad press or good press, the attention is powerful and it keeps him in the headlines — I say this knowing full well that most media entities live and die on it.
There’s still plenty that hasn’t changed about Trump. In the same CNBC interview above, you can see a lot of discussion about candor and honesty that mixes in with discussion about ratings.
Well I think the candor that I have does get me into a little bit of trouble, but I also believe it’s why I get high ratings and other people don’t. When Larry King says, “Please be on my show cause you get my highest ratings”, and things like that and plenty of others say the same thing, I think it’s because I’m honest. I don’t even think it’s candor, I think it’s honesty. I’m a very honest person, and I speak the way I think, I went to the best schools, I did very well at those schools, and I just have figured that over a period of time, honesty is the best policy, and a lot of people say, “Oh, your candor, you’re so out there.” It’s not a question of candor, I’m just saying the truth. But often times, I’ll say things that other people won’t say or don’t want to say, or just can’t say, and it’s honesty and people, I think, like it.
I think that when you are doing something really well and you start getting recognition, the press will start hitting you and they hit you hard. It’s almost, they want to tear you down, and then, by the way, often times they want to build you back up again. But they have fun tearing you down…
I hate bad press when they’re lying and knowing lying. And, and I say that quite a bit. They give you bad press and they know it’s wrong. They know what they’re writing or what they’re doing is wrong. However, if I deserve bad press, I’m a man, I take it like a man, I think it’s fine, but I don’t like it and I don’t think it’s fair when they give it to you when you don’t deserve it.
So is Trump just being Trump and just being honest with how he has changed over the years? Or is it an act by a man who loves the press and learned from mistakes of a previous candidacy? I’m on the fence, but I think there’s dueling stories going on behind the scenes in the Trump camp.
(Via New York Times / Independent Press Report / CNBC / Buzzfeed / Global Grind)