The FOX of old would probably have given him his own show after the election. Would the FOX of today?
Cool. I went to law school with Chris, but I wasn’t aware that he had achieved such notoriety.
Trump has lately been quoting the figure $100mil (gross) as what he’ll spend of his on money on his campaign. He doesn’t even claim to have spent all of it yet though, and might not.
But as was mentioned he forgave loans to the campaign >$50mil. Some campaign spending has been for services from Trump owned entities, but those entities in general have expenses in providing those services, eg. much of $5.6mil paid for use of a plane presumably goes to fuel, salaries, actual depreciation of the plane etc. and even the profit portion might be earned selling the services to somebody else. Unless that is the rates charged for the services were grossly inflated, but that’s a separate fact not given by the various articles claiming Trump isn’t ‘really’ spending that money because some of the services are provided by Trump related entities. Again I think the main variable in the $100mil is whether Trump actually spends it, not the related entities issue; the $50mil+ seems fairly solid at this point.
Thus Trump’s spending is in the general ballpark of Perot’s in 1992 (said to have spent ~$64mil from a fortune of ~$3bil, both in then-dollars). If Trump is really worth $2-$4bil (Forbes and Economist estimates) and spends $50-$100mil, he’s being similarly to perhaps more aggressive. He’s being less aggressive according to his own claim of his net worth, but few believe that claim. Meg Whitman is said to have spent $175mil out of around $2bil in losing the CA’s governor’s race, but there’s yet to be one of these people who really risk spending themselves into poverty. Even though Trump isn’t as rich as he says, and anyone is free to speculate the real number is lower than even Forbes/Economist found, $50-$100mil still isn’t likely to be a life changing amount of money for him.
Neither Meg nor Ross’s empires were built on mountains of debt.
‘Net worth’ means assets minus liabilities including debt. None of those estimates is a gross asset number from which debt still needs to be subtracted. So the spending relative to net worth is apples to apples across the three, with caveat of more controversy what Trump’s NW actually is.
Separately Trump’s NW would be more volatile than the other two if he has more debt relative to gross assets. But it’s not clear Trump is very leveraged. The NYT article on Trump’s debt found a not necessarily exclusive $650mil for ‘companies he owns’, ‘twice the amount that can be gleaned from public filings he made as part of his bid for the WH’. However that’s not very leveraged if $650mil in debt v $2.65bil in assets=$2bil NW as per Forbes and less if $4bil as per Economist. Although again it can’t be proved the NW isn’t less, or the debt more.
But moreover debt of ‘companies he owns’ doesn’t necessarily have recourse to him. That’s the criticism of his walking away from bankruptcies in Trump entities. But it’s a less effectively leveraged position than if he was (legally) personally responsible for that debt. Trump’s financial near death experience in the 90’s was exacerbated by loans he personally gteed to get lower rates. Since then he has apparently be loath to do that, and has shifted his whole business model toward making licensing and TV money off being a ‘famous real estate developer’ rather than actually being one so much.
Three of the factors mentioned above can be used to make political hay: Trump walked away from non-recourse loans (his failed casino’s etc); Trump isn’t really a real estate mogul in recent years as much as playing one on TV and media to make licensing revenue; Trump is a pedal to the metal real estate guy leveraged up the wazoo so $100mil spending of liquid assets on the campaign really could put him up a creek. But there’s some contradiction between the first two and the third, and the third IMO is dubious based on the known evidence.
I agree with this. Perhaps he thought that running would burnish his brand value but it’s had quite the opposite effect. Whatever supporters he has don’t seem to be the sort capable of renting rooms in his hotels or buying apartments in his buildings. We might see these properties rebranded to remove his name.
The FOX of today is so stupid, they don’t realize that they’re propping up their future competition.
Trump News Network is going to take all of the crazies away from FOX. And that’s about 90% of their demographic. FOX is going to have to descend even more into crazy conspiracy-town if they want to maintain viewer share.
One thing I’ve heard is that Trump didn’t take the usual path of giving his money to his campaign fund. Instead he loaned his money to the campaign.
This means that when the campaign is closed, any unspent money in the campaign fund (and there’s apparently a lot of unspent money) can be used to pay off debts - like the loan from Trump. So a lot of the money that people donated to the Trump Campaign to get him elected President is going to end up as Trump’s personal assets.
Trump’s FEC filings showed all loans to his campaign up to at least July as forgiven, which is the $52mil floor number consisting of both forgiven loans and direct contributions from him.
Trump’s more recent statements that he will spend $100mil is subject to verification he actually does.
In the run-up to the first debate, I was doing a little trolling of Trump and the RNC, which was fun but resulted in me being added to their e-mail list for a few days ( I have long since successfully unsubscribed.)
But the running theme in these e-mails was the theme that Donald J. Trump would PERSONALLY match every donation that I made. With great emphasis on “personally”. I hope someone holds his feet to the fire to make sure he really came through on that because I find it hard to believe coming from Mr. Other People’s Money.
Thus transforming them into a $52 million ‘bad debt’, which he can write off from his taxes. And he’s pretty good at not paying taxes.
See "Producers (1967) and remake (2005).
Broadway producers hit upon the idea of making a sure-fire disaster because nobody tries to trace the money with a flop - they only come looking with hits.
So “Flop = free money” and “Hit = having to repay investors”. Hence the “guaranteed flop” entitled “Springtime for Hitler”.
Back when the Trump campaign was announced, I saw a note that the Candidate had “LOANED” the Campaign x million.
Of course, I expect the Party to be renting space in Trump Tower, and is picking up the tab for all planes, trains, and automobiles (incl. buses) with the TRUMP name on them.
Once the buffoon loses, all will be forgotten/forgiven. And Donald will have another Tax Loss to write off more income (that 990-some MILLION of 1995 is probably wearing off, and he needs another massive loss to carry him for another 20 years.
In the movie, Springtime for Hitler turned out to be a hit and the Producers were screwed.
What if Trump 2016 actually works?
I am at a loss for “Why on Earth did this fool actually run for President”.
This is my best guess at this point.
Saw a note that the Old Post Office Building (now a super-luxury hotel) is running a huge dificit since the name TRUMP is now splattered on it and nobody paying $1200 and up/night want to explain why they have the name TRUMP on their hotel key.
You think maybe this loss will somehow show up on his personal taxes?
The analogy is not new, even I worked it a little on here 6 months ago.
But actually I was wrong; beyond the liberal chest beating and that moral indignation facinating things are happening in US politics - like with, say, healthcare people have been taken for a ride for decades on bogus pretexts (‘socialised medicine is unamerican’) about how wonderful the USA system of government is when, in reality, it’s close to junk.
Looking at it from distance, you wouldn’t sell it to your neighbour.
So Trump, like Sanders, is symptom of discontent at lack of representation - of the political class for decades feeding at the trough of capitalist self-interest at enormous cost to the people they are allegedly elected, and paid, to represent.
Really not The Producers, for the discontents the issue is more the oligarchy of the 1%: all that liberal chest-beating is so much … self-regard.
two parodies (I can only find the one by the actors that did "The Producers)
have been made and a Google search shows a few articles asking the same question
I see it more like somebody saw Monty Python’s “Election Night Special” sketch, with the Silly Party sweeping into power, and thought it was both real and a great idea.
Forgiven loans to campaigns are treated as contributions for tax purposes, not deductible.
“I, Donald J. Trump, calls for an immediate suspension of IRS activities until our elected officials can figure out what the hell is going on.”
I wish prosecutions of Trump were viable, but I just don’t see it happening. As much as he deserves a prison jumpsuit (Orange is the New Orange), the last thing Clinton needs after she takes office is for Trump’s base to think she’s prosecuting him as political payback (which they’ll believe no matter what state or district puts him on trial.) I can see her encouraging various jurisdictions to withhold charges, to whatever extent she has influence. For the same reason MacArthur spared Hirohito, post-election peace depends on letting this shitbag skate.
That won’t stop the civil lawsuits, though.
And I predict Trump TV will be a major bust. Glen Beck had a pretty big following when he left Fox but his “network” is circling the drain. Being the presidential choice for millions of people doesn’t necessarily make you their news broadcaster choice. Just ask Al Gore.
And a charitable Foundation can’t make donations in lieu of fines you would have to pay after being caught violating the law. Yet somehow the Trump Foundation did, and the IRS allowed it.
Apparently, when you’re rich, “You can do anything”. To quote Donald Trump.
I still think it’s useful info to point out that you’re not allowed to deduct campaign contributions, forgiven loans are contributions, and there’s case law saying so where people tried; the previous poster didn’t seem aware of that as I read the post.