The Swamp fears Donald Trump, With Good Reason

As we all know, Democrats and the Swamp hate Donald Trump.  They probably hate him more than any president ever.  Those elites, including celebrities, journalists and politicians used to love Trump, with thousands of them smiling and taking pictures of him over the years. But not anymore.

All of that changed in 2015 when he decided to run for president.  It wasn't that he was running for president that made him enemy number one, but rather because he was running for president as a Republican.

But of course being a Republican wasn’t always the polarizing factor that it became in 2015 and beyond.  Sure, the media disliked Bush and McCain and Romney, but they were OK because they were all within the acceptable limits of what could be tolerated and controlled.  Trump was and is something altogether different. 

To understand why he was and is different, look at the people at the heart of the Swamp, the government.

Nancy Pelosi, is 84 years old with 47 years in politics & government, a Political Science major with no experience in the private sector.

Chuck Schumer, 74 years old, 49 years in government, a lawyer with no private sector experience.

Hakeem Jeffries, 54 years old, 17 years in govt. A lawyer with no private sector experience.

Joe Biden, 82 years old, 50 years in government, a lawyer with zero private sector experience.

Bernie Sanders, 83 years old, 53 of which were in politics and government, a Political Science major who held a smattering of odd jobs prior to joining government.

Adam Schiff, a 64 year old lawyer who’s spent 38 years in government with zero private sector experience.

Pete Buttigieg, 42 years old, 12 years in government, a Political Science major who spent 3 years working for consulting giant McKinsey & Co. mostly working with NGOs and corporations.  He was in the Navy and did a stint in Afghanistan.

AOC is a 35 year old Econ and International Relations major who’s spent 8 years in government and whose private sector experience is that of a bartender.

Gavin Newsom, a 57 year old Political Science major who’s spent 27 years in government and who in 1992 was brought in by his friend, Gordon Getty, as the co-founder of PlumpJack Winery in Napa, California.   

Elizabeth Warren, a 75 year old lawyer who’s spent 30 years in government and has zero private sector experience.

And it’s not just Democrats…

Mitch McConnell is an 82 year old lawyer who’s spent 50 years in government and never held a private sector job.

Kevin McCarthy is a 59 year old MBA who worked in government for 37 years and sold sandwiches out of his uncle’s yogurt shop while in college.

Paul Ryan is a 54 year old Political Science and Economics graduate who spent 28 years in government before retiring to become a lobbyist in 2019.  He was a waiter and fitness trainer in college.

So there you have it, of the dozen or so most powerful people in American government & politics, only one has any real experience in running a business (Newsom) and that business was funded by one of the richest men in the world at the time.  But somehow they’re the ones making the laws that increasingly impact the businesses that employ every American, and indeed the lives and communities of every single American.   

For these people, government is virtually everything in life.  For most of them, they know nothing about the private sector, the thing that powers America.  They know nothing about running a business, creating jobs, meeting payroll, and perhaps most importantly, doing all of those things while risking everything and while trying to abide by a stultifying labyrinth of ever changing government regulations from an endless array of agencies. 

None of them, aside from Newsom, has built anything of any consequence.  They have no experience of what it’s like to be in business, where 86% of employed Americans work, run a business or be an entrepreneur, the economic fount of America. For most of their adult lives none of them had to worry about the solvency of their next paycheck. Their healthcare plans and those of their families and their employee’s families weren’t resting on their success.  They’ve not had to worry about selling enough products or services in order to keep the lights on, the employees’ paid and fresh product on the shelves or services in the pipeline.  Worrying about and conquering those pressures are what created America’s prosperity. Those are the things that fund the paychecks Americans pay taxes out of that the government turns around and redistributes.  Those are the things that make most Americans’ lives better than those of almost every person in human history. It’s those things, not government…and the people arrayed against Donald Trump have virtually no experience with any of it.

But Trump, he has it in spades.  He’s built giant hotels in the midst of economic turmoil.  He’s done so having to deal with unions, mafia, government regulators, contractors, competitors, bankers and more.  He’s built hotels, golf courses, casinos, apartment buildings, communities and more around the world.  He owned the Miss USA and Miss Universe pageants.  He was a founding member of the USFL, a competitor to the NFL.  He was the star and producer of the Apprentice, the business focused reality show that averaged 14 million viewers per episode for its first six years.  Sure, Trump’s had failures, bankruptcies and lots of lawsuits, but you don’t accomplish anything without risking those outcomes.  He’s failed plenty of times, but he’s succeeded far more often.  He’s created companies that have made millions of paycheck deadlines, that have fed tens of thousands of families and have generated billions of dollars in revenue. 

Donald Trump accomplishes things.  Not only without government, but usually in spite of government.  Maybe the best example of this is his renovation of Wollman Rink, a project that had languished for six years in the hands of the NYC government, who wasted $13 million working unsuccessfully on the project.  Trump completed it in a matter of months, and under budget. And that’s what scares them the most. The Swamp cannot afford to let Donald Trump, on the world’s biggest stage, show Americans that they don’t need government to succeed, that problems can be solved without government “help” and to demonstrate that many times, government is actually the problem. If you’re in the government business, that’s a bad thing because as anyone who’s ever picked up a history book knows, Americans, when unshackled from government regulation, can do extraordinary things. And once they’re reminded of that, all bets are off. 

The last time Trump was president he said he was going to drain the Swamp.  He didn’t. The truth is, he had no idea how deep or wide the Swamp was and is. Most of us didn’t.  Now he does and now we do.  This time he’ll be under no illusions about what he’s up against, and ideally, will act accordingly.  The Swamp knows that. They see the writing on the wall. And it terrifies them.