Presidential candidate book reviews

PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATEBOOK REVIEWS Judging a candidate by their writings

“The Art of the Deal” by Donald Trump (1987)

Who I’d recommend it to: Aspiring venture capitalists, real estate visionaries, hospitality gurus, political critics and all libertarians

Who I wouldn’t recommend it to: Anyone who isn’t 100% pure-blooded capitalist, students who aren’t innately passionate about business and hospitality and those who believe in ethics-driven politics

Summary: Trump reveals his personal vision of deal-making through a series of accounts of his greatest business ventures and transactions, shining light onto his business methods and inner character as his career progresses and his dominion expands.

The first reasonable question is why I think a 33 year-old book can be used to judge someone and their future. Trump answers this for you in his personal introduction to the audiobook, which he made when it was published in May 2016:

“I don’t do it for the money; I have enough, much more than I’ll ever need. I do it to do it. Deals are my art form. That’s how I get my kicks. My book was made almost 30 years ago and its words still ring true today, in fact truer than ever.”

That solves the question.

We can see the character of the book’s introduction being applied by some of his very first acts of presidency: withdrawing the United States from the Paris Accord, an international agreement on climate change, and withdrawing from the Transpacific Partnership, an economic trade agreement between 11 countries bordering the Pacific Ocean. The deals were not good enough for Trump; different deals would have to be struck.

Now back to the actual book. Let me further clarify who this book is for: those who want the primary aspect of their career to be making deals. Unlike the blanket term “negotiation,” this means top-to-top, head-to-head maneuvering to reach an end-product most to one’s own advantage.

This thins the herd of most business majors – Trump makes it clear in his book he doesn’t work with information systems, he specifically dislikes accountancy and distances himself from “number crunchers,” and he doesn’t himself rely on quantitative marketing skills. He doesn’t manage things either; he invests in hiring the best of the best to manage for him. That leaves us with finance majors.

Trump makes his endgame clear: He wants to sit down in a room with the head of the other organization, play his best positions, move a lot of money around and not walk away until the deal is cemented. The bigger the better, and the sooner it’s over with the sooner he can start making the next deal.

In this book you’ll get business tactics, strategies and personal philosophies: always go to the head of an organization instead of the employees. Vet someone’s personal life before doing business. When in doubt, stick with the proven winner and always send thank you, congratulations and condolences cards.

Some of this may feel generic, but perhaps the success of its source will prove its validity to you.

You’ll also get details into Trump’s style and personal traits, the little things that set him apart from mere mortals like the rest of us. He doesn’t drink. He dislikes parties and small talk. He favors spontaneity over rigid structuring. He has a fixation for cleanliness. Most of all, he believes skill at deal-making is something instinctual that individuals are either born with or incapable of learning.

The bulk of the book consists of detailed accounts of his ventures in establishing an ever-expanding presence in Manhattan, building the Trump Tower, moving into the casino and gaming industry, foraying into professional football franchise ownership, etc. These chapters are reminiscent of case studies from business course textbooks for graduate classes, but with the disadvantage of losing relevance as the decades have passed and the nature of the industry has shifted.

This has mixed tie-ins with being the president of the United States. Who can make bigger deals in the world than the leader of a country with the largest economy and military in the world? The real answer is the same president but with the backing of Congress, the senate and the judiciary system. Business as it is presented in this book has only one divine authority: money. And if money is the god, the company president is the prophet telling the people how to worship.

It turns out presidents don’t only answer to one entity and are at the mercy of an array of political checks and balances. This is where the book is no longer able to keep track of its subject – the uncharted territory is so different from Trump’s stomping grounds in real estate that this book can no longer be an effective indicator of what his future actions might be.

Character

As far as explaining the essence of Trump’s character, this book tells how his charisma and attitude brought him to where he is today. It’s all narrowly focused on what he does best and cares about most. Given that “The Art of the Deal” doesn’t explain much the philosophies or histories of deal-making, it’s a fair assumption that the author believes his own experience is enough to define the art.

“The Art of the Deal” raises the grand question: is Trump making deals on behalf of the United States and for the welfare of its citizens, or, as he stated in this book’s introduction, is he doing it for the sole sake of enjoying making lavish deals?

Verdict

If you’re a fervent Trump political supporter or take Warren Buffet as a role model and you have 15 bucks to spare, download the audiobook and you’ll learn something. If you don’t know who Warren Buffet is or are opposed to shrewd capitalist tactics, you will be at best disinterested and, at worst, repulsed.

PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATEBOOK REVIEWS

Judging a candidate by their writings Scott Campbell | Reporter | @ScottCa81380794

“Conversations with Joe” by Joseph Biden (2019)

Who I’d recommend it to: Joe Biden’s extended family Who I wouldn’t recommend it to: I feel everyone else can sit this one out since I’ve got you covered. Summary: Through audio excerpts from a series of interviews Biden took while touring the country in the fall of 2017, Biden candidly addresses his political views, personal life and future plans with leaders from a diverse variety of fields.

It’s a little bit of a cheat to call this a book in the traditional sense. It’s a series of edited conversations Biden held throughout his 29 city U.S. tour with a variety of industrial innovators, artists, writers and performers. Think of the audiobook as an interview-based documentary without a narrow focus, but also not quite an autobiography.

One of my first questions before starting the audiobook was about why Biden talks the way he does. Throughout his campaign he’s had some stick-out moments: rambling past his train of thought and away from the subject at hand, calling a voter a “dog-faced pony soldier” (compliment?) and challenging another voter to a pushup contest. The current president has attacked his demeanor by referring to him as “Sleepy Joe.”

His conversations throughout this compilation shed light on this for me. When he addresses an audience, he speaks just the same as he does in a one-on-one interview or conversation with a friend. I would describe it as a “stream of conscious” style that works better when he receives and responds to reactions than in a speech where he’s the only one talking.

This style naturally befits the interview format of “Conversations with Joe.” We all knew going in that he would discuss things like being a champion of the middle class, having a close relationship with Barack Obama, encouraging youths to be active in local government and the like. It’s a politician’s prerogative to show us the best side of themselves the entire time, and these are the aspects he’s consistently shown. I think the intention of using interviews instead of writings is that

Courtesy: Amazon

it would show us how he feels when talking about these topics, not just what he has to say.

Character

A large portion of the substance of these interviews is about Biden’s family life, specifically the death of his son Beau Biden to brain cancer in 2015. Another large part of the discussion is about his memoir “Promise Me Dad: A Year of Hope, Hardship and Purpose,” which is also about his son’s death. These subjects cater to a specific audience but still provide a window into his character, which from what I can tell is a vibrantly positive, personable and idealistic civil servant. The real bamboozle is the consistency of the interviewers — there hardly are any. There’s billionaire philanthropist Melinda Gates, award-winning actor Leslie Odom Jr., The Late Show host Stephen Colbert, fiction author John Green and 14 other distinguished persons from a wide assortment of fields. This variety of unique characters is great, and it might lead you to think there are going to be as many unique conversations, but the array of topics doesn’t fluctuate very much.

For some conversations, there just isn’t enough back-and-forth. If the interviewer only ekes out four questions in a 20-minute session, there’s no interplay between personalities and the author might as well be reading from an email. This even stings expectations a little. With interviewers like Constance Wu, actress and the star of “Crazy Rich Asians,” I was hoping to hear some of what the former vice president’s thoughts on the film or entertainment industries are, but instead he spends the bulk of the conversation regaling her with the account of how they sacked Bin Laden.

The conversations also have a lot of fluff about miscellaneous things like Irish heritage and Thanksgiving dinner traditions – things I can’t imagine anyone besides a professional biographer wanting to know. They’re nice little details if you’re really trying to truly understand every nook and cranny of his character, but certainly nothing you should feel guilty for fast-forwarding over.

Let me wrap up with addressing my initial mission for the review: what insight have I gained into the essence of Joe Biden’s character? Not as much as I’d hoped, to be honest. The diversity of content just isn’t enough. Within the first few interviews, you can tell what kind of person Biden is; the rest just reinforces and adds minute details to it. Repetition for the sake of emphasis is understandable, but at some points it’s just Biden telling the exact same advice over again to different people.

Verdict

“Conversations with Joe” provides a lot of the same information and probably won’t change many minds about the author.