David Brooks, as quoted in "Shields and Brooks on the GOP push to stop Trump" http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/shields-and-brooks-on-the-gop-push-to-stop-trump/ (4 March 2016), PBS NewsHour
2010s
“For all the promises Trump is breaking, there is one he has kept without wavering: his vow to be unpredictable. … Some suggest that there is a method to Trump’s madness, that he is trying to make would-be adversaries think he is irrational and capricious, thereby making foes and rivals wary of pushing him too far. … But in Trump’s application of the Madman Theory there seems to be less theory than madman. There may be advantages to keeping foes and opponents off guard, but Trump is baffling friends and allies, too. In foreign affairs, unpredictability spooks allies and spreads instability. And unpredictable policy at home has long been seen as toxic for business. … The widespread chaos suggests Trump isn’t signaling new policies as much as he’s winging it. His unpredictability is not a theory. It’s the absence of one.”
Trump’s one consistent policy: Chaos https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/trumps-one-consistent-policy-chaos/2016/12/06/f1a5a5ae-bbf7-11e6-91ee-1adddfe36cbe_story.html?utm_term=.f664c9ebc888, The Washington Post (December 6, 2016)
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Dana Milbank 3
American journalist 1968Related quotes
2010s, 2016, Donald Trump and the fitness threshold (2016)
Context: Donald Trump, the man who defied every political rule and prevailed to win his party’s nomination, last week took on perhaps the most sacred political rule of all: Never attack a Gold Star family. Not just because it alienates a vital constituency but because it reveals a shocking absence of elementary decency and of natural empathy for the most profound of human sorrows — parental grief.
Why did Trump do it? It wasn’t a mistake. It was a revelation. It’s that he can’t help himself. His governing rule in life is to strike back when attacked, disrespected or even slighted. To understand Trump, you have to grasp the General Theory: He judges every action, every pronouncement, every person by a single criterion — whether or not it/he is “nice” to Trump.
Twitter post http://www.examiner.com/article/lindsey-graham-better-for-a-democrat-to-win-the-white-house-than-donald-trump (August 2015)
2010s
Wikinews interviews three figures from Donald Trump's political past (October 2015)
2016, In Trump We Trust: E Pluribus Awesome! (2016)
2016, Remarks on Donald Trump and the 2016 race
Presidential campaign (April 12, 2015 – 2016), Speech in Warren, Michigan (August 11, 2016)
“Existence proofs always trump theory. That’s engineering.”
Source: Short fiction, The Man Who Sold The Moon (2014), p. 135
Donald Trump, America’s modern Mussolini https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/donald-trump-isnt-todays-wendell-willkie-hes-todays-benito-mussolini/2015/12/08/77c81b0c-9ddc-11e5-a3c5-c77f2cc5a43c_story.html, The Washington Post. (8 December 2015)
Speech at the National Press Club http://www.press.org/sites/default/files/20161031_thiel.pdf (October 31, 2016)