Newsweek published this story under the headline of "Trump for President?" on September 14, 1987. George Hackett's prediction came true: Thirty years later, in 2017, President Donald Trump is the leader of the United States. In light of his recent domestic and foreign policy blunders, Newsweek is republishing the story.
Think of the traffic jams when Donald J. Trump, future president of the United States, travels to the New York City White House for the weekend. The Secret Service motorcade and police roadblocks will really mess things up around the 68-story Trump Tower, located on one of Fifth Avenue's busiest corners. But perhaps President Trump will thoughtfully avoid the chaos by choosing Trump's Castle, one of his Atlantic City casinos, as his home away from home. Trump could helicopter right to the roof, just like the high rollers do in TV commercials. Still better, the president might choose to enjoy his leisure time at his secluded Palm Beach digs, the 118-room former mansion of cereal heiress Marjorie Merriweather Post, purchased a couple of years ago for $ 7 million.
OK, maybe we're jumping the gun a bit. Just because the billionaire New York developer took out full-page ads in three of the country's most influential newspapers last week attacking America's foreign policy doesn't necessarily mean he's promoting himself as someone who could do a better job. "I just have a great interest in the future of this country," Trump explained. Nor should too much be made of the fact that Trump has scheduled a speaking engagement next month in New Hampshire, site of the first presidential primary. "I'm honored," said Trump, 41, of a fledgling Draft Trump movement in the Granite State. "But I'm just not interested."
Maybe he's not, but the ads certainly sounded like something from the campaign trail. Running in The Washington Post, The New York Times and The Boston Globe, Trump's "open letter" ridiculed the Reagan administration's Persian Gulf policy and demanded that our allies ante up some cash in exchange for all the protection we provide. "The world is laughing at America's politicians as we protect ships we don't own, carrying oil we don't need, destined for allies who won't help," wrote Trump, a Republican. "End our huge deficits, reduce our taxes, and let America's economy grow unencumbered by the cost of defending those [such as Japan and Saudi Arabia] who can easily pay us for the defense of their freedom." The ads cost $ 94,801—or about one three-hundredths of 1 percent of Trump's estimated $ 3 billion net worth.
Draft evader? Perhaps no one was more excited by Trump's tirade than Mike Dunbar, the New Hampshire Republican who is organizing the Draft Trump movement and who invited Trump to speak at the Portsmouth Rotary Club luncheon on Oct. 22. "I'm encouraged," says Dunbar, who has never even talked to Trump. "I have talked to his assistants and nobody said, 'Hey, back off. The guy isn't interested.'"
That's hardly confirmation of a candidacy. But why else would Trump publish the ads and take the trip to New England? One prominent New Yorker thinks he has the answer. Says longtime Trump antagonist Mayor Ed Koch: "He's going to stroke his own ego."
Uncommon Knowledge
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
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