Monday, August 29, 2016

The Clinton camp believes that Mr. Trump is most insecure about his intelligence, his net worth and his image as a successful businessman, and those are the areas they are working with Mrs. Clinton to target. http://mobile.nytimes.com/2016/08/30/us/politics/hillary-clinton-donald-trump-debate.html

How interesting. I never would have placed IQ at the top, assuming that that is a rank-ordering, or even on the list; net worth is a twist I wouldn't have shouted for on his taxes, and, now let's read this carefully, "his image as a successful businessman." So, not "his success as a businessman," his "image."

Intelligence: "I went to all the best schools," he said in Iowa; "I guarantee you I am smarter than he is," he said of Jon Stewart upon being skewered as Fuckface von Clownstick; Marco Rubio really got under Trump's skin by joking about Trump's misspelled Tweets, which Trump corrected, as he did to his misspelling of Dwyane Wade's name; "They used to laugh at me."  Drumpf: so close to dumb, or dummkopf.

"If Trump hadn't inherited his money he would be selling watches on a Manhattan street." That was another Marco Rubio sizzler that went directly to Trump's "image as a successful businessman," as did Mitt Romney's speculation that Trump's tax returns would show a man comparatively net worthless, a double whammy blow to his "image."

The aim of this psychological profiling is not to contrast Hillary Clinton as smarter, worth more, or a more successful businessperson, read carefully: Those are what Trump is "most insecure" about and the aim is to needle Trump into going Full Trump in the first debate.

Very interesting stuff.

The Clinton campaign was the source for most of the information in this article. Why would they do that? To work on Trump, certainly. It is planted information; as such it may be disinformation. But it doesn't read as disinformation. It reads pretty as intelligent strategy. They don't give much away. Lot of ground in intelligence, net worth is precise if currently unknowable, image as successful businessman covers some ground, as well. So, they don't reveal campaign secrets.

However much it was intended to work on Trump, there is also another person it was intended to work on: the moderator. He or she seeks advice from colleagues on which topics to address, which questions to ask. This is an article published in America's quasi-official newspaper of record. The New York Times published this as a message to the moderator. It would take uncommon deftness on the candidate's part to push Trump's buttons to send his inner ghoul skyward. George H.W. Bush could not have asked Michael Dukakis the rape-and-murder-your-wife question that exposed Dukakis as an automaton. Moderator Bernard Shaw could and did. This article is multi-focused in its targets.