The race for the 2016 Republican nomination for the US presidency, “already as jammed as a Tokyo subway car”, has become a lot more so, now that Donald Trump and “his enormous ego” have entered the competition, says David Horsey in the LA Times.
Declaring his candidacy from the heights of the Trump Tower, his speech “fulfilled the hopes of comedians and cartoonists” across the US. America, he said, is the “world’s biggest sucker” and he is the guy to change that; Mexican immigrants are, in the main, a “horde of criminals, drug dealers and rapists”, so he will build a Great Wall on the southern border and make Mexico pay for it.
Yet despite his slight grasp of “political complexities”, he may still have a “significant impact” on the nomination process. A “stage-savvy bully” like Trump could provoke “more credible but overly scripted candidates” into damaging their prospects by doing or saying things they regret.
At present, Trump is polling well enough to land a place in the national televised Republican debate in August, says The New York Times. If he does, his “TV skills” could lead to a memorable performance that keeps him in the media spotlight. He has said he has no regrets about anything he said in his 45-minute kick-off speech, which, according to Newsweek, managed to insult not only America, but Canada, China, Japan, Mexico, John Kerry and free trade enthusiasts.
Neither the insults nor the inaccuracies matter much, says Sam Leith in the Financial Times. “Picking fights can be effective.” A speech is “not necessarily less powerful because it makes no sense”. George W Bush was “notorious for confusion on the stump” and it didn’t affect his success. “Transcripts do not tell you much about the effect of oratory on the ear.”
It is ridiculous to suppose that “The Donald” might one day be president, but as Trump himself observed in one of his management books, Jimmy Carter made it. Why? Because, “poorly qualified as he was for the job, Carter had the nerve, the guts, the balls, to ask for something extraordinary”. Trump is “doing that for sure”.