King Donald: And Other Rich People

 King Donald: And Other Rich People

I have just completed an 80-year study of rich people. This complex study comes at a fortuitous time where we now accept unscientific conjecture based solely on opinions, observations, and personal bias without question. This study falls into this unscientific study category so it must all be true and anyone who doubts its authenticity will be fired, their businesses will be threatened, and they will be placed on the official naughty list for all time. “All time” here refers to a period that lasts from forever to any point where a sincere change of heart brings you to accept all that I say.

I have been observing rich people for a very long time. Granted there were few observations early on when my world consisted mostly of family where wealth was fleeting and came only when you found some loose change between the couch cushions. “Found” money was more valuable as it could be spent on almost anything non-essential. These early years provided a foundation for my study of rich people as it is always good to have a control group that lacks the qualities you are seeking to analyze.

The term “rich” is relative. If you are a relative of mine, you don’t have any money. If you have more money than me or my relatives, you could be rich. Almost everyone I knew in my first neighborhood was “middle class” and therefore had enough to live a comfortable life and occasionally take a vacation away from that comfortable life. By the time I reached high school I was able to observe that there were a select few who had more “things” than I could afford. They wore clothes that didn’t come from JC Pennys, Sears, or hand-me-downs from relatives with older kids or the church bazaar. They had their own cars and could drive those cars on dates and go places I couldn’t afford. How does a gawky kid compete with someone who drives a new Corvette Stingray when all you can do is borrow your mother’s 1956 Buick?

There was a fictional TV series in the late 50s where a wealthy man gave away, tax free, one million dollars to ordinary people. The one stipulation was that they couldn’t tell anyone where the money came from. The show then revolved around the dramatic changes in their lives, some for the better but often with negative results. This was, after all, the Golden Age of Television.

While in college I was further exposed to people with more wealth. I got a job parking cars at the Boca Raton Hotel and Country Club. I would observe golfers paying other golfers when they gambled on individual holes. I saw and drove my first Rolls Royce’s. One early observation was that, if you had lots of money, you had to let others know that you had lots of money. It would seem that, if you didn’t flaunt your success, you couldn’t enjoy your wealth.

One such character at the country club called himself a “Count.” He wore an ascot and a dress jacket. In his right pocket he kept one-dollar bills folded and rolled into tight balls. If a staff member called him Count where others might hear, he would flip them a dollar bill. In his left pocket he had five-dollar bills also rolled into balls. These were reserved for those times when a staff member could spot “The Count” across a crowded room and yell for all to hear, “Hey Count” or some similar greeting that would force all eyes in his direction. This didn’t happen often but everyone on staff knew of a few successful five-dollar tips. To put five dollars in perspective for the mid-sixties, a typical tip for someone who just delivered your car to the front of the hotel was a quarter.

During my working career I again had the opportunity to study the very rich. For one year I worked for the Chevrolet Motor Division of General Motors in Miami. My job was more social than business oriented as it was my assigned task to make arrangements for visiting executives and guests of these powerful people when they were in South Florida. This involved getting new fleet cars from dealerships, picking them up at the Executive Airport and arranging for their entertainment. One GM executive always demanded that he be taken to Joe’s Stone Crab Restaurant where he refused to wait for a table. If you know of Joe’s, they don’t take reservations for anyone. To get “Lord Harry” his rushed accommodations at Joe’s, we would have to call the Miami Beach dealership (Potamkin) owner who knew, and one can assume paid, a few Beach commissioners, who then forced Joe’s to alter their policy for this one person. It was Harry’s way to flaunt his wealth and importance.

"Yes, but I have something he will never have—enough” This phrase is from an anecdote where Kurt Vonnegut tells Joseph Heller that their billionaire host made more money in a day than Heller’s novel, Catch-22 will ever make. The quote is Heller’s reply. This brings me to my last observation of the wealthy. That is that they are like sharks that need to constantly swim to stay alive. The very wealthy must always be gathering more wealth, or they die, or perhaps that is when you know that they are dead. They are never happy regardless of how much they own. There is no satiating their appetite, they always want more and more.

Enter Donald Trump. I bet you were wondering when I would get around to him. He just makes my case. He is a materialistic insatiable billionaire who now has access to more untold wealth than he could have ever dreamed of. There is real estate, merchandise, bitcoin, crypto, jet planes, gold trophies, and more, much more. He has to be like a kid in a candy store not knowing which colorful treat he will try next. His head has to be swimming with visions of sugar plums headed for a diabetic coma. Like his lust for women, his lust for wealth knows no bounds and now there are no restrictions. “When you’re a star, they let you do it. You can do anything.”—Donald Trump.