Trump – Short Fingered Vulgarian – Jerry Schwartz Associated Press 21 Feb 1989

Source: The Recorder, Greenfield Mass, Tuesday, February 21, 1989

Donald Trump: hero or a 'short-fingered vulgarian'?

By JERRY SCHWARTZ

Associated Press

NEW  YORK  — Donald  Trump  can  buy  hotels,  he 

can  buy  football  teams,  he  can  buy  casinos  and  air-

lines.

But he can't  buy  respect.

Spy  magazine  calls  him  a  "short-fingered   vulgari-

an."  Cartoonist  Berke  Breathed  takes  Trump's  brain 

and  installs  it  in  the  skull  of  Bill  the  Cat,  the  foul  fe-

line   of   "Bloom   County,"   A  Daily   News   columnist  

writes  that  when  she  needs  cheering  up,  she  watches 

"Donald Trump do something  silly."

 

The  Stand  Up  New  York  comedy  club devoted  a 

night   to  ridiculing  Trump.  For   two   hours, comics  

drew  laughter  with  readings  from  "Trump:  The  Art 

of  the  Deal"  and  took  their  own  potshots  — suggest-

ing,  for  example,  that  he  bought a Parisian  landmark 

and renamed  it the "Arc de Trump."

The  43-year-old  billionaire  does  not  believe  he  de-

serves  this  tidal  wave  of  derision,  which  rises  along 

with  its  success  and prominence.  But Trump  — who

declined to be interviewed — thinks he understands  it.

"Those  Who don't  like me  don't  know  me,  and  have 

never  met me," he  told  Time  magazine.  "My  guess  is 

that they dislike me out  of jealousy."

Not  so,  say  Trump's  detractors.  They  dislike  him 

on merits.

"He's just  an  everyday  slob  with  too  much  money, 

he just  doesn't  have  enough taste to  keep  his name 

off of things," said  Breathed.

The   sequence   about   Trump's   transplanted  cere-

brum,  Breathed  said,  is  born  of  his  conviction  that 

Trump  "looks  too smooth and polished  on  the  outside, 

he should look like Bill the Cat. 

Trump  is  no  stranger  to  the  funny  pages,  he  also 

appeared  within  the  past  year  in  "Doonesbury."  Gar-

ry  Trudeau  showed  Trump  tossing  casino  chips  from 

the  deck  of  his 282-foot  yacht,  the  Trump Princess,  to 

small  boats  below. This  obviously  was  not  the  "quali-

ty" jmage Trump wants to project.

"I  did pretty  well in school, but  for  the  life  of  me,   I  

really can’t  understand  what  'Doonesbury'  is  about." 

Trump  has  said.  He suggested  Trudeau’s  wife,  televi-

sion's  Jane  Pauley,  "has  a  lot  more  talent  than  he 

does."

Critics have found fault with Trump's taste. When

he announced last month that he intended to close

that Plaza Hotel landmark of bogus Hawaiiana, Trader

Vic's — a closing that he delayed when the threat

of the bar's demise improved business — Trump said

he was doing so not because of any hostility to Samoan

Fog Cutters and similar drinks, but because the

bar was tacky.

"Wildly tacky," riposted Village Voice reporter

Guy Trebay, "is TrumpTower with its mean escalators

and pink marble vastness. Does Donald Trump

think a waterfall wall is the acme of subtle design?"

Critics have found fault with Trump’s ego and penchant

for self-promotion. Daily News columnist Gail

Collins, writing about a new board game based on

Trump's wheeling and dealing, noted that "Trump —

The Game" contained "approximately nine million

photos of Donald Trump.

The game is meant "for players 12 and up, and I

suppose there could be worse things to give to your

12-year old than a game that encourages him to act like

Donald Trump. 'Uzi: The Crack Dealer,' for example," 
she mused.

Critics have found fault with Trump's dedication to

building glitzy buildings in a city where homelessness

-and poverty are endemic. One group staged a brunch

for the homeless this month in front of the Plaza,

along with a "public shaming" of its owner. Trump

did not attend.

But the reigning champion of Trump bashers is

Spy, a New York satire magazine, and Trump has reacted

with irritation and vitriol.

In September. Trump claimed Spy was in dire

straits and would be out of business within a year,

now each issue contains a countdown of “our death

foretold. Last week, an outraged Trump claimed

that the father of a Spy executive had suggested Spy

would ease up on Trump if the Trump Shuttle offered

the magazine to passengers; Spy said this was a joke.

The irreverent and irascible magazine is fixated on

The Big T – on the “eerily stiff hairdo” of Trump’s

wife, Ivana; on Trump himself, who was mentioned

derogatorily in all 10 issues last year and whose picture

was compared in the March issue with the first

police sketch of Son of Sam.

Each year Spy lists the 100 most annoying people,

places and things in New York. One year, Trump was

No. 1; one year, he was No. 3. Last year, he was Nos.

10, 14, 21, 26 and 30, subdivided into Donald Trump,

Candidate; Donald Trump, Acquirer; Donald Trump.

Boxing Promoter; Donald Trump, Author, and Don

aid Trump, Fixer of Things We'd Almost Rather

Leave Broken.

“We don’t hate him, we despise him,” Spy said this

month.

But why?

"He's ... sort of a polyester guy in a 100 percent cotton

world," froths Editor E. Graydon Carter. "He

represents a sort of mass-market, fake sophistication.

In a city that invented real sophistication, his kind is

driving the real stuff out."

Carter is just warming up. He dismisses Trump as

"sort of show-and-tell child" who insists on splattering

his name everywhere he goes.

Carter knows that Trump has become a celebrity —

his face on the covers of news magazines, his book a

bestseller. To some, he is a capitalist hero.

"The folks who watch motivational cable shows

late at night — to them he's a hero," Carter said, "To

anybody who cares about New York, who doesn't like
brass, he's no hero."


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