Trump essentially makes four arguments to support his candidacy. Here they are, with my responses:
1. As an outsider, and a businessman, I bear no responsibility for the failures of either the GOP or the Democratic establishment over the last 20 years. I can’t disagree with that, but if that is the only criterion, I am equally qualified to be President.
2. As a successful businessman, I know how to make the economy run better than any politician does. Trump’s record is actually a mixture of successes and failures; the logic of this argument would lead you to support Michael Bloomberg, or Warren Buffett, not him. In addition, as I have explained at some length on previous occasions, running the government is fundamentally different than running a business, and there is no reason to believe that businessmen have any special insight into how to grow the economy as a whole.
3. I am a great negotiator. I can get parties together and produce deals. By all accounts, Trump is, in fact, an effective, if volatile, negotiator. Making deals with local governments and other businessmen, however, is not the same thing as negotiating with parties who have armies of constituents, or even nuclear weapons, behind them. It should also be noted that there is a lot more to running a government than making deals.
4. I am a strong man. I kick butt. To be a man on horseback, you have to be able to ride a horse. Trump is a businessman, not a military man; there is absolutely nothing in his record that suggests that there is any validity to this argument. Furthermore, it is logically inconsistent with #3, which presupposes that he is capable of engaging in give and take with adversaries. If you’re really a strong man, you don’t have to negotiate with your opponents; you just impose your will on them.