Kryptos said:

Yeah, based on the research that I've been doing, I don't think people are gonna be too worried about side effects that include sleepwalking and high cholesterol or some shit when it kills their inoperable tumor.

As for Trump spreading wisdom...I've actually picked up a copy of his book "Art of the Deal" where he talks about absolutely everything except his methods. He actually mentions at one point that he doesn't want to give anyone advice, because then they might use it against him.

Promising.

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Kryptos said:

I've spent the last few years, as both an undergrad and graduate student, tutoring other undergrads. Most of my students are from wealthy backgrounds, where money is no object and they happily throw cash at problems (such as drinking instead of studying) to make them go away. In many cases, this works. I've watched under-qualified students get positions that they could not handle, and I've seen more than a few students literally pay their way to a passing GPA with fellowships and donations. I would like to share a story about one student that stands out in particular.

This kid was dumb as a fucking rock. I normally don't use grades as a measure of success, as my own personal GPA out of high school was below 2, but my fault was lack of effort, and I got into college based almost entirely off my test scores and knowledge that I gained independently. This particular student was not like me. He, also, lacked any sort of effort or initiative, but he did not admit it. He was convinced that he was hot shit destined for greatness, regardless of any of his actions. Where I simply got bad grades because I was too busy reading off topic, he got bad grades because he was busy drinking his way through every party he was invited to. Yeah, his social life put mine to shame. On the other hand, his social life was developed at the cost of basic knowledge and information. He didn't want to learn, he wanted the results without the effort.

So, during our second tutoring session, he asked me to do one of his take home tests for him. He offered me $100 to literally just do it for him, so he could put his name on it and turn it in for credit. Me, being a broke grad student, accepted. I don't think I did anything wrong by helping him commit academic fraud, because it's not like I could get in trouble for it, and I could use the beer money. So I accepted the $100, and sent him an answer key for his test the next day. Thing is, I knew that he could get in a bunch of hot water if anyone found out it was not his work. As a matter of fact, I planned on that. I didn't bother giving it my best effort. I aimed to get him a C. Average passing grade, according to most undergraduate college requirements. Plus, I figured if I did any better than that, then he would get a suspiciously good grade and end up in hot water.

Apparently, he got a B+ on that test (his best for the semester). I got my $100, he got his grade, and I started charging his (similarly not that smart) parents double for tutoring sessions. They continued, and I continued tutoring this kid, though I saw him less as a person and more as a cash cow at that point. What do I care if some idiot gets passing grades, only to get hired at his daddy's law firm and become partner by nepotism. I get paid, and eventually, people are gonna realize that he's got the mental capacity of a brick in a suit (that costs more than my rent, which he was now paying at 50$/hr). He had the social skills to keep it going long after I stopped being an obvious factor. His daddy's law firm was a big enough name (his granddad's actually, his daddy wasn't all that bright) that a few screw ups weren't gonna sink it.

Of course, I'd need to wait for some years to pass before I could pass definitive judgement, but Trump gives me the same exact feeling. It's really not hard to "succeed" as a businessman when your daddy hands you a sprawling real estate empire plus a few (40) mil in start up cash. You are selling a zero-sum product, where you don't actually produce anything, but just charge people to use property that you happen to own already. Of course, a smart mogul would be making deals and snagging construction projects, in the interests of improving the value of the land. A not so smart mogul would try to expand holdings into developing markets that don't pan out, and then just declare bankruptcy to get money back. A mogul that is not so smart but is incapable of admitting it would also go back and sue the banks that loaned him money for slander, because they "slanderously" proclaimed his inability to pay them back (how do you manage to bankrupt yourself with a casino? The entire premise of casinos is that most people are too dumb to realize they statistically lose money every time).

The thing is, if that happens once, that's no problem. Everyone makes mistakes, and almost everyone learns from them. Twice is bad luck. Thrice is coincidence, I guess. Four times, you might genuinely be an idiot who is incapable of running the empire daddy gave you, not to mention the biggest economy in the world and the country that spends as much on their army as the next 15 combined, of which 14 are allies. Bankruptcy on a personal level sucks for you and your employees. Bankruptcy combined with the inability to accept the truth, as well as access to a nuclear arsenal when you have a history of suing for slander when a bank says that you declared bankruptcy instead of paying them back? That's a bit terrifying.

Let's go back to that student I tutored. I truly believe that he's gonna make more than twice the money that I make in our lifetimes. To be fair, I became a chemist not for money, but because I want to make life saving drugs (and get high for free in the process of doing so). I don't need millions to live, though I wouldn't mind being handed millions. My average living expenditures for the last few years are $12k/yr. It's just that the prospect of having that student become the leader of the country that not only do I happen to live in, but one that has the military power to exert its influence anywhere else in the world I would flee to is not something I want to imagine.

I should be clear, the point here is not that Trump is an idiot. I don't believe that he is. I actually believe that he is an extremely intelligent person who could put most people to shame. I just really don't think he has any business being in charge of anything but a flashy brand and a TV show.

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Kryptos said:

I became a chemist not for money, but because I want to make life saving drugs

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Yeah, but like, what about LSD, man? That's like, a life saving drug, man