I was a little dumbfounded at this naive remark:
I don't get the "Trump has big debts, therefore he could be blackmailed, or do something reckless to pay them off" argument. He's always owed lots of money. He's shown no compunction about declaring bankruptcy. Why do we think it'll be different this time around?
— James Surowiecki (@JamesSurowiecki) September 28, 2020
Listen, not all sources of funds are banks. Some are what we so quaintly call loan sharks. A loan shark doesn’t care if you declare bankruptcy, he just sends a dude with a rifle to make an example of you.
And Trump knows this. He already owes money up the wazoo, and he’s proven himself to be quite a foolish person, so it’s not beyond imagination that he’s into someone – say, some petty dictator – that would take great umbrage at losing money at any substantial scale.
And, of course, there’s more than one way to make an example of someone. Over the last four years it’s become clear, from the examples set by Jeffrey Epstein, President Trump, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, and others, that reputation is another greatly valued possession, and while virtually no one wants a bad reputation, up there in the financially rarified atmosphere where Trump and other billionaires – or wannabes – fly, many actually value their reputation as billionaires almost as much as the billions themselves.
And this is not even foolish: Such reputations can make or break deals.
The leak of his tax returns has not had their identity revealed, which leads me to speculate that what we’re seeing right now could be the beginning of the end of Trump the Billionaire Deal Maker, as orchestrated by another billionaire – or as a very public lesson in why you pay back borrowed money. Oh, I don’t think the chances are great that either speculation will turn out to be true, and I wouldn’t put any money on either, but it’s not impossible.
