Marble Falls       Negotiations are often tricky, but usually they have a structure and some common elements, if they are designed to be successful and arrive at not just an agreement, but one that will be honored by the parties.  Watching Trump pretend to negotiate is a puzzle that raises more questions sometimes than it answers.  I honestly can’t believe he can really negotiate well, despite having clearly made some deals that he signed, as we can read in the papers now on trade.  We don’t need Trump negotiating; we need to find out who is closer is.

There’s a lot of evidence for my point of view.

• He goes high-low all the time, which never encourages an easy or quick settlement.
• He changes his positions all the time.
• He doesn’t bargain in good faith – ever!
• He undercuts tentative and final settlements – think Canada!
• He broadcasts his positions before he gets to the table – think land giveaways to Russia from Ukraine.
• He doesn’t include the right people at the table to make a deal – see above, think Ukraine again and again.
• He doesn’t care or try to understand the other party’s position.
• He doesn’t prepare his proposals, but wings it at the table – think removing Palestinians to make Gaza a resort area.
• He is unpredictable, so lengthens negotiations, since the other party can’t be really sure what his bottom lines might be.
• He never knows when to be quiet and when to speak.
• He ignores precedent from previous negotiations and doesn’t pay attention to patterns in bargaining – think Brown University at $50 million for 10 years for Rhode Island workforce development, versus $500 million for Harvard, versus $1-billion demand for UCLA.
• He doesn’t even know how to spell “transparent,” making a deal harder and longer to achieve.
• He sets unrealistic timelines with no real sense of what takes to achieve them – think tariffs, Ukraine, the Middle East, and about everything other than his lapdog Congress, the Republican Party, and the Speaker of the House.
• He has no demonstrative understanding of economics and what a deal will cost – think tariffs over and over again.
• He doesn’t live up to deals he makes, even when the other party does – think Mexico and their aggressive effort against drug cartels and now his empty threat to employ US troops in their country.
• He has no clarity about the constituency he’s representing outside of his own and his family’s self-interest, making him easily distracted at the table by flattery and what most would call bribery or financial inducements – he’s not a “honest broker” in bargaining ever.

You get the point.  If you were training community or labor negotiators, Trump and his so-called “deal” making or bargaining tactics would be a case study in what NOT to do.

Not that this is a surprise.  His genius is in branding and marketing, not development or business or certainly deal making.  To the degree there’s ever a deal made, especially if by some miracle, it’s a good one for any of us, much less the American people, we need to know who actually was the real negotiator.

Trump’s a front man.  He’s bully.  He’s a media hound.  He can make clouds all day long, but he can’t make it rain.  We need to talk to his closer or find a way to get him one who can really handle him and make the deals.  He may be simply the worst negotiator ever.