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To the extent that this is true I think it because the words "smart & capable" are more often a short-hand for displaying behaviors and beliefs associated with the elite, rather than anything to do with intelligence or the capacity to solve problems.
As men like Donald Trump and Elon Musk aptly demonstrate, you can be hugely successful across multiple domains for decades and still get dismissed by affluent liberals as an idiot/incompetent for having the wrong aesthetics.
What the hell? You're grouping Trump together with Musk?
Trump was never hugely successful at anything. "The Apprentice" was perhaps the only real success.
What did he ever outperform at, given his ambition (which any idiot can be born with) combined with absolutely massive inherited wealth (400m usd or so)?
The man leveraged a middling career in reality TV to go 2 for 3 against the entire political establishment of the most powerful nation on earth. I know he hasn't turned that into fulfilled promises, that he's running into hard walls and making bad decisions. But if he is a failure, he has failed to greater heights than most will ever dream of.
He's a success because of the failure of the system. It's not a novelty, it was always the criticism of democracy that it would allow charismatic demagogues to claim political power. The miracle was supposed to be figuring out a way to either keep them at bay or check them
Trump is clearly skilled at moving the public. He's not skilled in some sort of objective domain like someone like Musk who we can say is more impressive at that than the bulk of the elites.
(And I think that Musk also failed at government).
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The claim was "hugely successful across multiple domains for decades", implying pre-POTUS times.
“Everyone who inherits 400m is famous” - he’s famous for being rich but 99% of people who are rich are unknown. He had a tv show. He managed to build a lot of buildings.
If I can be 5% as successful as pre-potus Trump I’m taking that deal.
You might be able to legitimate bullets that his IRR on investments had no alpha.
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