So much for my presidential prognostication skills. Though I thought I had predicted the perfect game plan with which Donald Trump could mount a presidential run over the summer -- just long enough to get attention without having to disclose his financials -- The Donald scuttled that idea yesterday (Monday).
The host of NBC's The Apprentice revealed his presidential plans while appearing in New York at the NBC upfronts, and threw his hat out of the ring in a way that was very, well, up front...
Instead of announcing the official start of his presidential bid to all the advertisers gathered to sample NBC's wares for the fall 2011-12 season, Trump instead announced the renewal of his NBC reality show.
"This will be our 12th season," Trump said of his Apprentice franchise, "and I have to say, I love Celebrity Apprentice. We've raised tens of millions of dollars for charity. We've never raised so much as we have in the last season."
Trump went on to say, "I've decided that we are going to continue onward with 'Celebrity Apprentice.' We're going to continue making lots and lots of money for charity. I will not be running for President, as much as I'd like to, and I want to thank everybody very much."
Trump's decision to stop flirting with, and getting free promotion from, politics comes after President Barack Obama's successful mission to have Navy SEALs locate and swoop in on Osama bin Laden's suburban secret compound in Pakistan.
I had written my prediction about Trump's next move (you can read that column HERE) days after that daring raid -- and I suspect that the overwhelmingly positive response to Obama's secret mission was the factor that made Trump decide to put his promotional eggs back in his own Apprentice basket.
The timing, though, must have been irritating. If Trump had continued to consider an option to run for office, even for a few months, he couldn't have used the platform of the NBC upfronts to announce the renewal of Celebrity Apprentice for next season -- because NBC couldn't air it with Trump as an announced presidential candidate.
But now that Trump has made his decision public, that means there's no "surprise announcement" tacked on to this Sunday's season finale of Celebrity Apprentice -- just the suspense, which is minimal, of whether John Rich or Marlee Matlin will become the fourth celebrity to emerge victoriously from the celebrity edition of Trump's Apprentice show.
But there IS a piece of news buried there in plain sight. Once again, the normal people who once battled for a spot in the Trump organization, in the regular editions of The Apprentice, are being shoved aside to make room for this show's very generous definition of "celebrities."
Once again, the person with more recognition, and the biggest media platform, wins.
That goes for normal people vs. celebrities... and it also goes, apparently, for Donald Trump vs. Barack Obama.