Trump's Bad Deal

One of the reasons why I tolerated having to listen to Donald Trump on The Apprentice and Celebrity Apprentice TV shows was that it was a real meritocracy reality TV show.

You had to accomplish tasks in real and tangible ways.

Sadly Donald has tossed the one real reason to appreciate the show into the trash when he chose Joan Rivers over Annie Duke.

Merit was squashed by spoiled, trash-talking celebrity. I came into the show with nothing but admiration for Joan Rivers but now she DISGUSTS me.

And so does Donald Trump.

He tolerated from Joan some of the most actionable language in a board room ever. Joan's lying, whining accusations and bullying behavior would have gotten her fired on the spot from any reputable firm. That Trump facilitated it was vile and weak-willed on his part.

Trump knew the truth behind Annie's statement that Joan lost the party planners for both teams. It was on camera. The event planning company would have to have informed the Celebrity Apprentice show that it was not going to fulfill its contract. Annie was thrilled with the service she got from the event planners, Joan clearly was not.

The show's producers clearly realized that Trump was not going to "embarrass" Rivers by exposing what a fraud she was so the producers edited the show to reveal the truth without explicitly coming down one side or the other. They let Annie speak rather than truly defend her but at least Annie was allowed to speak at some point. That Joan Rivers was allowed to lie, lie, slander, and lie again only exposes her and Trump's low hypocrisy.

There is a point that Joan won three of the five tasks but who cares? River's overall performance was but a dim echo of Annie's and Annie crushed her on the crucial money-raising aspect. This three out of five win smells freshly manufactured to me - guest satisfaction seems to be the weakest point. Annie had all her friends there and I can't imagine they bad mouthed Annie's party after dropping nearly half a million dollars on her charity in order to help her beat Rivers.

Basically, Donald Trump chose gay New Yorkers over his customers. And he will suffer for it.

Trump allowed Joan to bad mouth Annie's profession and insinuate all sorts of evil such as Annie has "mafia" money. What does that say of Joan's opinion of Trump? He owns casinos for Christ's sake! Donald's appalling short-sightedness explains why he has to use the Bankruptcy courts as a business tool regularly.

What top-level poker player will visit a Trump casino now? None should after this.

Joan behaved beastly. Annie was professional and raised more money for charity than all the other players combined. Donald chose wrong and hopefully will lose his customer base at his casinos because of it.

He's also lost a viewer.