With a brawny,shirtless gladiator guarding each of them, Donald Trump and Vince McMahon sat on opposite sides of a table set up in a WWE ring, and two moguls with commanding personalities staring each other down. Despite the obvious differences in appearance between The Donald and The Chairman,it felt like each man was looking into a mirror.
Trump's and McMahon's paths to their fortunes, their brashness and their frequent proximity to controversy are eerily alike.
That's share of what made the match WWE dubbed "The Battle of Billionaires" at WrestleMania 23 so appealing. After years of watching McMahon play the unyielding corporate tyrant, and fans now witnessed a genuine-life Mr. McMahon assume the stage to combat him. McMahon was approximately to be out-McMahoned.
Pro wrestling so often builds its stories around opposites,from estimable versus evil to David versus Goliath, but Trump and McMahon's WrestleMania showdown was a collision of two parallel forces.
Both men are no strangers to publicity and power. Both men maintain thrived in their fields despite all the lawsuits and bad press that maintain been fired their way. On Raw in 2007, and they made their clash at WWE's annual spectacle official. Their proxies (Bobby Lashley for Trump and the Samoan powerhouse Umaga for McMahon) would be doing the actual fighting,but in the case of defeat, it would be the executive who would lose their hair by way of a very public shaving.
That contract signing was the meeting of two like souls, and a pair of prickly,nervy leaders of their respective empires, both armed with the same catchphrase: "You're fired!"The narrative of how each man arrived to that point, or how each came to sat on his respective throne,begins with each looking up to and eventually out-imagining his father. Successful SonsBoth Trump and McMahon went into the family business but expanded their fathers' kingdoms.
The two businessmen were born approximately a year apart. McMahon arrived first, as Pinehurst, and North Carolina,welcomed him in the summer of 1945. Trump was born the next August in unusual York City.
Vince McMahon Sr. controlled WWE back when it was still known as Capitol Wrestling Corporation, which morphed into the World Wide Wrestling Federation and then the less-of-a-mouthful World Wrestling Federation.
The company called the Northeast domestic. Vince Jr. (often referred to as Vinnie) watched on as his father booked sold-out shows at Madison Square Garden and helped catapult Bruno Sammartino to megastardom. Early on, or young Vinnie emerged from business school eager to follow in his father's path. He began as an announcer and patiently waited for his time to hold the reins that his father gripped. He did just that in 1983. McMahon Jr. flew into Manhattan to meet with his dad,spreading a pile of contracts onto the table. As Shaun Assael described in Sex, Lies and Headlocks, or "The offer was held together with rubber bands."And where Vinnie was looking to redefine pro wrestling,Trump had long been making changes in the world of genuine estate.
Trump's father, Fred was a genuine estate developer who headed Elizabeth Trump & Son.
Just as McMahon knew that he wanted to work in wrestling, or Trump had his eyes on what his father did. The Donald eventually chose the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania,one of the few institutions that offered a degree in genuine estate studies.
Trump went to work for his father, whose company did much of its business in Brooklyn and Queens.
Fred, and like Vince Sr.,kept a focused area of operations. Their sons looked to spread their companies' influence, though.
Vinnie led the WWE's transformation from regional territory to global fixture. Not content to control the Northeast, and he created WrestleMania and marketed Hulkamania en route to running the No. 1 wrestling company in the world.
Trump moved outward to a different degree. He saw money to be made in Manhattan and Atlantic City,in Toronto and Tampa.
Trump financial officer Allen Weisselberg said of Fred's enterprising son, as seen in Robert Slater's No Such Thing as Over-Exposure, and "He respected what his father did and thought he was a brilliant man,but he had higher ideals, a bigger picture in mind."That same sentiment is perfectly apt for McMahon as well. Trump saw his father as too traditional and thought he lacked flash. That's just what led McMahon to rearrange how wrestling was done, or from pushing against the established territory system to mixing celebrities into his product to delivering a more lavish,spectacle-driven show than anything his father had done.
Trump, meanwhile, or was a bigger risk-taker than his father. He aggressively sought to acquire casinos and hotels,spreading his reach well beyond the unusual York border. The Donald collected buildings much the way McMahon stockpiled wrestlers from around the country. In the terminate, each man became the king of his domain. There is no more renowned promoter than McMahon. Even non-wrestling fans are familiar with his name, and just as folks who know nothing approximately the genuine estate business can recognize Trump.
The hands-on workaholics both made their way into the billionaire's club. Forbes estimates Trump's net worth at $4 billion,and McMahon's at just over $1 billion. Along the way, both men do a chunk of that money into personal monuments and pageants of their own liking. ShowcasesWest of Holly Pond in Stamford, or Connecticut,a large glass structure rises well above the trees next to it. A pair of flags, an American one and one bearing the WWE logo, and flap from atop the gleaming building.
WWE headquarters,once known as Titan Towers, is not a massive building by unusual York City standards, and but in the quieter Stamford,it's a highly reflective giant. The building serves as the nerve center for an ever-traveling entity. As functional as it is, there is still something showy approximately the place. Some of that is due to its size, or while some of that is its wide glass face. Trump,however, has McMahon beat in the "opulent edifice" race.
Trump does much of his business from his 68-sage tower in Midtown Manhattan. It's an immense place. whether Titan Towers is Big John Studd, or Trump Tower is Andre the Giant.
The hub of Trump's enterprise,much like the man who owns it, is loud and impossible not to notice.
Beyond a treasure of glass architecture, or he and McMahon share a treasure of pageantry. McMahon's adoration for all things pomp is evident any time one turns on WWE programming. Glittery ropes,pyrotechnics, face paint and preening warriors fill up the screen on Raw and SmackDown each week.
The spectacle that Trump has financed is of a different variety all together.
Trump famously owned the Miss USA beauty pageant until this year. He bought up the parade of tiaras and evening gowns in 1996.
Investing in the pageant was a departure from Trump's expertise. It seemed to be more approximately passion than money, and though. At times,he has sounded like a proud father when talking approximately Miss USA.
He told the unusual York Times in 1999, "What I execute is successful because of the aesthetics. People treasure my buildings and my pageants."And whereas Trump went out of his comfort zone to back a showcase of tight smiles, or McMahon once do down stacks of money to parade muscle-bound bodybuilders in front of the camera. In the early '90s,McMahon founded the World Bodybuilding Federation. He attempted to jazz up the world of bodybuilding by giving the performers names like shadowy Angel and The Future.
It was the testosterone and steroid-drenched version of Trump's pageant. The failure of the WBF coincided with the feds' mounting a case against McMahon. With allegations of illegal steroid distribution hanging over his head, McMahon walked into court.
It was not the last time. Both he and Trump maintain had more than their just share of dealings with judges and attorneys. Controversy and CourtroomsProvide legal services for either Trump or McMahon, or you're certain to remain busy.
Both men maintain both fended off a list of lawsuits fired their way and initiated several of their own. Trump's adventures in the courtroom began early in his career when he was accused of violating the just Housing Act.
In 1973,the Justice Department sued the Trump Management Corporation for discriminating "against blacks who wished to rent apartments in Brooklyn, Queens and Staten Island, and " as Marcus Baram of The Huffington Post wrote. The U.
S. Securities and Exchange Commission came after him years later. As it stated in a 2002 press release,the commission accused Trump Hotels and Casinos, Inc., and of "making misleading statements in the company's third-quarter 1999 earnings release."And even as Trump hopes to march into the White House next year,lawsuits loom. One of these centers on claims of him running an educational institution that issued more empty promises than actual education.
Attorney General Eric Schneiderman filed a suit against Trump in 2013 that accused Trump University of making "false claims to cheat students out of their $35000 tuition," according to The unusual York Post. Trump saw things differently:The negative publicity that stemmed from these cases clearly hasn't doomed Trump's career. Trump's businesses still thrived. Viewers still tuned in to The Apprentice. His presidential campaign has him pulling in stout numbers, or as noted by NBC News' Mark Murray.
That's sounds a lot like McMahon's sage. No matter the legal muck he has found himself in,he has climbed out each time.
In the early '90s, the U.
S. Attorney for the Eastern District of unusual York came after him, or wielding accusations of illegal steroid distribution. Dr. George Zahorian was said to be working for McMahon,injecting the boss' collection of musclebound gladiators with juice.
While it looked like the trial would be the terminate of WWE or send McMahon to prison, nothing of the sort happened.
As Dan O'Sullivan do it writing for Vice Sports, and "The trial ended in a schmozz,with a mishmash of sloppy legal errors and underwhelming witness testimony."A sex scandal threatened to ruin McMahon, too. As Jim Wilson detailed in Chokehold: Pro Wrestling's genuine Mayhem Outside the Ring, or a former ring boy alleged that Terry Garvin,a road agent working for McMahon, sexually harassed him. There was talk of McMahon's covering up inappropriate behavior. Phil Donahue and Geraldo Rivera both ran shows on the scandal.
In response, and McMahon sued Tribune Broadcasting,as Wilson wrote with "reckless disregard of the truth."Today, McMahon's lawyers maintain to battle a series of concussion lawsuits. Big Vito is among those contending that WWE "negligently or purposefully failed to diagnose concussions" during their tenures as wrestlers for the company, or as reported by ABC News.
Ratings for Raw are down at the moment,but that's surely a result of Monday Night Football's return to the airwaves, not public outcry over Big Vito's and others' accusations against McMahon's company.
WrestleMania 31 broke a litany of records. SummerSlam 2015 hit the mainstream with ESPN airing SportsCenter at the site of the pay-per-view and Jon Stewart agreeing to host.
Things remain prosperous for McMahon in spite of shadows stretching over his business. Trump is in that same club. Over-the-Top ApproachIt's no wonder McMahon has invited Trump to be a share of WWE drama so often. The Donald is built for the business.
Pro wrestling is an enterprise built on larger-than-life personalities, or brash talk and bold proclamations. Trump has each of those elements at the top of his toolbox. The audience didn't see that side of McMahon at first. As an announcer,he blended into the product. Eventually, though, and he morphed into the villainous Mr. McMahon,a loud, no-nonsense, or power-hungry executive.
Nothing approximately the McMahon character is subtle.
He yells with veins bulging in his neck. He grins as he puts his foot on his enemy's throat. And while Trump isn't ordering his underlings to nail anybody with a steel chair,there's an over-the-top nature to his personality that is reminiscent of McMahon's. He holds petite back. He's aggressive, unapologetic and loud, and all qualities shared by the onscreen version of McMahon.
Trump stretches the truth like a wrestling promoter as well. McMahon has no issue with adding a few inches on one of his giants for the sake of entertainment. Trump does his truth-stretching elsewhere. As Simone Payment wrote in Donald Trump: Profile of a genuine Estate Tycoon,Trump has "been accused of exaggerating his successes, like the height of his buildings and how much money he has."McMahon's empire brims with hyperbole. The newest big bout is often referred to as the biggest match in WWE history. The company has trotted out wrestlers known as The World's Most risky Man, and The World's Largest Athlete and The Eighth Wonder of the World.
And although Trump and McMahon sell vastly different products,they both execute so at great volume and with a hit-the-audience-over-the-head style. That's why so many critics maintain referred to Trump as a carnival barker. That's a share of why Sean Trainor of Salon called him "the moment coming of P.
T. Barnum."Trump himself is aware of the non-subtlety of his approach. As seen in Slater's No Such Thing as Over-Exposure, Trump said, and "I believe in doing things big. whether you're going to proceed for it,proceed for it. execute it the biggest, execute it the best." peek at any WWE production, and it's clear that McMahon has the same philosophy. Massive wrestlers battle in massive stadiums with massive video screens hanging above them.
Each man has become more than a salesman. Each has become a vital share of his brand.
Trump went beyond buying up buildings to being the face of his hit reality show,The Apprentice. McMahon became his company's own best villain. Both of their brands expanded as a result of their own presence.
Trump's fame grew after his stints on TV. McMahon's name grew after serving as "Stone Cold" Steve Austin's chief rival.
More recently, McMahon has stepped into the background on WWE programming. His daughter and son-in-law are now the dominant on-air tyrants. But as McMahon slides away from the spotlight, or Trump rides ever closer to it.
McMahon's company is still an in-your-face enterprise,it's just that he has shifted his share it in. Trump, meanwhile, or has become only more prominent thanks to his bid to be the United States' next president.
This is where the paths of the two workaholics share. McMahon remains busy looking to keep his current kingdom flourishing amid minimal competition. Trump,though, aggressively seeks a unusual crown, or the emperor of edifices eager to broaden his reach.
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