A night in San Francisco with Donald Trump

This weekend, yours truly went to see The Donald speak at the Moscone Center in downtown San Francisco. I'll repeat what I remember. Keep in mind, the following is a report on what Mr. Trump said, so don't assume I agree or disagree with anything. I'm just repeating what I remember.

One thing I just got to love about Trump is he loves to be surrounded by beautiful women. While the other speakers wore real spiffy suits and talked about real estate investing, Trump was proceeded by beautiful women dancers in tank tops. Ten dead zombies for the intro.

Trump started off a story of how The Apprentice started. It was nice, but more you had to be there so I won't bother repeating it.

What I did like though is that he gave five points on what it takes to succeed in real estate investing. He drummed into our heads that real estate is still the best investment out there. People make more money in real estate than pretty much everything else combined. He gave the example of how the average American family's best asset is their house.

After he ended his speech, a lot of the 61,000 people audience left. Yes, it was that big. So we pushed our way up to the front so we could actually see the man in person.

He came across confident. Some people confuse that with arrogance, but people like me see it as a strength, not a character flaw.

He opened up the floor to a Q&A section, where the audience was allowed to ask anything, and he really meant anything. A few highlights...

Mr. Trump made it clear that he is in no way a homophobe, which delighted the San Francisco audience greatly.

As his mentor, he mentioned his father, who also doubled as his main role model in life. Yes, he had a strong father, and that he cites as one of the big reasons he's as successful as he is today.

He is happy, and loves what he does. He emphasized strongly that if you don't like what you're doing, do something else. You have to love what you're doing or else you won't do a good job at it. He noted that not everyone is cut out to be an entrepreneur, and he prided himself in actually steering away some people he cared about from being entrepreneurs.

When asked about Martha Stewart, he said he harbors no ill will towards her, but yes, he was mad that she blamed her failures (of her version of The Apprentice) on him, even though he helped her every way he could.

Someone asked him about the Iraq War and he went off on it. He thinks it's a huge waste of money, and the real threats are not Iraq but Iran, North Korea, and Pakistan having nukes. He said something like 700 billion dollars is spent in the Iraq War, and that could hypothetically cause interest rates to go up, which would be an economic disaster.

He made it clear that he's disappointed that we're spending that kind of money in Iraq but we have yet to fix Louisiana.

So someone else asked him if he wanted to run for President, and he made it clear he wouldn't. He loves his current job and his life as is. Although he has political opinions, he has no intention of running for political office.

Someone else asked him what success is, and he said that it's being happy at what you're doing. It doesn't matter if it makes you money or not, if you're happy doing it, you're successful.

Back to money, he still believes real estate is the best investment there is. Someone asked if he owns anything in San Francisco, and he said yes, 30% of the Bank of America building.

The next Apprentice will be in Los Angeles.

Someone asked him why it's such a bad thing that Iran, North Korea, and Pakistan have nukes. Mr. Trump said that Iran and North Korea are rogue states, and Pakistan is a revolution away from becoming a rogue state. All it takes is a nuclear bomb dropped in San Francisco and we'd have a serious disaster.

Someone else asked him what would happen to San Francisco real estate if a rogue state dropped a nuke in San Francisco. Trump immediately dismissed the question as being stupid.

Someone else asked boxers or briefs. Geez, you have one of the best real estate investors in the country in a Q&A and that's all they could ask? What a moron. That's almost as stupid as the guy who asked about San Francisco real estate if a nuke was dropped.

Someone brought up the Forbes list and he's mentioned as having $2.4 billion in net worth. He hinted that Forbes made a low estimate. He said that he really doesn't care where he is on that list, because he loves what he does, and that's enough for him.

All in all, it was a good experience. Of all the things I'll remember most, Trump emphasized liking what you're doing and being a good parent. He talked about parenting skills many times and despite his dislike for his ex, she's a wonderful mother. Oh, and he said many times to get a pre-nup.