Keep your friends close and your enemies closer.
President=Elect Trump seems to believe in the advice that Machiavelli gave to the de Medici family.
Trump is "the Prince"....
He understands #MachiavellieBOOK20
Put those who have OPPOSED you in the position of power. You will be able to CONTROL them
Trump and Romney
Trump and Gore....
Wisdom TRUMPS intelligence!
The Machiavellian Trump?
What is Trump up to?
News item: Trump’s most vocal loyalists
during the campaign, Chris Christie, Newt Gingrich, and Rudy Guiliani,
have been completely passed over for senior positions. (In Christie’s
case, he was publicly humiliated and defenestrated.)
News item: Trump meets twice with Mitt
Romney, dangling the position of secretary of state to one of his most
severe critics in the GOP nomination battle.
News item: Trump meets today with Al Gore to talk about climate change.
From Machiavelli’s Prince, Book XX:The prince will always be to win over to himself with the greatest ease those men who in the beginning of a principality had been enemies, and who are of such quality that to maintain themselves they need somewhere to lean. They are all the more forced to serve him faithfully as they know it is more necessary for them to cancel out with deeds the sinister opinion one has taken of them. And so the prince always extracts more use from them than from those who, while serving him with too
much security, neglect his affairs.
http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2016/12/the-machiavellian-trump.php
A prince can also win prestige by declaring himself an ally of one side of a conflict. Neutrality alienates both the victor and the loser. The victor sees the neutral prince as a doubtful friend; the loser sees the neutral prince as weak coward. Someone who is not your friend will always request that you remain neutral, while a true friend will always ask you for your armed support. A prince can escape short-term danger through neutrality, but at the cost of long-term grief. Instead, a prince should boldly declare support for one side.
If the prince allies with someone stronger than himself, and this ally wins, then the prince protects himself through the alliance, because the victor will feel an obligation to the prince. If this stronger ally loses, at least the prince will win the protection and shelter of the ally. If the prince is stronger than either opponent, an alliance essentially means the destruction of one side through the help of another.
A prince can also win prestige by declaring himself an ally of one side of a conflict. Neutrality alienates both the victor and the loser.
http://www.sparknotes.com/philosophy/prince/section9/page/2/
A prince can also win prestige by declaring himself an ally of one side of a conflict. Neutrality alienates both the victor and the loser.
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