In these days of ridiculous hyperbole, where even in golf every player is habitually asked after a modest round if it was the greatest or most significant in his career, the Donald Trump in Scotland saga could be a modern parable.
Last week, the Trump organisation’s attempt to block the European Offshore Wind Deployment Centre a bank of 11 wind turbines to be erected in Aberdeen Bay, a mile and a half from his Menie Estate project was rejected by the Court of Session.
Later that same day, Trump confirmed he had bought Doonbeg, a golf resort in Co Clare on the West Coast of Ireland for a reported knockdown price of 15 million euro. The resort, featuring a 200-room hotel and an acclaimed Greg Norman designed golf course, had gone into receivership last month.
At the same time, a planning application to Aberdeenshire Council for a second course at Menie was pulled.
Naturally, most people suspected these moves indicated Trump was pulling out of Menie, especially as his son added “all our investment and energy” would now go into Doonbeg while his Scottish representative Sarah Malone declared the turbines and the Menie project were “mutually exclusive”.
A day later, another statement came from Trump and Malone, and once you got past the habitual hectoring, on the end was clarification that Menie Estate was not for sale, instead “this investment will be protected.”
But for how long? Given that Trump’s appeal against the Court of Session decision seems doomed to fail he no longer has the political support to see it through as the original plans did is he really in the business of maintaining a single golf course in Scotland with limited facilities, a mere fraction of what was originally promised?
Or does he, like the skilled entrepreneur he is and as they sometimes must do with risky investments, write off his Scottish adventure while getting the best deal he can?
Surely he will do so, whilst also engaging that ludicrous hyperbole of which he so fond. Such as comparing the turbines to the Lockerbie tragedy, as he did in the Irish Times last week.
And he’ll continue to make unsubstantiated claims for his project, that it would have resulted in 4000 jobs, that the hotel would have been a world class facility attracting hundreds of big spenders to the North East.
Last week Trump was still claiming his course was the best in the world; it’s a striking track but far too hard for mere mortals and as hyperbolic as the man himself. It’s not the best course in Aberdeenshire.
It was fairly clear from the start that the houses, hotel and even the clubhouse elements of this ambitious project were unlikely to ever be built. Trump, for all his considerable property acumen, was coming into a market where established luxury golf resorts in better locations with far better weather, such as Turnberry, were struggling in the midst of a severe economic downturn.
“I’m a five handicap but a plus five in real estate,” he’s fond of saying. Well, I’m a 20 handicapper in real estate but I couldn’t see how Menie would ever work. Doonbeg is remarkably similar, in an even more isolated location, with wind turbines planned for nearby, and it has lost money like a drain.
But even if he does make a success there, the turbines were always a convenient get-out for Trump once it became clear that the outlandish aims of his Menie project were untenable. Now he can rail at the “anti-entrepreneurial” attitude of Scotland and its government and make failure appear to be a success denied.
This will also suit the Menie project’s many vocal opponents. I always found both sides to be disingenuous; each claimed to have the majority of local support behind them, but it really depended on who you asked.
The film “You’ve Been Trumped” was entertaining polemic and not in the least bit balanced. But fair enough, someone had to speak for those opposed to the project, and it wasn’t as if the Trump organisation ever put out a statement that was even slightly understated.
Both sides will no doubt claim victory when Trump, perhaps inevitably, sells up. That’s what seems to happen in modern conflicts; there’s a whole lot of sound and fury, and it all ends in conveniently fudged fashion with no-one having to admit defeat.
*In America, much to be noted over the last week.
One of Augusta National’s most notable obstructions, The Eisenhower Tree, has been removed from the 17th fairway because of irreparable damage sustained in the ice storms which engulfed the American South this last fortnight.
Golf’s Calvinist nature is reflected in the dismay at this news, largely from people who seemed to enjoy hitting into it President Eisenhower didn’t, as he requested it’s removal in 1957 and instead had it named after him.
No such talk from Tiger Woods, who injured his left achilles tendon under the tree in 2011 and thereby missed a large chunk of the season, including the Open and US Open.
Augusta being Augusta, they’ll simply pop a mature tree the original was at least 125 years old – into the gap before long, but there’s not enough time between now and the Masters for them to do so, making for added interest this year on the final stretch.
While we’re on the subject of old relics, the addition of Ray Floyd to Tom Watson’s Ryder Cup backroom team means they’ve now hit the cumulative age of 201.
If Jordan Spieth makes the team, as seems likely, he’ll be skippered and vice-captained by three guys comfortably old enough to be his grandfather.
What exactly do the PGA have against Fred Couples, who is such an obvious vice-captaincy candidate? At a mere 54, having been a successful President’s Cup captain and actually playing on Tour, he at least has some connection with the young `uns.
Finally, at the Northern Trust (or LA) Open at Riviera, Bubba Watson won for the first time since Augusta in 2012, holding off a late run from Dustin Johnson.
Interestingly, Riviera has always been a strategic, thinkers’ course, and these two are how can I put it delicately not the sharpest pair of stakes holding up the gallery ropes.
Both are arch-bombers, however. It seems even elegant Riviera has no defence against an unregulated ball.