Over the last week, the guide has surged to become the 5th-most-accessed book on Project Gutenberg, an open source repository of free and public domain ebooks. It is also the fifth most popular ebook on the site over the last 30 days, having been accessed nearly 60,000 times over the last month (just behind Romeo and Juliet).
Direct link to the book (without the backref):
Some speculate that he cannot read at all. I do not think this is the case, as it is very difficult to finish university without some kind of reading and writing (even with grades as horrific as his).
But I strongly believe that Trump is dyslexic. Which would explain his aversion to reading at all costs and his desire to have things done in picture form and not written form. I am not the only one who suspects this.
It’s not at all difficult to finish university without reading or writing, it’s just more expensive.
I can’t fathome sitting through an exam that requires writing and reading comprehension to do anything with money. I understand getting others to do your homework for money (hell, I had a hustle in university where I did that), but sitting through an exam, which can make or break your entire course, is something else entirely.
You can purchase essays and tutoring. The little income I do get right now is helping get the rich and illiterate through college.
I did have a hustle in college where I did homework for some guys (they were not rich. They were just lazy). But my main concern isn’t about getting essays or some other projects done. It is about sitting through exams. How would he have finished an exam while being functionally illiterate? The only way it could be done is that he bribed someone to bring him a copy of the exam beforehand so he can have someone tell him what to do for what part.
But if that was the case, his grades wouldn’t be as utter shit as they were. I know if I had an advance copy of an exam, no matter how tough it was, I would have at least gotten a B or B+.
This is one of those benefits of joining a fraternity/sorority. Many do keep collections of old exams, homework assignments, etc. Imagine how that factors with the type of fraternities the uber wealthy join too.
Another strategy is getting accommodations. With money, you can get the kind of diagnoses and paper work to get around a lot. This is not at all to attack the legitimacy of college accommodations - I’ve worked with many who deserved them, and in some ways I was able to access some myself. I’ve also worked with people who did pay for a diagnosis and list of accommodations. This is more of a rich people taking advantage of a system that is mostly inaccessible to poorer people.
Another aspect is “track system.” Eg, my ex husband came from serious money, went to a high school where there was a track for those who wanted to learn, and for those whose parents just wanted them in a nice school with other rich kids. (He would freely admit to switching to the “rich kid” track because he was too lazy to write essays. That continued in college - he used the strategy of having me do it.)
I think this continues in colleges, especially the more expensive privates/Ivys/and even local colleges, in certain major programs. People joke about Business majors, but yeah… There’s an element of institutional knowledge here that can also go with the frats/sororities - who lets you take home the tests, who uses multiple choice, etc…
Always very frustrating to me - I got kicked out of college a couple times trying to get through STEM/engineering while working multiple jobs and pimping myself out on Craigslist. Knowledge is a candle, and lighting others does not extinguish one’s own flame, but damn if don’t have some resentments some times.
He certainly reads at a very low level, and I’ve seen analysis of his speeches explaining how we know this. I don’t know if he’s always been that bad at reading or if this is a new thing in the last 10 years or so.
No he never was interested in reading or writing. From my understanding his book, The Art of the Deal, was not written by him but dictated to someone who wrote down what he was saying. Some say that’s why the book sounds like something he is saying to you than writing to you.
I need to mention that Hitler also had mein kampf written this way. He didn’t sit at a desk and write it with a pen or typewriter, someone else just wrote down what Hitler was saying directly to them.