Losers will generally remain losers.

As I write, Donald Trump is on his 14-hour trip to Beijing. The president never comes empty-handed. Flying with him are his top political associates, like Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Secretary of War Pete Hegseth. Additionally, Donald Trump has with him the cream of the American CEO crop. Think about the conversations at 30,000 feet between Tesla CEO Elon Musk, Apple CEO Tim Cook, and NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang. If they have to circle once before landing, the circling time might have had a trillion dollars' worth of value for the US economy.

If a father wanted to point to Donald Trump or Elon Musk as examples of success, his son might argue that these guys were born lucky. Both are very smart and have been very successful in their respective fields of endeavor. And while the boy’s argument would be true, he would miss a couple of key points. Firstly, both Trump and Musk have had very public setbacks. Donald Trump had years of write-downs from his real estate business, while Elon Musk watched rocket after rocket explode before SpaceX became the orbital powerhouse it is today. Additionally, neither man sat around and felt sorry for himself. Donald Trump picked himself up, added to his fortune and became president of the United States twice. Musk kept sending up rockets until he got them going up and landing upright upon return. Both could have quit. Both could have blamed others or bad luck. Neither did.

Winners like Trump, Musk or say Michael Jordan definitely have brains and abilities. But, as importantly, they have a drive that never lets them assume the mantle of victimhood. They never wallowed in self-pity. Donald Trump took the strange 2020 election outcome and his indictments and spun them around into a 2024 victory over Vice President Kamala Harris. Michael Jordan was famously sick as could be in one NBA Finals game and went out and put up 38........

© Townhall