Free Republic

The first time I interviewed Donald Trump, back in 1987, he said this: “When I go up to New Hampshire -- I'm not running for president, by the way -- I get the best crowd, the best of everything in terms of reception. “The politicians go up and get a moderate audience. I go up, and they're scalping tickets. You heard that? They're scalping tickets. Why? Because people don't want to be ripped off, and this country is being ripped off. I think if I ran, I'd win.” He has been honing this act for a long time. Many pundits—some...

Would you buy a Trump brand mattress? On the off-chance that you answered yes to this — and if you did, please email me at evan@mediaite.com for a follow-up interview — then you’d better act fast. On Thursday Serta became the latest company to announce it was ending its business relationship with celebrity plutocrat Donald Trump following his remarks on Mexican immigrants. “Serta values diversity and does not agree with nor endorse the recent statements made by Mr. Trump,” the company said in a statement, declaring that it would not renew its contract with Trump at the end of the...

UPDATE 3-Serta owner to buy Simmons in $760 mln deal Sat Sep 26, 2009 1:29am IST (Recasts, adds information about Serta) * Simmons and Serta combined beat out Sealy * Simmons will file for bankruptcy By Caroline Humer NEW YORK, Sept 25 (Reuters) - Mattress makers Simmons and Serta are planning to dethrone competitor Sealy as the world's largest mattress company in a $760 million deal that includes Simmons filing for bankruptcy. Simmons Co said on Friday that it has put together a restructuring plan to be sold to private-equity firm Ares Management LLC and a unit of the Ontario...