Celebrity Apprentice -- Annie Duke / Melissa & Joan Rivers/ Clint Black / Donald Trump

Wow -- great episode. Having just watched a full season of the amazing UK Apprentice with Alan Sugar, I was pleasantly surprised to have enjoyed this particular episode. Overall, even when compared to the original Apprentice with non-celebrity candidates, the UK's version direction and cinematography is perfect. I think both Trump and Sugar make great decisions. Perhaps I prefer Sugar's less showy style a bit more, but America prefers more ostentatious showmanship.

In any case, back to this (9th) episode of the Celebrity Apprentice. After the end of this show I'm sure of one thing: Annie Duke is the smartest woman I've ever seen. Now let's assume that she lived in Europe a few centuries ago and was the wife of a king, i.e., the queen. It wouldn't be a surprise if she got to that position without special hereditary privileges. Either way, if she was the queen, let's further assume, as was the case the vast majority of times, that the queen and women in general didn't have any outright power in the legal sense. The king did. However, as the queen, she would have had the opportunity to be a very powerful adviser. Now let's say that Clint Black was the king. He would have been very autocratic, yet open to advise (albeit grudgingly) from his wife and a couple other people.

In this scenario, Annie Duke would have been the ruler of the country. Everything she said, Clint would have done. Why? Because she is the smartest woman I've ever met :-). She is absolutely brilliant at manipulating people to get what she wants. It is simply amazing.

Now, if she were allowed to be the queen and legal ruler, she would have been a brilliant ruler, better of course than Clint Black. She probably would have been better than Elizabeth I. Perhaps she was in another lifetime!

As for Melissa, yeah, you were the odd one out like in a high school clique, but you didn't have as much to contribute! And Joan, you're the funniest woman I've ever met, but you're no angel yourself. The only sweet one in this group was the golf pro Natalie Gulbis.

Great episode!

P.S. I agree with Trump that people don't really change. The way they come out is who they are. Environmental factors slightly swing a skyscraper one way or the other, but the structure itself is extremely rigid. I think that's why it's so amazing all the different traits that people have, especially stuff that they're good at. Some people are great at music, or engineering, or design, or teaching, or nurturing, or comforting, or socializing with people, or manipulating people, or writing, or running, or stealing, or fighting, etc., etc. In one way or another, whatever each one of us has, that's the dice that was rolled by natural selection.