Mark KennedyDonald Trump may have written "The Art of the Deal," but he's got nothing on my two sons when it comes to negotiating.
My kids, ages 8 and 13, are relentless deal cutters.
I have no personal experience from their side of the negotiating table. Growing up with an Army sergeant dad who believed in corporal punishment, I didn't dare so much as frown at him.
As an adult, I have reported on and participated in labor negotiations, but I have never seen any adult advocate as cunning and single-minded as an ordinary 8-year-old kid.
If you're not yet a parent - but think you might someday become one - listen up. Here are some negotiating tactics you will encounter from your future children and some suggested defenses.
The End Around
Any child old enough to know "mommy" from "daddy," knows that a "no" response from one parent is not a deal killer. There is always a chance the other parent, when blindsided by the same request, will say "yes." The child will interpret your answers using baseball rules - "tie goes to the runner" - and jump right into the forbidden activity.
By the time both parents detect the deception, the child will meekly ask for forgiveness. He or she will know that the penalty for successfully using the "end around" strategy is absorbing a stern speech and then faking 15 seconds of remorse. This is a relatively small price to pay for getting your way.
As they grow older, your children will become more brazen. One may even look you in the eyes while reframing his or her request for your spouse, after you've already said "no." For these times, you might want to remind yourself, "No, this is not a dream. And, yes, I am officially a feckless parent."
' Solution: Deploy technology. Before saying "yes" or "no" to anything, text your spouse.
The Guilt Trip
Sooner or later, all kids learn that their parents - despite their protests to the contrary - are sensitive to social status.
Cunning kids use this information against you as a pressure point, like a Rhonda Rousey arm bar. They will note, for example, that the Smiths went to Hawaii this summer and the Jones order all their kids' clothes from Vineyard Vines. Their real motive, meanwhile, is to ask you if they can take a friend on your family's upcoming trip to Myrtle Beach.
After establishing that you are not a breadwinner capable of supplying luxury goods, thereby planting a seed of guilt in your mind, it makes their take-a-friend-to-the-beach request seem not just reasonable, but downright charitable. How genius is that?
' Solution: Develop a poor-boy defense. As in: "When I was a boy the closest I ever got to the beach was a creek."
The Fairness Doctrine
Before you decide to have a second child, close your eyes and repeat the phrase: "It's not fair. It's not fair. It's not fair. " If you find the chant annoying, continue to practice birth control.
The moment that you concede that fairness is your moral compass, your life will be ruined. Your kids will invoke the sibling "fairness doctrine" for every circumstance that you can imagine, and some that you can't. They will want to convene the Supreme Court to decide who gets the last blueberry Pop-Tart, or to determine who slapped whom in the back seat.
' Solution: Repeat this phrase to your children every chance you get: "Sorry, kids, fairness is not one my core beliefs."
The Parental Promise
Even kids who always forget to do their homework and never remember to brush their teeth will have saved a notarized copy of every promise you have ever made to them.
' Solution: Never promise anything.
The Power Pout
Even parent-pleasing kids will occasionally resort to pouting as a form of passive-aggressive manipulation.
From the time our boys were in diapers, they both knew the power of a pooched-out lower lip. It says, "Although I have been wronged, I will suffer my fate quietly, with dignity - hopeful that my loving parents will somehow come to note my earnest need for a cherry Blow Pop."
' Solution: There is no useful defense for this. Buy the sucker.
Contact Mark Kennedy at mkennedy@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6645. Follow him on Twitter @TFPCOLUMNIST. Subscribe to his Facebook updates at www.facebook.com/mkennedycolumnist.