Donald Trump is trying to set the record straight: He actually had a blast at the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner and just wasn’t sure how he was supposed to react to being taunted by the president. 
 
 Trump also calls himself ratings gold, evaluates the GOP hopefuls and suggests his own endorsement is the one worth waiting for. And based on their treks to Trump Tower, some seem to think so too. 
 
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 “The Republican field has several good candidates in the race — most of whom have come to see me at my office in Trump Tower,” The Donald writes in his new book, out this week. “The reason they come to see me isn’t just because I am a nice person but because millions of people listen to what I say and know I ‘get it.’ Some magazines have said I am the single most important endorsement a presidential candidate can have. I don’t know if that’s true, but it wouldn’t surprise me. I don’t say that to brag; I just tell it like it is.” 
 
 “Time to Get Tough: Making America #1 Again,” put out by the conservative publishing house Regnery, focuses heavily on the frequent fire-breathing cable news network guest, developer and reality TV star’s prescriptions for nation-curing. 
 
 The book reads like a Trump interview on TV — he volunteers to show the reader proof that Jon Huntsman called him and asked to speak with him, questions why President Barack Obama gets so much credit for Osama bin Laden’s death and begins sentences with, “Here’s the deal.” 
 
 He claims credit for creating Lady Gaga. 
 
 “She became a big star and maybe she became a star because I put her on the Miss Universe Pageant. It’s very possible, who knows what would have happened without it, because she caused a sensation,” he writes. 
 
 Chapters are entitled “Get tough,” “Take the Oil,” “Tax China to Save American Jobs,” “A Safety Net, Not a Hammock” — all hitting on the same protectionist, smaller government themes that Trump strummed when he toyed with a presidential run back in the spring, harnessing a take-the-fight-to-Obama message that left an imprint on how the GOP primary candidates have campaigned. 
 
 Trump wraps the book with an afterward on “The Press and the Presidency,” in which he lambastes by name reporters he felt were dishonest, recaps some of the more notable moments of his exploratory effort and evaluates the GOP hopefuls who had come to meet with him prior to the book going to press. 
 
 “I think I’ve had a very big impact [on the course of the race], and they’re not coming up to ask me for money, they’re coming up to ask me for an endorsement,” Trump told POLITICO in an interview last week about the book. 
 
 “I love the country, and they’re talking about the wrong things,” he says of the current White House, in a refrain that helped him stoke polls earlier this year. “We use to be one of the great [countries] and now we’re a laughingstock.” 
 
 Trump didn’t rule out an independent run himself, either in the book or in his POLITICO interview, when asked whether he would be willing to run with the group Americans Elect, which is trying to get on the ballot for a third-party candidacy in every state. But he says his NBC show “The Apprentice” — which he cited in pulling out of the race in the spring — would keep him from running, because of equal time laws and his contract. 
 
 Trump said he will most likely endorse in the GOP race but didn’t put a timeframe on it. 
 
 In the last chapter, he writes up the field of hopefuls who have come to see him. ||||| Real estate mogul Donald Trump said he hopes to endorse a candidate for the Republican nomination within the next "three or four weeks" but has not ruled out an independent bid if primary voters choose someone who can't win. 
 
 "If they pick somebody who I think can't win and if they pick somebody who is, in my opinion, the wrong person … and if the economy continues to be bad, I might run as an independent," he told USA TODAY. 
 
 He also says he has the money to do it on his own. 
 
 Included in his new book, Time to Get Tough Making America #1 Again, are the financial disclosure forms that Trump would have filed if he had decided to run for president this year. 
 
 So how much is he worth? More than $7 billion, the forms show. 
 
 "It's hard for Trump to run and have somebody who is struggling say I'm going to send him $100 or $1,000," Trump said, referring to himself in the third person three times. "They'd say I love Trump, I'm going to vote for Trump but it's even nicer that he doesn't need my money. 
 
 The reality television star announced in May that he would forgo a presidential bid after several months of speculation that he might throw his hat into the ring. The buzz began after he seized upon the so-called birther issue, a conspiracy-fueled theory that President Obama was not born in the United States, and he began appearing at the top of several early national polls. 
 
 Trump said the decision was difficult but at that point giving up The Apprentice was too difficult. 
 
 "Other people don't give up anything when they run," he said. "You give up a top, prime-time television show and I don't want to sound trivial but that's a lot." 
 
 His decision not to run has not kept him from remaining relevant in the Republican race for the nomination. 
 
 Trump announced Friday he would host a debate in Iowa on Dec. 27, just days before the Iowa caucuses. However, two candidates — former Utah governor Jon Huntsman and Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas — have declined to participate. Former House speaker Newt Gingrich, who is now leading in the most recent Iowa poll, said he will participate. 
 
 Paul's campaign said Trump's role as a moderator was "wildly inappropriate." Trump responded in a statement, "Few people take Ron Paul seriously and many of his views and presentation make him a clown-like candidate." 
 
 New York's Trump Tower has become a familiar campaign stop for many of the current presidential contenders. 
 
 Gingrich will be the latest to drop by for a visit today. 
 
 Trump describes his impressions from a few of those meetings in the book: 
 
 •Sarah Palin is a "terrific woman" and the stir they created in New York on their trip to a local pizza place was "wild." 
 
 •Rep. Michele Bachmann is a "real worker bee," who has a "great political future ahead of her" no matter how the race turns out. 
 
 •Texas Gov. Rick Perry is "different from the debates" and "is forceful and strong" off camera. 
 
 •Former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney is "warm and engaging" and someone "the public needs to get to know better." 
 
 "They want my endorsement, not my money, and the reason is because I have millions of people … that really want to hear what I say," Trump said. "They basically know that I understand how not to get ripped off and we are being ripped off by the world." 
 
 That theme would likely dominate any future Trump bid for president. His book describes his belief that China is secretly trying to sink the U.S. economy through currency manipulation and cyber warfare while preparing to dominate militarily. 
 
 "Get it straight," he writes. "China is not our friend." 
 
 Trump said China and the role of Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) in the United States' economy have not been discussed enough during the primary, but said the book was not meant to be a policy checklist for an endorsement. 
 
 Asked when he would make a final decision about a run if the right person was not chosen, Trump said after the next season of The Apprentice wraps in May 2012. 
 
 "You don't need a lot (of time) in the age of television, of computers … to be honest and, you know, most people know where I stand anyway," he said. "I'm a free agent right after the (season ends), which is May 15." ||||| It might be true that no American has spent more one-on-one time with the leading Republican presidential candidates than Donald Trump. 
 
 The real estate mogul and reality show host has devoted the second half of this year to fashioning himself as the single most important potential endorser in the GOP sweepstakes. The candidates have cycled through his offices at Trump Tower to ask for his support, and he has cycled through Fox News’s anchors talking about it. The latest to come calling is former House speaker Newt Gingrich, who will visit on Monday. 
 
 This is what makes the afterword of his new book, “Time to Get Tough,” so relevant. After boasting of his own accolades — he writes, “I was quickly #1 in the polls,” as well as, “I am a ratings machine” — Trump offers his personal impressions of the candidates. 
 
 Trump writes that Mitt Romney has been “spectacular” in the debates and that the former Massachusetts governor is “a much different guy” in private than he is in public, describing him as “warm and engaging.” 
 
 “He gets criticized for changing his opinions, or ‘flip flopping,’ but over a lifetime I’ve seen many people who don’t change and they always get left behind,” Trump writes. “Smart people learn things, so they change their minds. Only stupid people never change their minds.” 
 
 In an interview with The Washington Post, Trump repeated his defense of Romney’s evolving positions on key issues. “If you have a concrete wall in front of you, you can’t just try to run through it,” Trump said. “You have to go around it, under it, over it. Everybody changes.” 
 
 
 
 Trump writes that he found Texas Gov. Rick Perry to be “much different from what you see in the debates.. . .so forceful and strong.” Trump writes that he said to Perry: “Rick, why can’t you act this way in the debates?” 
 
 “He said, ‘Donald, the debates are just not my thing. So I said, ‘Why don’t you pretend you are someplace else? You gotta act different. You are getting killed in the debates.’ But he repeated, ‘Donald, they are just not for me.’ 
 
 Trump describes Rep. Michele Bachmann (Minn.) as “a real worker bee.” He notes that she visited his office “more than once” and that “no matter what happens with her run for the White House she’s got a great political future ahead of her.” 
 
 One candidate who hasn’t visited Trump is former Utah governor Jon Huntsman Jr. Indeed, Huntsman made a public show of not wanting or needing to see Trump, and last week declining an invitation to a debate Trump is moderating two days after Christmas in Iowa. 
 
 But in his book, Trump tells a different story. He writes that Huntsman had courted Trump just like the other candidates. 
 
 “He called me a number of times and I was unbelievably busy doing a deal and I didn’t get back to him,” Trump writes, adding: “In fact, he left me his number and the person’s name to call to set up a meeting.” 
 
 Trump writes nothing about Rep. Ron Paul (Tex.), who scorned him Sunday on CNN: “I don’t understand the marching to his office. I mean I didn’t know that he had an ability to lay on hands, you know, and anoint people.” 
 
 In the interview, Trump said he plans to endorse a candidate “over the next month or so” and that he would consider making an independent run next year if he is not satisfied with the Republican nominee. 
 
 Trump weighed his own run this spring, as he drew media attention for challenging President Obama’s birthplace. He writes that he didn’t run because he believed the press would have unfairly gone after his hundreds of business deals. “It is very hard for a truly successful person to run for office,” he writes. 
 
 Trump writes that he had completed his financial disclosure forms in preparation for a campaign, and publishes a three-page summary in the book. He estimates his net worth at $7 billion, including a “brand value” he assesses at $3 billion. 
 
 Trump writes at length about NBC, which airs his show, “The Apprentice.” He criticizes its decision to change the time of Jay Leno’s show: “I warned them it would be the first time in history somebody’s going to be taken out of the #1 position and moved.” 
 
 Trump also writes about his beefs with marquee talent in the network’s news division. “They have this guy called Lawrence O’Donnell whom I seldom watch (and neither does anybody else). His ratings are terrible,” Trump writes. 
 
 Trump claims credit for the commercial success of pop star Lady Gaga: “I really believe I had at least something to do with it.” 
 
 But what really gave Trump a rise was Obama’s riff on him at this year’s White House Correspondents’ Dinner, which Trump attended as a guest of The Washington Post. The president was making fun of Trump and the outsize role he was playing in the GOP race. 
 
 “While I shouldn’t admit this, I don’t mind being the center of attention, especially on such an evening,” Trump writes, adding: “I loved it!”
– One thing is certain: Donald Trump has no shortage of self-esteem. In his new book, out this week, he takes credit for making Lady Gaga "a big star," hypothesizing, "maybe she became a star because I put her on the Miss Universe Pageant. It’s very possible, who knows what would have happened without it, because she caused a sensation. … I really believe I had at least something to do with it." More from Time to Get Tough: Making America #1 Again from Politico, the Washington Post, and USA Today: On his endorsement: "The Republican field has several good candidates in the race—most of whom have come to see me at my office in Trump Tower. The reason they come to see me isn’t just because I am a nice person but because millions of people listen to what I say and know I 'get it.' Some magazines have said I am the single most important endorsement a presidential candidate can have. I don’t know if that’s true but it wouldn’t surprise me." On Osama bin Laden: "It’s wonderful that we got him, but what sane person would have decided otherwise? Why does Obama get so much credit? I know that’s not politically correct to say, but if somebody can explain that to me, I would be very grateful. Our military deserves all the credit, not Obama." On the president's mockery of him at the White House Correspondent's Dinner: "While I shouldn’t admit this, I don’t mind being the center of attention, especially on such an evening. I loved it!" he writes. "I didn’t quite know how to react. Should I be laughing? Smiling? Frowning? I wasn’t sure so I decided to keep a straight face, with a few little smiles every once in a while because I knew the cameras were on me." On Rick Perry: "Every time I speak to him he is so forceful and strong that I have actually said to him: 'Rick, why can’t you act this way during the debates?' He said, 'Donald, the debates are just not my thing.' So I said, 'Why don’t you pretend you are someplace else? You gotta act different. You are getting killed in the debates.'" More choice quotes about himself: "I was quickly No. 1 in the polls." "I am a ratings machine." "It is very hard for a truly successful person to run for office." In interviews with all three publications, the Donald did not rule out re-entering the presidential race as an independent, and even went so far as to say he would consider an independent run if he doesn't like the Republican nominee.