User Reviews
Rating: really liked it
About a quarter of the way through this comprehensive history of everything leading up to the election of Trump and all the current events, Gary Cohn, the former president of Goldman Sachs who is the president’s top economic advisor, attempts to explain our economy to Trump. He brings him copious research and data and finally makes it as simple as possible by asking: which would you choose—to go into a mine and get black lung or to make the same salary doing something else? He is attempting to intrude into Trump’s belief that our trade agreements are disgraceful because we’re losing manufacturing jobs—despite the data that more than 80 percent of our jobs are
not in manufacturing and that a trade deficit is not a bad thing since it allows people to spend more money on what they’re spending it on anyway—services. Nothing seems to penetrate.
Several times Cohn just asked the president, “Why do you have these views?”
“I just do,” Trump replied. “I’ve had these views for 30 years.”
“That doesn’t mean they’re right,” Cohn said. “I had the view for 15 years I could play professional football. It doesn’t mean I was right.” (138)
Multiply this thousands of times and apply it to all government issues (foreign policy, trade, immigration, etc.) and you begin to understand the problem of a person who never tells the truth because he lacks a basic understanding of what truth is and how one discerns it. Nor can he learn. No amount of correction penetrates: he is told repeatedly that Iran is in compliance with its nuclear weapons agreement, yet he insists on his belief about cheating; he’s given the world history that makes South Korea’s partnership crucial to world peace, yet he wants to disrupt the relationship; he’s presented with statistics proving that steel tariffs will weaken our economy, but he wants what he wants, etc. Nor can he understand the intricate symbiotic relationships between national security, foreign policy, and immigration. In other words, we have elected a man who lives in a fantasy and who therefore bollixes the efforts of anybody who operates according to facts, and when those facts are inconvenient, he dismisses them as “fake” and the people who spew them as “stupid.” He places no value in experience and expertise, ignoring advice derived from those things as he inexplicably disseminates information that is Russian-derived propaganda. And naturally this constant whirlwind of ignorance as a management style has created a whirlwind of people spinning out of control while they simultaneously try to control or please him.
There is little new news in this book (except for a harrowing account of how close Trump came to declaring war with North Korea, with no understanding of the ramifications of doing so!), but Woodward is every much the historian that Doris Kearns Goodwin is writing about past presidents, and this book is an alive blow-by-blow meticulous record that will be studied by students who have not yet been born—if we live to see that future. (I am not usually a history buff, so sometimes the details become overwhelming; but I made the choice to be a student when I read both Doris Kearns Goodwin and this book, and that choice has me applauding the value of the detail for posterity.)
There is nothing mean-spirited about this book. Everybody is presented at times sympathetically—even Trump in his albeit fleeting upset about the chemical-weapons-killed babies in Syria; Jared and Ivanka (who have a miniscule role in this book) come across on the side of DACA kids and the Paris Climate Accord; advisor Rob Porter is heroic in slow-walking terrible orders from Trump; Lindsay Graham is a great deal-maker willing to find ways to make sane things happen; General McMaster tries so hard to do a good job. And this even-handedness highlights the horror of the chaos—everybody is working against each other, undercutting somebody else, running around secretly to “save the world” or “fight for the president.” The horror of this book is that our president has no understanding of truth and has evoked absolute pandemonium in the White House and subsequently all over the world, creating problems where none existed—in trade, in immigration, etc.
For me the value of this book is to better see the whole story, which for some reason makes it both more and less horrifying. It is an alarming story that will result in either the destruction of the world (via WWIII) by a child president who is incapable of learning or understanding the consequences of his hyperbole, or the activation of all of us who love the planet and want peace.
However, in my opinion, Trump and his minions are not the threat to our lives. It is the great apathetic public who refuse to vote let alone know the story that is so well written here. Those who most threaten our security are the people with fixed beliefs like Trump, who shrug and are bored by talk about the relationship between their ability to walk down the street and troops stationed in South Korea, and although I think this is a wonderful and necessary book, I know that it will never be read by those who most need to recognize their peril.
4/20/19 Addendum The publication of the redacted Mueller Report has validated much of this book: the out-of-control ignorance of our president, his disinterest in and blatant flaunting of the law, as well as how he seems to slip away from so much legal culpability because his staff simply refused to carry out criminal orders. And as the news breaks, so too is my dismay validated by the complete disinterest of those with fixed beliefs and no interest in facts who dismiss the report without even reading it.
***
Postscript:Because it has come up in my review thread comments that probably will not be read by many people, I would like to reiterate and elaborate on my sense of the tone of this book: It is not only even-handed and steady, but there is a compassionate undertone. Woodward is not out to get anybody. In the acknowledgements and the front-of-book personal note, he shares about his researcher and collaborator, Evelyn M. Duffy, and his wife, Elsa Walsh, "known widely as the Kindness Lady." He attributes to Evelyn a noble work ethic and a reverence for authenticated fact-based journalism, which is palpable in this book. And to Elsa he acknowledges "not just an unselfish appreciation for each person but a reverence for each." This best describes the compassion I sense in Woodward's writing and his approach to even those people with whom he disagrees. All this adds to the reader's sense that he is telling truth.
Rating: really liked it
…the only thing we have to fear is fear itself - Franklin Delano Roosevelt Inaugural address – March 4, 1933
Real power is—I don’t even want to use the word—fear. - Presidential candidate Donald J. Trump in an interview with Bob Woodward and Robert Costa on March 31, 2016
FDR was correct. The fear that gripped the nation in the Great Depression may have had a basis in reality, but acceding to that fear could have hindered any attempts to make the dire economic situation better. Would Roosevelt feel the same way today? Do we have nothing to fear but fear itself? Well, we do have a very concrete problem that generates a fair bit of concern, anxiety, nervousness, and yes, fear. The guy in the White House. The fear that Roosevelt addressed was a concern that the nation, under the weight of the latest in a series of economic collapses, might not be able to recover from it soon enough to matter, leaving the nation impoverished, riven with internal strife, and in danger from external enemies. The fears we contend with today include a widespread concern about a declining standard of living, a whipped-up concern about minorities, both foreign and domestic, distrust of those who worship differently, or not at all, confusion about increasing gender fluidity, and diversity. But there are specific fears that center on the guy in the Oval Office, both of the incoming and outgoing sorts.
Bob Woodward - image from the Washington Post
As illustrated in the opening quote above, (which is the opening of the book as well, the Trump quote, that is) Donald Trump believes the application of fear in dealing with people and nations is the proper course. Threats, bullying, and intimidation are the favorite irons in his bag. In the application of this approach, it is distinctly possible that he might miscalculate to the point of sparking economic mayhem, or even war. But the other element of fear that should terrify us all is his fear
for himself.
Donald Trump has paid vast sums of money to see that his under-the-covers philanderings remain under cover. (
“You’ve got to deny, deny, deny and push back on these women,” he said. “If you admit to anything and any culpability, then you’re dead.”) He is terrified that the world might see what an empty vessel he truly is. You may recall his conversation with the Mexican president in which Trump pleaded with
El Presidente to give him some political cover so he would not have to face his supporters with the news that building the wall was really only a campaign scam. He is afraid that he will be shown to be a mobbed-up front-man, a tool for the Russian mafia, living large by laundering their ill-gotten rubles. He is terrified that he will be exposed as an asset of the Russian government, impacting American foreign and domestic policy in ways that advantage his Russian handler. Where those fears become kinetic is in how he attempts to protect himself. He has done his best to shred the two American institutions that might hold him accountable, the justice system and the fourth estate, waging war on truth itself.
Trump has been griping about the media, well the media that is not Fox, Infowars, Clear Channel, Rush Limbaugh, or any of the far right-wing outlets that serve as a public relations propaganda support system for him, at least since his campaign. It has always seemed clear that the intent here is to erode the standing of news organizations that were likely to expose his many misdeeds. His attacks on judges handling suits against him, on the FBI, which was investigating his campaign’s potential ties to Russia, and on the Justice Department, which controls the FBI, and under which the Special Counsel was appointed, are all attempts to undermine the authority of agencies that are likely to bring his crimes to light and him to justice. If he can persuade the American people that the cops and judges are all corrupt he might get away with his particular responsibility for decades of money-laundering, at the very least, and quite likely a traitorous alliance with Putin, whether entered into willingly or via blackmail. Fending off investigators, public and journalistic, is an existential challenge for him, driven by his fear of exposure.
The focus of Woodward’s book is on one particular form of fear, the concern the people who work for Donald Trump have that he might do serious damage to the United States, and even to the world, either in his handling of potentially fraught negotiations, domestic or international, (there is particular attention paid to dealings with South and North Korea that illustrates this very well) or in his need to preserve his freedom, and privilege, by destroying respected norms and institutions. He is Godzilla, and we are all Tokyo.
Another substantial element is the chaos that is the White House, where established lines of communication and authority are regularly crossed, where the staff are constantly on the edge, wondering when the next absurd and/or dangerous presidential action may require their intervention, to try talking him out of it, slow him down, or make the requisite paperwork vanish.
A third theme that permeates is Trump’s flaws as a leader, his lack of intellectual curiosity, his adherence to preconceived notions regardless of research and advice that would lead a flexible human to a more informed opinion, (for example, accusing Iran of violating the treaty despite his own people telling him that they had not) his inability or unwillingness to take in more than a minimum amount of information on pretty much any subject, suggesting an attention deficit disorder.
You have probably heard quite a few quotes from this book, as coverage of its contents has been widespread. Perhaps the most significant are in the prologue
It was no less than an administrative coup d’état, an undermining of the will of the president of the United States and his constitutional authority.
In addition to coordinating policy decisions and schedules and running the paperwork for the president, Porter told an associate, “A third of my job was trying to react to some of the really dangerous ideas that he had and try to give him reasons to believe that maybe they weren’t such good ideas.”
Another strategy was to delay, procrastinate, cite legal restrictions, Lawyer Porter said, “But slow-walking things or not taking things up to him, or telling him—rightly, not just as an excuse—but this needs to be vetted, or we need to do more process on this, or we don’t have legal counsel clearance—that happened 10 times more frequently than taking papers from his desk. It felt like we were walking along the edge of the cliff perpetually.
…the United States in 2017 was tethered to the words and actions of an emotionally overwrought, mercurial and unpredictable leader. Members of his staff had joined to purposefully block some of what they believed were the president’s most dangerous impulses. It was a nervous breakdown of the executive power of the most powerful country in the world.
As with Michael Wolff’s
Fire and Fury, Steve Bannon has clearly offered the author considerable information on the goings on inside the White House. It is also clear that there are many other insiders who have talked to Woodward. One must always wonder, of course, where reporting events accurately leaves off for these sources, and where reputation embellishment begins. Thankfully, Woodward has gone to great lengths to corroborate diverse accounts to arrive at an accurate picture. I would be inclined to take what is reported in this book as
the best obtainable version of the truth.
Here are some other details that are worth remembering. -----Reince Preibus, as head of the GOP, had invested heavily in analytics and big data, over $175 million, and was very effective in using the drill-down intel to target neighborhoods with battalions of volunteers in the 2016 election. The intel even allowed targeting of individuals.
-----It was in 2015 that the NSA first found that Russia was looking at US voter rolls.
-----After pussygate, while almost all of his advisors urged Trump to drop out of the presidential race, there were two who urged him to stay in, Bannon, which is no shock, and Melania, which is, given the general view that she wanted no part of a presidential run.
-----Woodward also reports that, while Trump and Melania operate in pretty much separate spheres, there is genuine affection between the two. Color me skeptical.
----- It was interesting to learn how much influence and access Lindsay Graham had at the White House, which goes a long way to explaining how Graham could have pulled such a 180 on Trump. Graham had called Trump a “race-bating xenophobic bigot” in 2015, but in 2018, Graham said “He’s not, in my view, a racist by any stretch of the imagination.” It’s enough to give a guy whiplash.
-----Fascinating to read about Trump’s lawyer John Dowd and his dealings with Trump and Robert Mueller.
-----It was somewhat alarming learning of the sundry notions that were floated by presidential advisors re how to deal with North Korea’s acquisition of ICBM capability.
-----And also alarming, although not at all surprising, to read of John Kelly’s avid hostility toward Dreamers.
----- His people manage Trump’s time so he gets home after the weekend news on CNN and MSNBC goes into softer mode at 9pm.
Much of the book goes into specifics on the hirings and firings that keep the doors of the White House in need of constant oiling. Sometimes the idiocy is mind-boggling. Trump, early on, passed over John Bolton for a significant position because he did not like his moustache. Not that I have any particular fondness for Bolton, myself, but you do not base such decisions on the quality of someone’s facial hair. I mean he hired Ty Cobb, for god’s sake, or had him kidnapped from another century.
Gripes – Woodward sticks by his public position that the Steele dossier was a “garbage document” and that Comey should not have presented any of it to the president. It is unclear on what Woodward bases this position, given the solidity of the investigator, and the ongoing verification of information reported in that document.
You have probably heard/read this, but here are some of the lovely things said about Trump by his own appointees
-----Cohn had witnessed this for over a year—denial when needed or useful or more convenient. He’s a “professional liar,” Cohn told an associate.
-----He’s a fucking moron,” Tillerson said so everyone heard.
----- Trump had failed the President Lincoln test. He had not put a team of political rivals or competitors at the table, Priebus concluded. “He puts natural predators at the table,” Priebus said later. “Not just rivals—predators.
-----The president’s unhinged,” Kelly said
-----Trump normally wouldn’t listen long or very carefully to his national security adviser but it had gotten much worse, McMaster told Porter. “It’s like I can’t even get his attention.”
-----Cohn realized that Trump had gone bankrupt six times and seemed not to mind. Bankruptcy was just another business strategy. Walk away, threaten to blow up the deal. Real power is fear… Applying this mind-set from his real estate days to governing and deciding to risk bankrupting the United States would be a different matter entirely.
----- In a small group meeting in his office one day, Kelly said of the president, “He’s an idiot. It’s pointless to try to convince him of anything. He’s gone off the rails. We’re in crazytown.
“I don’t even know why any of us are here. This is the worst job I’ve ever had.
-----McMaster said that he believed Mattis and Tillerson had concluded that the president and the White House were crazy. As a result, they sought to implement and even formulate policy on their own without interference or involvement from McMaster, let alone the president.
----- In the political back-and-forth, the evasions, the denials, the tweeting, the obscuring, crying “Fake News,” the indignation, Trump had one overriding problem that Dowd knew but could not bring himself to say to the president: “You’re a fucking liar.”
The man really commands loyalty in his people. And then there are the insults, the abuse to which he subjected that staff, regardless of their level of loyalty to him. It is amazing anyone will even speak to the man. I will spare you those.
It is obvious that there is a clear and present danger to all Americans from the man currently resident in the White House, a man who is not only unfit to hold this highest position in the nation, but a man whose dull intellect, exuberant venality, core-deep corruption, contempt for American values and laws, authoritarian inclinations, and unsurpassed greed have made him the worst president in the history of the nation. His rigidity and ignorance have caused even people who share the political values he espouses to engage in activities that are probably criminal in order to spare the nation the downsides of his ill-informed, and often darkly-intentioned decisions. Fear is not the only thing we have to fear. We have just cause to fear what Donald Trump might do with the gigantic instrument he has been charged with operating. While busying himself looting the national treasure for himself and his pals, while paring back sane restrictions on polluting industries, while dismantling much of the mechanism of government that produces and distributes factual information for the nation, while engaging in border practices that make us remember the 1930s and 1940s, he is also busy tearing down respected institutions, shredding political and moral norms, and making the USA the laughingstock of the world.
So, President Roosevelt, it is most certainly NOT THE CASE that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself. There are plenty of fear-generating people, nations and events on our planet that can justify our fears. But the one that supersedes all, for the moment, is Donald J. Trump. He is a danger to us all, and, as the investigations into his dark deeds progresses, he is only getting more paranoid and desperate. Be afraid. Be very afraid.
We must especially beware of that small group of selfish men who would clip the wings of the American Eagle in order to feather their own nests.
FRANKLIN D. ROOSEVELT, State of the Union Address, Jan. 9, 1941
Review first posted – 9/21/18
Publication date – 9/11/18
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EXTRA STUFFLinks to the author’s personal, Twitter and FB pages
September 5, 2018 - I Am Part of the Resistance Inside the Trump Administration - by Anonymous
Interviews-----September 15, 2018 - New York Magazine - Bob Woodward on the ‘Best Obtainable Version of the Truth’ About Trump - by Olivia Nuzzi
-----September 5, 2018 – CNN - 13 totally bananas moments from Donald Trump's phone call with Bob Woodward - by Chris Cillizza. – a fun piece
----- September 14, 2018 - The Guardian - Bob Woodward: 'Too many people are emotionally unhinged about Trump'
- by David Smith
----- September 14, 2018 - KQED.org – Washington Week Washington Week episode: ‘Fear’ inside the Trump White House - with Robert Costa – Woodward’s final line in the interview -
“He’s really disabled. He can’t tell the truth.”Items of Interest-----October 15, 2018 - A nice short video that puts the current danger into historical context - If You’re Not Scared About Fascism in the U.S., You Should Be
-----February 22, 2019 - Atlantic Magazine - The Alarming Scope of the President's Emergency Powers - by Elizabeth Goitein - When push comes to prosecute or impeach, do you really expect Trump to accede to the rule of law? This alarming article points out the many tools available to Swamp Thing that might be misused to keep his crooked ass out of jail. Be afraid. Be very afraid.
-----March 7, 2019 - NY Times - Nicholas Kristof offers an optimistic perspective on the unlikelihood of a Trump Reich - We Will Survive. Probably.
-----March 14, 2019 - NY Times - Donald Trump’s Bikers Want to Kick Protester Ass - building a brownshirt militia - this is really bad
-----But Lawrence O'Brien Lawrence O'Brien thinks it's just gas. Sure hope he's right.
Rating: really liked it
It’s Bob Woodward. How do you think Trumpworld will react? Woodward is methodical, precise, and willing to hold anyone to account, regardless of political stripe.
https://www.politico.eu/blogs/on-medi...
Rating: really liked it
Unlike FIRE AND FURY, Bob Woodward's work is backed by the validity of two Pulitzer prizes and numerous accolades for his inscrutable reporting. One of the key men responsible for helping to shed a light on (and bring down) Nixon and his atrocities, I can think of few other journalists who are needed more in our modern political realm than Woodward.
That said, FEAR scared the shit out of me. Move over, Stephen King, Bob Woodward has written the most terrifying book in years. Never has it been so crystal clear as it is within these pages just how unfit and batshit insane our president is. From his rambling tirades, to his painful ignorance, to his absolute steadfast intentions to push for his own interests and casting aside the greater needs of our country, Woodward paints an revoltingly intimate portrait of a man who conned an entire country and seems determined to watch it all burn in his wake.
Let me make this clear: I don't want things to be like this; I don't live to read about the salacious and cringeworthy acts of our president—I take no joy in this. I just want a competent, compassionate president who has the greater interests of our country in their heart. Woodward's intricate and detailed reporting gives us incredibly specific examples of our president's malfeasance and the shock and awe not only among our allies, but within his own White House. The bottom line: none of this is normal. We, as Chief of Staff General Kelly himself said, have gone off the rails—this is Crazytown. There is no way that this is sustainable. Either we will tear ourselves apart as a nation, or one of the president's nonsensical actions will do the job for us.
One of the most important books of the year. Woodward gives us the facts—the rest is up to us.
Rating: really liked it
Revelation? “Cohn realised that Trump had gone bankrupt six times and seemed not to mind. Bankruptcy was just another business strategy. Walk away, threaten to blow up the deal. Real power is fear.”
Donald Trump is probably the most divisive President in US history and has created a polarised nation between those believing he is honestly and strategically playing a role to achieve gains for the US, and those who think he’s destructive, stumbling from one, sometimes self-imposed, incident to another.
The world that shaped Trump is one of privilege and wealth. His business style is one of brash authority where he doesn’t need to placate others, and if he makes a mistake, it costs money but is not life and death. As US President, one of the most powerful men in the world, he is responsible for global politics, economics and national security, and IT IS a matter of life and death. The big issue I wanted answering is, whether Trump is equipped with the capability, integrity and selfless ambition to form a Government and serve his nation. He is required to shoulder the expectations of ALL citizens to deliver prosperity and security to his country and play his role on a more and more inclusive world stage. Is he doing this?
Bob Woodward sets out a journalistic-style, piece-by-piece book, that draws a picture of a leader that is erratic, unpredictable and will say and do anything to remain a popular public figure. The image of Trump is of a president that lacks knowledge about his area of responsibility, someone who lacks integrity, someone who cannot analyse a situation in depth and bring comprehensive diverse advice to inform a coherent defendable but definite decision. He will make irrational decisions with little appreciation of political structures, legislature or legal agreements.
“Despite almost daily report of chaos and discord in the White House, the public did not know how bad the internal situation actually was. Trump was always shifting, rarely fixed, erratic. He would get in a bad mood, something large or small would infuriate him”
Trump is presented through the various incidents covered in the book to show a lack of understanding on economic strategies and how they affect domestic and global markets, and how little candour and loyalty he has when it comes to building a team that can cohesively deliver the Government’s plans. His turnaround in staff is deeply concerning and his history of turning apparently close friends into enemies is shocking. In particular the Clintons, Steve Bannon (Trump’s Chief Strategist) and Gary Cohn (Director of National Economic Council).
With Trump’s impulsive and unpredictable approach, this can be advantageous in certain instances and can achieve results. For example, the NATO agreements on moving each member country to honour it’s committed financial contribution, or the rapid consolidation of the Gulf Cooperation Council, showing unity against Iran. It would be a great tool to have at your disposal when diplomacy drags in the quagmire of debate and negotiation. However, if it becomes the norm, it becomes predictable and playable. Woodward describes a White House environment where advisors, aides, appointed officials, and Government staff are constantly berated while they protect the President/Country by hiding executive order documents to prevent serious international consequences. Rex Tillerson (Secretary of State), after one of the senior staff meetings, says to Reince
“I just don’t like the way the president talks to these generals. They don’t deserve it. I can’t sit around and listen to this from the president. He’s just a moron.”
Chapter by chapter, the narrative covers the period from pre-Republican nomination to recent times, through issues involving, immigration, racial divisions, tax reforms, North Korea, South Korea, Afghanistan, Iran, Pakistan, NATO, and the numerous trade deals. Unfortunately, there are no real revelations that we may have hoped for. The sad result is that our greatest fears about Trump, his bullish, disrespectful and offensive character, and his inability to constructively contribute to a domestic and international political and economic agenda have a solid foundation, and are not just a front. The pace of these events and the dialogue are a little slow but there are moments of interest that are engrossing, and then it’s gone again.
It’s almost impossible to be unbiased in considering Trump and his position as President of the USA. I haven’t read other books on Trump but when this account became available from Bob Woodward, my perception was that if there is an opportunity of reading a considered account of Donald Trump as US President, where the veracity of the background research and sources are validated, this would be it. There are obvious debates over those sources being played out in the news and Woodward’s own agenda, but I feel it slightly irrelevant, as there were no surprises or startling insights that would cause me to change my perception of Donald Trump. Whether open-minded pro-Trump supporters will see their President in a different light, is an interesting question.
I would recommend reading this book as it does provoke interest and debate but don’t expect any great revelations. I may just be cynical, but I’m still not convinced I’ve heard the whole truth and I’m just wondering what hidden agendas are at play by sources providing material for this book.
Rating: really liked it
The thing you should know about Woodward and Bernstein is that Woodward was never much of a writer. No, Bernstein,
he was the writer. Choosing the right word, arranging the facts in a persuasive array, concluding with a rhetorical flourish: these are contributions Bernstein made that gave the work of Bernward and Woodstein its sophistication, its polish.
Of course, Bernstein was a heck of a reporter too, but the two of them were different. Bernstein was mercurial and intuitive; Woodward was indefatigable and relentless. Bernstein knew instinctively what would move the reader; Woodward was the boy who got things done. (Speaking of getting things done: in addition to their collaborations, Woodward has to date completed seventeen books. Bernstein has completed three.)
Still, for all his strengths, Bob Woodward has always been a plodder. For example, he introduces his “characters” with predictable adjectives: Bannon is “aggressive, certain, and loud,” Kellyanne Conway is “feisty,” Mitch McConnell is “wily.” He does not paint a scene well, and he seldom tries. Instead, he lets his dialogue do it for him.
It is the dialogue that gives his books their strength. Woodward is known to make audio recordings when he can, and stenographically record everything else. His dialogue has the ring of authenticity. If not completely accurate, each scene undoubtedly reflects the memory—however self-serving—of his principal source for the particular event. And, given Woodward’s methods, you can be sure each source is backed up by one or two others.
In
Fear, it is not difficult to see who these sources are. Predictably, they seem to be big-time players already ejected from the administration: Bannon, Priebus, Cohn, Porter, McMaster, Tillerson, and Dowd, with an occasional scene contributed by a peripheral player, such as Lyndsey Graham or Chris Christie.
The sad fact, though, is that little is to be learned from
Fear, in spite of all the hype. The value of the usual Woodward book is that Bob—because of his sterling reputation—has a knack for getting on record sources other people can’t get. But this is an unnecessary virtue when you are writing about a White House where
everybody leaks all the time.
I’m not saying you don’t learn things from the book. You learn, for example, how Mattis (in conjunction with McMaster and Tillerson) saved us from WW III by saying “no” to Trump, how Gary Cohn and Rob Porter forestalled economic meltdown by stealing papers from Trump’s desk, and how Dowd (unsuccessfully) tried to rescue Trump from Trump. And of course you learn how stupid and erratic and childlike everybody thinks Trump is. But if you’ve read
Fire and Fury, if you’ve been following the
Times and the
Post, then you know most of this stuff anyway.
I’d like to end with a brief passage. It is not central to the book, not even germane to the coprological cataclysm that is the Trump White House, but I liked it because it told me something I did not know: why Kim Jung Un is a more effective leader of his nation than his father Kim Jung Il.
The elder Kim had dealt with weapons test failures by ordering the death of the responsible scientists and officials. They were shot. The younger Kim accepted failures in tests, apparently absorbing the practical lesson: Failure is inevitable on the road to success. Under Kim Jung Un, the scientists lived to learn from their mistakes and the weapons programs improved.
Rating: really liked it
I have decided to embark on a mission to read a number of books on subjects that will be of great importance to the upcoming 2020 US Presidential Election. Many of these will focus on actors intricately involved in the process, in hopes that I can understand them better and, perhaps, educate others with the power to cast a ballot. I am, as always, open to serious recommendations from anyone who has a book I might like to include in the process.
This is Book #31 in my 2020 US Election Preparation Challenge.While the talk of the 45th President of the United States (POTUS) seems to be an endless cycle of conversation, insults, and downright headaches, I approached reading this book with an open and curious mind. I chose to let Bob Woodward —a highly esteemed journalist in his own right—guide me through some of his findings during the early period of the Trump presidency.
Woodward explores Trump’s candidacy and first year or so in the Oval Office, tackling some of the more controversial events and topics that came to light. Woodward offers the reader some insights into this time, where Trump was fuelled by a passionate hatred of President Obama and how he would do anything to derail or dismantle programs put in place, making promises at rallies and seeking to enact them as soon as he had a presidential seat.
There was also much talk of his attempts to make his own mark in the military, trade, sanctions, and even diplomacy, all guided by his Trump-centric mentality. Woodward clearly points that Trump was not alone, as he had a number of well-meaning—as well as completely useless—advisors around him, many of whom tried to guide him in a certain direction. While I may not agree with their politics, Woodward presents these advisors as those who sought to educate and guide Trump towards what could be done for America and how the Jenga blocks needed to be inched in a certain direction in order not to make things come cascading down, thereby heralding catastrophe.
The few sycophants who emerge from the text are those who are useless to the larger process, but entirely what Trump felt he needed on a daily basis. Armed with his narrow view on the world and with his Twitter account as a billy club, Trump tried to fix all things in a few characters, which usually failed to bring about presidential diplomacy.
If Woodward offers a single theme in this book that echoes throughout the pages of well-documented chapters, it is that Trump wanted to do things his way and will rarely follow the narrow and calculated path asked of him. A renegade to some and completely rogue to others, there is reason to fear.
America’s enemies are ready and willing to strike, which evokes added concern, when the man with his finger on the button treats it like his own personal toy, rather than listening to the reason of those who seek to advise.
Woodward should be applauded for this book, as he seeks to offer insights through the eyes of others, rather than rallying his own personal attacks with little substantive proof. Recommend for those who want a glimpse inside the West Wing without the baseless attacks of a jilted few who feed only negative information to sell books.
I have heard much about this book before I even began the opening sentence. Some loved the book for its openness and exploration of a number of topics, while others hated it for not revealing new smoking guns or additional finger pointing. Still others criticized it for poking fun at the POTUS in any way, as we should bow to him and allow him to create America in a new image.
I found the book to be intriguing in many ways and took much away from it. While I have read a few books on the Trump presidency—is it not indicative of something that so many pieces have come out so soon after he made it to the Oval Office?—there are themes that come out in all of them. These include: obsession with television portrayals, refusal to read background materials for essential decisions, preconceived notions of effective governance, and a hatred for all who oppose him.
What this book helped me see was that all of these and other perspectives were further solidified through the interviews Woodward undertook with those closest to Trump. This was not Woodward standing atop a soap box and issuing criticism dreamed up in his own mind, he used the words and sentiments of many who were ‘in the trenches’ to garner a better understanding for the reader. Call me naive, but I cannot see Bob Woodward as one who is all that interested in using weak information to build his arguments. Woodward has shown time and again that he asks the tough questions, but seeks to be fair in his delivery. First hand accounts serve as the foundation of this book’s narrative momentum, which I applaud.
There are moments of praise for Trump and others of complete mockery, but when they come from within, can be really call it a smear campaign by liberal media sources? I have never hidden my sentiments on this topic and while I try to get some of my foundation through reading and trying to better understand the situation, I am also an outsider. I admit to being happy that I have the right to expand my horizons and to better comprehend that which I argue against from my side of the (unwalled) border. Freedoms to express my sentiments cannot be taken, nor should they, so long as I am not fanning unfounded hatred for the sake of personally harming others. Worry not, Woodward handles this discussion in the book when he speaks of the supremacist rallies in the summer of 2017.
This was the first book I read on the subject where I was attacked by both pro- and anti-Trump folks. The former group sought to criticize me for reading about the negativity of the POTUS and how it all lies, while the latter bemoaned that I would waste my time reading about him at all. It is this ignorance that has pushed for me to seek a better understanding of the situation. I find many readers seek to ‘trump’ the ongoing discussions, in hopes that people will stop talking and trying to better understand things as they evolve.
Should we, as citizens of the world, live in fear until 2020? Might the type of behaviour exemplified in this book lead to horrible things? There is that possibility, but it could also be a rallying cry for American voters to turn out to cast their ballots, while Intelligence agencies work to plug some of the gaping holes that permitted outsider influences in elections past.
I encourage Bob Woodward to return to this topic after the Trump presidency has ended (however that will come about), as I would read that book, which can explore the entire experience in a single arc. Until then, I encourage all readers with an interest to give this book a try, ignoring the trolls on both sides who hurl insults at your choice. (Note, since reading and reviewing this book the first time, Woodward has added to the Trump White House series, my next major read, RAGE).
Kudos, Mr. Woodward, for giving me something about which to think. I feel enriched about what you have presented and look forward to where things will lead from here.
Love/hate the review? An ever-growing collection of others appears at:
http://pecheyponderings.wordpress.com/
A Book for All Seasons, a different sort of Book Challenge: https://www.goodreads.com/group/show/...
Rating: really liked it
I don’t read many non-fiction books, and almost never politics, let alone foreign politics. But more than two years of slavishly, horrifiedly(!) following a spectrum of US news sites and tweeters has changed that.
First, I read and reviewed
Fire and Fury (my review HERE), as one of the early headline-grabbing books of Trump’s regime.
Then,
A Day in the Life of Marlon Bundo (my review HERE), as it was refreshingly fun, and with a good, positive message. And much later, but in a slightly similar vein,
A Ladybird Book About Donald Trump (my review HERE).
Next up was
The Faith of Donald J. Trump: A Spiritual Biography (my review HERE) as it’s at the rotten heart of what I most despise.
And now this. Because it’s by Bob Woodward: a multi award winning journalist and biographer of nine presidents, red and blue. There’s a detailed index, notes, explanations, and no gossip. No analysis either. Just reportage “from multiple deep background interviews with firsthand sources”.
The most revealing so far is Mary L Trump's psychological analysis of her dysfunctional family,
Too Much and Never Enough (my review HERE).
Fear is a Liar“
Real power is - I don’t even want to use the word - fear.” - Candidate Trump, in an interview.
Trump weaponises fear, deliberately:
“
Real power is fear. It’s all about strength… You’ve got to deny, deny, deny.” - Trump to a friend accused of sexual misconduct.
Image:
“Fear is a Liar” - graffiti. Source.
What does the fearmonger fear?
He pivots and lies instinctively, compulsively, and maybe sometimes unconsciously. Even in private, on trivial matters, and regardless of how easy to disprove. That’s why his lawyer didn’t want him to talk to Mueller.
There’s plenty to fear from a fact-averse White House that is as unpredictable as its nominal head: one minute threatening “fire and fury” on North Korea from his bigger nuclear button, and a few months later declaring he “fell in love” with Kim thanks to a “beautiful letter”. Trump’s dysfunctional regime is one long nervous breakdown, and, with key documents being swiped from the Resolute Desk before Trump can sign them (the big scoop of this book), there has perhaps been an “administrative coup d’état”.
Cast Aside FearIs Trump a puppet (whether of Putin, Bannon, the Mercers and other 1%ers, the Saudi royals, or the Faith and Freedom Coalition and other fundamentalist conservative “christians”) or is
he the master manipulator? I’m not sure which would be more alarming, let alone which is true.
“
All presidencies are audience driven, but Trump’s central audience was often himself.”
Staff despair of his TV and Twitter habits, but he knows their power, and harnesses it:
“
This is my megaphone… This is who I am. This is how I communicate. It’s the reason I got elected.”
Trump gets printouts of his most popular tweets to spot what works. The showman knows what he’s doing in this medium, and thus controls the public discourse and news cycles.
For the narrow period covered, this book is thorough, and it’s reasonably well-written. But it's old news. The worrying aspects of Trump’s personality and behaviour have long been in plain sight; this book adds context and examples, but nothing new. It will doubtless be referred to thirty years hence and beyond, but it’s not history yet.
There is certainly the fear of the title. But somehow it's dull. Maybe I have fear fatigue.
Image:
“Cecily is finished with Fear” - GoodReads auto-generated status.
Focus on HopeDid staffers speak to Woodward to salvage some integrity, especially those who left it too late to leave Trump’s regime untainted? (With hundreds of pages of detailed notes, plus hours of recordings, I’m sure their identities will eventually be proven.)
“
It’s not what we did for the country… It’s what we saved him from doing.” - Gary Cohn.
That gives hope to those who still fear what this unpredictable and unprincipled president might do.
Image:
“Hope” by George Frederic Watts. Source.
I’ve seen this beautiful picture in London. Hope is blinded, seated on a globe, and clutching a lyre with a single remaining string. It is apparently a favourite of Obama’s after it was used in a sermon, and the pastor said the woman in the portrait had the audacity to hope - an idea Obama used as the title of his autobiography (my dusty review HERE).
Hope isn’t about fluff and rainbows. Hope is most powerful in times of need. In times of fear.
"Real power is hope. It’s not all about strength… You’ve got to hope, hope, hope. And act when, where, and how you can." - Cecily.
Rating: really liked it
“In 2016, candidate [Donald] Trump gave [journalist] Bob Costa and myself his definition of the job of president: ‘More than anything else, it’s the security of our nation…That’s number one, two, and three… The military, being strong, not letting bad things happen to our country from the outside. And I certainly think that’s always going to be my number-one part of the definition.’ The reality was that the United States in 2017 was tethered to the words and actions of an emotionally overwrought, mercurial and unpredictable leader. Members of his staff had joined to purposefully block some of what they believed were the president’s most dangerous impulses. It was a nervous breakdown of the executive power of the most powerful country in the world. What follows is that story…”- Bob Woodward,
Fear: Trump in the White House In deciding to read and review Bob Woodward’s
Fear, I broke two of my personal rules.
The first has to do with time. Specifically, how long it takes for the “news” we ingest each day to become “history.” Typically, a decent number of years – sometimes decades – must pass for us to even approach a full understanding of a momentous historical occasion. This passage allows reason to overtake emotion; gives historians an opportunity to ferret out evidence; and provides the full measure of clarity that comes with hindsight.
That time is clearly missing here.
Covering less than half of President Donald Trump’s first term in office, the stories recounted in
Fear are obviously rather fresh in everyone’s mind. More than that, we are still living with the aftershocks of the former president’s tumultuous administration. Memories are still very vivid. Wounds are still very raw. It is hard – bordering on impossible – to guess what this half-decade of bruising campaigns, discarded norms, fractured electorates, and unbridgeable divides will mean in ten or twenty or fifty years. The Republic will
probably still be here, but that no longer seems like a given.
***
The second rule has to do with discussing – or even mentioning – politics on the internet. To me, an online political discussion seems about as productive as covering myself in rotting fruit and physically embracing a large nest of murder hornets.
That makes it hard to talk about
Fear. It is about politics. More specifically, it is a scathing indictment of the forty-fifth president. Roughly fifty percent will accept everything in the book as a given, the other fifty ignore it as fake news. There is little hope for anything meaningful in bringing it up in the first place. If politics can still ruin family holidays, you can imagine what it does to complete strangers basking in the perceived anonymity of the worldwide web.
Thus, before going any further, I want to emphasize that this review – and my rating – is based on
Fear as a work of literature, nothing more.
To that end,
Fear is a very average book, bordering on the disappointing.
***
Given that I didn’t much like it, I should begin with the question of how I chose it. The answer: after minimal thought.
There is a massive cottage industry of Trump takedowns. Close your eyes and point your finger. Now open your eyes. You’re pointing at a book about Trump. These run the gamut. Some are serious pieces of journalism. Others are insider tell-alls. Some strive for integrity, others traffic in unsourced gossip.
Honestly, I didn’t expect to ever read a Trump book. I planned to put my head down, ignore them all, and then wait fifty years, by which point I’d be long dead and never have to think about this period again. Of course, I couldn’t do that. I couldn’t ignore the world swirling about outside my door. However unlikely, I wanted to try to comprehend what we’d just been through.
I picked Woodward’s book based solely on his reputation. After all, this is the man who – with Carl Bernstein’s help – broke the news that forced a president out of office. The knock on Woodward is that he is part of the establishment, a brand unto himself, prolifically churning out inside-politics bestsellers year after year. It is this establishment-ness, though, that makes Woodward so good. He has the sources. Everyone, it seems, wants to talk to the guy who gave us Deep Throat and
All the President’s Men.
It also helps that Woodward’s books are so massively overproduced that if you wait a couple years, you can get a beautifully unread hardcover copy for less than a coffee at Starbucks.
***
Fear begins in 2010, with a brief episode in which Steve Bannon opines that Trump will never run for president. It ends in March 2018, when Trump attorney John Dowd resigns in the midst of the Mueller Investigation. The fact that Woodward covers such a relatively long span in less than 400 pages should let you know just about everything there is about the depth of coverage.
My entire – mostly negative – reaction to
Fear can be boiled down to this: it is glib. Woodward’s style reminded me of
Frogger, with that desperate frog navigating a hazardous river by jumping from lily pads to logs, all the way to the other side. Instead of lily pads and logs, Woodward skips from one scene to the next, at a pace so frenzied that you barely notice the complete lack of context.
There is nothing resembling a thoughtful narrative here. It is the written equivalent of a clip show, a series of scenes strung together, mostly comprised of allegedly-verbatim dialogue. There is a lot going on in these pages, including tensions with North Korea, Trump’s threats to leave NATO, Trump’s threats to overturn trade agreements, Trump’s fixation on trade deficits (involving his threats to impose tariffs), Trump’s insult to decency after the Charlottesville white supremacist rally, the passage of the tax bill, and the slow-moving cloud of Robert Mueller’s investigation.
Woodward uses each of these vignettes for one purpose: to shock the reader with some jaw-dropping quote either by or about Trump. To be clear, I have no problem believing these things were said, as they have been reported elsewhere. Moreover, the chaotic nature of Trump’s administration is well-corroborated and no longer a secret. The trouble is that – as a reader – I felt like I was getting the highlight reel without any feel for the whole game. Every page seemed like it was designed to be Tweeted. Heck, even though I hadn’t read this before, it was exceedingly familiar, mostly because the juiciest excerpts had already appeared in
The Washington Post and other outlets.
One of the many results of this style is an absence of prioritization. For example, with regard to North Korea, Woodward seems to have some real insights into the dangers posed by Kim Jong-un, and the important relationship between the United States and South Korea. Instead of digging into this issue, though, it gets brought up, dropped, and left behind, all so that Woodward can tell us about Trump insulting Jeff Sessions.
***
Missing is any thoughtful analysis. Missing is any sense of how these scenes connected together. Missing is any meaningful portraits of the characters involved. If someone – it won’t be me – actually picks this up in fifty years, they’re not going to have any idea of what’s going on, and not simply because this is the tale of an inherently disordered presidential administration. It’s because Woodward has decided that he doesn’t need to include all that boring old stuff like background, setting, and subject-matter exploration. He knows – or thinks he knows – what his readers want, which is Trump’s chief-of-staff calling him an “idiot.”
***
This is very much a book designed for a
specific moment. Published shortly before the 2018 midterm elections, it became an instant bestseller, its highlights – by which I mean lowlights – splashed across the media landscape. If you read it upon release, I am sure that it was suitably horrifying to look behind the curtain.
Now that the curtain has been rolled back, we are left with a book that doesn’t seem to have much heft. It is not poorly written, for Woodward is a polished writer. Indeed, it’s incredibly readable, and I inhaled it the same way my kids inhaled their Halloween candy, with similar results.
It’s just not going to last.
Oftentimes we talk about the “first draft of history,” those volumes that come out in the shadow of big moments, that try to outline what happened, and that give us an initial impression, which can then be amplified, challenged, and changed.
Fear is far too slick to be the first draft of anything. It’s more like the press release for the abstract of the first draft of history. There will be far better titles in the years to come, ones that will obsess less on the insane things that were said, and focus more on the policies those words engendered. This future book will ponder not just what the hell happened, but what it all meant to a country that no longer knows itself, if it ever did.
Rating: really liked it
If Bob Woodward's latest book doesn't put a little fear in your heart, then you're not paying attention.
I'm a Watergate kid. I grew up with the Watergate hearings on our television - along with Vietnam, of course - every single day. We knew who John and Mo were and Senator Sam and the entire mesmerizing, horrifying bunch. But the pair we knew best were Woodward and Bernstein. To me, they were heroes who met in dark alleys to get the scoop and had the power to bring down the president! Of course, that was a different era when high crimes and federal laws actually were important and breaking those laws meant you would indicted and incarcerated or, in the case of Nixon, forced to resign. Thankfully. And sadly. We no longer live by the same standards today. :(
If you're looking for commentary on the meat of this book, there are plenty of other reviews out there to read. You already know what it is about. I'm not going to discuss politics or who is right and who is wrong. Everyone who reads this review already will have their mind made up - and that is sad. Just as Woodward listened to Deep Throat and wrote about that informant's information and kept that source a secret for decades, he again has listened to informants and recorded the despicable acts committed by an entire group of people but namely, Donald Trump. There is enough information in the book, credible information, to impeach Trump. However, it is doubtful in this age that it will be done. No one cares. Americans don't care. Americans can get riled up until hell freezes over regarding political parties but that is not what this is about. It is about an incompetent man in the white house; a man who broke laws to get there, one who is putting this nation in jeopardy with his tantrums, insidious postings to twitter and inability to lead a nation that once was the greatest in the world.
For the record, I am neither a Republican nor a Democrat. This country doesn't have a party for me and my political ideology. Again, that is not what this is about. The book - the one being read and reviewed - was written by a capable journalist whose facts are very succinctly laid out. Yes, his sources are protected - AS THEY SHOULD BE. Journalists have gone to prison for keeping a source's identity unknown. That does not negate their information and the information presented here, in the book, is spot on. I wouldn't expect anything less from Bob Woodward!
Rating: really liked it
Occasionally Goodreads members review a book using non-conventional criteria to protest bad behavior by the author on the site, or to protest the author or the author’s subject. One star because they hate the author or their subject. Five stars because they love the author or their subject.
My review is not that kind of review. Otherwise stated, my rating should not be conflated with an endorsement for or a demonstration against Woodward or Trump.
Instead, this is simply a book review.
Reading this book was neither enjoyable nor informative. A friend, Mike who commented below, pointed out what became painfully clear, Woodward gives a remedial lesson on every topic before he rehashes the news of the last 24 months. Don’t we all know what NAFTA is? Aren’t we all aware of the ongoing trade war as well as the Russia investigation? And at this point, don’t we all know what narcissist means? Apparently Woodward doesn’t believe so. He defines the word for us and seemingly did it without the use of a dictionary.
Perhaps I would have been willing to suffer through all these things if there were a lot of new information in here. There is not. Ninety-five percent of the facts in here come straight from the pages of our daily newspapers while maybe five percent is new information—information that was teased to us and put in every article about this book. Sometimes in Hollywood they put all the good stuff in the trailer. Same thing here.
If Woodward was able to put the Trump presidency and all its horror into some kind of historical or political context that has not been reported before--bring his wisdom to bear--that might have made the book worthwhile. Unfortunately, Woodward offers no lessons, just rehashes information and news.
Spend your time and money on a Washington Post subscription. Most worthwhile breaking news ends up there anyway.
Rating: really liked it
I have to say, I'd enjoyed Michael Wolff's book much more than this one. Simply because it was so much easier for me to indulge in Wolff's narrative of chaos and stupidity.
What Woodward's serves up here is harder for me to accept. The gist? The president gets what he wants and has plenty of enablers and supporters who will make any of his wants come true. I don't know how others see it, but it's clear to me the real pushback Trump ever got had to do with tariffs and South Korea. Yeah, his staff calls him names behind his back, so what? They go along with his bullshit anyway. I don't know why the White House needed to rebut anything written in this book. It portrays Trump as a man who will go after his goals with relentless stubbornness. No amount of information, common sense, expertise will distract him. You and I may have an issue with his view of the world where America's only purpose should be making money, and more money; his inability to understand complexities of geopolitics; or his use of power as the only diplomatic tool. But Trump's supporters love it!
What depressed me the most not that the book draws Trump as the small, limited person that he is, but that he will achieve most of what he aims to achieve, because he has the likes of Lindsey Graham and Mike Pence around to help him. And he will do so while tweeting disgusting garbage about women, people of color, asylum seekers, et al. There is no resistance in the White House, let's not kid ourselves. This is America now; and it can be changed only by people voting in the next election.
As far as the writing itself goes, I found the book to be very messy and poorly organized. I am guessing it is well sourced, but the main sources work here mostly to repair their public image. It's clear Cohn, Porter, Priebus and Bannon were the main spillers of the beans.
Now I am going to watch Brett Kavanaugh's hearing and get even more depressed.
Rating: really liked it
The ghost of Richard Nixon prowls the halls of the White House and pauses in front of the portrait of Kennedy.
He’s at it again, you know, that little s*** Woodward. Can’t leave well enough alone.
What’s that you say? He’s a journalist? Ha! He’s a journalist the same way I’m a Fuller brush door to door salesman. He’s a hitman, out to get those in power.
Sure he made coin on my misadventures, now he’s got his crosshairs on Trump. Yes, I know, there’s some truth to it, but he’s also a muckraker from way back.
Oh sure, I get your idealism, but we don’t all have your father’s whiskey money and your Irish good lucks. Got nothing to do with it? Are you really that naïve? Woodward wants to sell copy, that’s how the real world works Jack, or have you forgotten?
He talked to Trump aides and people in the administration? Well sure he did, and focused on the all the bad. But Jack, what about all the good? What about the fresh new ideas and the inspirations? What? Well, you’re a ghost too, Kennedy, don’t forget that!
What’s that? Trump is verbally abusive and condescending? Well, Jack, he’s got to be tough, it’s a brutal world out there. I was around a lot longer and let me tell you, it didn’t get any kinder or gentler after you left.
Corruption? Well … you want to make an omelet, you’ve got to break some eggs. What? You know full well what that means!
Where’d the title come from? He said it was from a quote from Trump, that “Real power is fear”. Well, of course I get the reference, we were all a bulwark against all the bad out there, and Trump’s no different! We had the goddamn Soviets to contend with and Trump has that little Korean guy. Well of course there’s more to it than that, there’s the pursuit of power and getting what you can and crushing your opponent and standing tall in the arena. Oh, well, sure, responsible government is too, sure it is. Hope and inspiration? This isn’t a Dickens novel, Jack!
Woodward shines a light on the new partisan politics and it’s gotten bad, Jack, not like when we were in power. I mean, you were my opponent, but not my enemy, there was respect. Nowadays … well, it’s ugly. 2016 was the worst presidential election year ever. I’m just glad Ike didn’t live to see this. Oh! Good evening, general, but you know what I mean.
Trump’s a billionaire who’s lost touch with the common man? But he ran on a populist agenda, for God’s sake! Well maybe. Consider this Jack, if you took dollars and converted them to seconds of time, a million would be about eleven days whereas a billion is like thirty YEARS?? I know, right? You may be right about that. For all your family’s ill-gotten gains, Trump’s fortune makes you look like a cloth fabric wearing Republican.
AND WHAT IN GOD’S NAME IS A TWEET?? I don’t know either! Does not sound presidential!
What’s that? Jameson or Tullamore Dew? Stay on track, Kennedy!
Well, sure, I guess it is important to read, but I don’t have to like it, and I sure as hell still don’t like Woodward!
Rating: really liked it
Since All the President's Men there really hasn't been a Woodward book I've enjoyed. I once owned a bunch of his Clinton, Bush books, but I found them obnoxious and DC proximity porn. While I think some of the information gleaned by Woodward for this book is worth the proximity porn, I still don't like his style. I'm also not a fan of the actual writing of this book. It doesn't flow.
Does it convince me more that Trump is a danger, an idiot, self-absorbed, reckless, without a moral compass, lacking empathy, compassion, loyalty, etc.? Sure. But I figured most of that out from JUST Trump's tweets. There are some nice quotes from various Trump-enablers calling Trump various versions of dumb, but still, not anything new. We've caught glimpes and shadows of this already (see Comey's book, see the Wolff book, etc).
Anyway, I'll write more later, but I'm done with Trump for the night.
Rating: really liked it
Never forget....
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PHBpl...
=======
They all knew....
“It is not necessary that people be wicked, but only that they be spineless.”
― James Baldwin
https://mobile.twitter.com/adamparkho...
=========
I am not a Trump defender. Quite the opposite. But this story is better suited as a Philip K. Dick novel come to life, that would truly capture the insanity of what's happening. I have written some of that story below. But first a word about the puzzling Woodward book. A missed opportunity.....
This book is a failure. It started out promising, but drops like a lead balloon about 25% in. After that, he has very long chapters on topics that anyone who is keeping up with what’s going on in the U.S. and the world already know— Hezbollah and the Middle East, Syria, The Afghan War, NAFTA, Tariffs, Russia, China, Mueller. Woodward introduces each subject as if it's new to the reader, when it's yesterday's news. I did not learn a thing from that part of the book. And it reads like an extended Wikipedia article in the same bland style.
There was some interesting material in the beginning, much of which has already been used to promote the book in newspaper articles. But it did stimulate my thinking about what kind of book should be written about Trump.
What’s really happening is like something out of a dystopian Philip K. Dick novel and was actually anticipated by David Foster Wallace in Infinite Jest. (See link below).
It’s a horror fantasy come true.
Trump has lived in a make-believe world his whole life. He got to play out that fantasy on his show “The Apprentice.” In spite of the phony drama of those shows, that many viewers somehow take as real, what happens does not matter, there are no real-world ramifications.
Then one day, in our PKD novel, the earth tilts on its axis and this nasty fellow, aka Agent Orange, steps out of his pixilated simulation into the material world. At first he’s confused. What happened? How did he get here?
But to his delight, he discovers he has real power, in fact he is the most powerful person in the world. He can do whatever he wants. Hire people on the spot, regardless of qualifications, and fire people on whim if he happens to be in a bad mood.
Agent Orange doesn’t know anything about the world. He was the C student who always figured life was only about making money. His dad taught him that. He has no use for eggheads or research. The main thing is to be decisive, to act. And to lie as much as necessary to get what you want. It’s become such a habit that it’s pathological. The world is his game board, he must move the pieces as he sees fit.
He hires a defense minister because he wears a uniform and stands “ramrod straight.” This officer has a secret SEAL mission he has always wanted to implement. Now is his chance. He wants to do a raid in Yemen. Agent Orange knows that all Muslims are evil and ISIS is bad, so go for it general!
At dawn on a Sunday morning, the raid goes into action. But, sadly, it does not go as planned. During a 50-minute firefight one SEAL is killed, three wounded. Civilians, including children, die. A $ 75 million Marine MV-22 Osprey lands hard, disabling the plane. It’s destroyed to keep it from falling into the hands of the enemy.
The SEAL’s death is a waste. But telling the truth is out of question because his widow is devastated. Everything in this world happens for a reason, so his death must have purpose. So, Agent Orange recognizes him in Congress and calls him a hero. Everyone stands and claps. The widow cries. Her life is changed forever. She should still have her husband. But at least she has a medal and a flag.
Though Agent Orange knows nothing about economics, his followers think he’s some kind of finance genius. A worried staff member brings in the president of a famous bank to try to educate the dear leader. His ignorance is shocking. He expresses surprise when the banker tells him that tech is costing jobs and will likely cost more in the near future. He better have a plan. Agent Orange is alarmed and confused. You mean I can’t bring those manufacturing jobs back from overseas? Sorry, no, the banker tells him, it will never happen. But Agent Orange promised the people. Oops.
He travels to North Korea to meet a leader he admires, because he has complete control over the country and has military parades. In advance, he has a movie produced about their future partnership that looks as if it were created by the Church of Scientology. The photo op in North Korea seems to go well. Agent Orange comes back and his fans hail his negotiating skills. But soon spy satellites show that North Korea has accelerated their nuclear development.
Agent Orange is shocked. He’s had enough. He orders a missile strike. That’ll show ‘em. One of this ramrod straight generals is stunned. He runs to meet with a notorious right wing, militarist Senator to come meet with Agent Orange to convince him to rescind the order. The Senator is very obsequious to Orange because he knows that’s the only way Orange will listen. He wants to give him an alternative to pushing the button. He takes a page out of the old Kissinger playbook about working through China. Orange thinks this would work because he believes China loves him. It probably won’t work, but at least there’s not a missile on the way.
Speaking of Korea, why do we own all that “shit land” in South Korea that includes a bad golf course?
Well, it’s part of the agreement for the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) missile defense system, the ramrod straight generals tell him. The system would help protect South Korea from a North Korea missile attack. You know, like how we protect Israel? More crucially, it could be used to help protect the United States.
“It’s actually a very good deal for us,” ramrod straight General McMaster says. “They gave us the land in a 99-year lease for free. But we pay for the system, the installation and the operations.”
It costs too much, says Agent Orange. This is a terrible deal. Put it in Portland, OR.
Syria is another thorn in his side. These complicated situations really frustrate Orange. Diplomacy and tactics are a pain in the ass. Always look for the simple solution, his dad always told him. Good. He orders the covert assassination of Assad. That’ll fix it. Again his staff has to scramble to talk Orange off the ledge. But this is his way: playing by ear, acting on impulse. This worked in the casino business, although he did go bankrupt a few times.
But Agent Orange’s fans are still happy. He’s the same bold, decision maker he was on TV. What’s not to like? Others don’t care for him personally, but that’s okay, they’re getting what they want for their businesses: corporate tax cuts, deregulation, increased defense budget and Supreme Court nominees who will reverse Roe v Wade.
The evangelicals are particularly excited about the Court. They actually don’t know the Bible very well. This reviewer, who knows the Bible backwards and forwards, can attest to that. They simply listen to their pastors who freely mix politics and faith.
As to helping the poor, can’t go for that. It’s their own fault they’re poor. What about aid to unwed mothers who won’t be able to have abortions? Not our problem. We just want to save the babies. Besides we want to go back to the Christian nation America once was, just like the Founders, who were mostly evangelical, wanted. (Um, you’re thinking of the Puritans). The Framers, as they are more properly called, were Enlightenment Deists who did not believe in a personal God. They also instituted a strict separation between Church and State because they saw what a disaster it was in Europe when they were mixed.
What’s a Deist?
Agent Orange is emotionally overwrought, mercurial and unpredictable. Members of his ever-changing staff have to scramble to block his most dangerous impulses. The executive office is having a nervous breakdown in front of the whole world and Russia, North Korea and other enemies are only too ready to exploit it and feed the chaos through cyber-attacks. But Agent Orange still admires their leaders. If only he could muzzle the media the way they can.
But “The Apprentice” watchers are so happy. They’re getting everything they hoped for. This is more than they could have expected. We’re getting rid of those criminal immigrants who threaten to destroy our country. The police have the black population under control and more of those predators are in jail. And gun rights are no longer threatened, we can take them anywhere we want, including to church and on to college campuses. We are more than ready to shoot the bad guys when they show themselves. He’s making America great again! Yay!
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the fake Trump created by "The Apprentice"....
“The Apprentice” portrayed Trump not as a skeezy hustler who huddles with local mobsters but as a plutocrat with impeccable business instincts and unparalleled wealth—a titan who always seemed to be climbing out of helicopters or into limousines. “Most of us knew he was a fake,” said show editor, Jonathan Braun. “He had just gone through I don’t know how many bankruptcies. But we made him out to be the most important person in the world. It was like making the court jester the king.” Bill Pruitt, another producer, recalled, “We walked through the offices and saw chipped furniture. We saw a crumbling empire at every turn. Our job was to make it seem otherwise.”
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/20...
Addendum....
President Trump says he and Kim Jong Un “fell in love” after the North Korean leader wrote him “beautiful letters” and characterized the U.S. as having “a very good relationship” with North Korea.
update: 1/2/19: now back to square A with Kim....
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/01/wo...
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David Foster Wallace character.....
http://dagblog.com/infinite-winter-pr...
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Bottomline: this Woodward offering made me miss Christopher Hitchens.
