“Fear” (2018) is a book by Bob Woodward about the White House under US President Trump. Back in the 1970s Woodward and Carl Bernstein broke the Watergate scandal that brought down President Nixon.
Title: Trump says real power is based on fear.
Time period: August 2016 to March 2018.
Sources: Based on interviews of some of the refugees streaming out of the Trump White House, especially:
- Steve Bannon – campaign manager, later chief strategist (Trump’s brain)
- Reince Priebus – head of the Republican National Committee, later White House chief of staff
- Gary Cohn – Trump’s top economic adviser
- Rob Porter – Trump’s staff secretary (handles all the president’s paperwork, in particular the pieces of paper he signs)
- John Dowd – one of Trump’s lawyers trying to keep him out of prison.
Crazytown: It is pretty much as people in blue states imagine, maybe a bit worse:
John Kelly, chief of staff since August 2017, in charge of bringing order to the White House:
“He’s an idiot. It’s pointless to try to convince him of anything. He’s gone off the rails. We’re in crazytown.”
An unnamed senior White House official in July 2017:
“The president proceeded to lecture and insult the entire group [of his top military and economic advisers] about how they didn’t know anything when it came to defense or national security. It seems clear that many of the president’s senior advisers, especially those in the national security realm, are extremely concerned with his erratic nature, his relative ignorance, his inability to learn, as well as what they consider his dangerous views.”
Rex Tillerson, secretary of state, right after that same meeting:
“He’s a fucking moron.”
Trump has the mind of a bright, spoiled 12-year-old. That is about his level of maturity and knowledge of the world. He is unwilling to learn and is bad at taking advice. He lies like it was nothing and easily breaks his promises. He expects loyalty but does not return it. He can ask sharp, profound questions, but the answers are lost on him.
Nepotism: On top of that he lets Ivanka and Jared Kushner, his daughter and son-in-law, do whatever they want, which undermines his cabinet and any orderly process.
Idiot king: If you imagine Trump as an idiot king, Ivanka as the princess, and Jared as the crown prince, you would have it about right.
Deep State: As Woodward tells it, there is a deep state – the Pentagon, CIA, FBI, Wall Street, etc. But it is not so much trying to overthrow Trump, as Fox News would have it, as trying to preserve the military and economic arrangements that the US and its allies set up to prevent a third world war. Trump is trying to tear all that down in the name of a narrow (White) nationalism.
Russiagate: Woodward, famous for Watergate, says surprisingly little about Russiagate. It appears, but more as an approaching storm. On one of the last pages of the book, John Dowd, his lawyer, warns Trump:
“Don’t testify. It’s either that or an orange jumpsuit.”
Expect a sequel.
– Abagond, 2018.
See also:
- Watergate
- All the President’s Men – where Woodward is played by Robert Redford
- deep state
- Russiagate update – from July 2018
- Steve Bannon
- Donald Trump
- Kohlberg’s stages of moral development – Trump is at Stage 2, ages 5 to 12: Self-Interest.
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“Deep State: As Woodward tells it, there is a deep state – the Pentagon, CIA, FBI, Wall Street, etc. But it is not so much trying to overthrow Trump, as Fox News would have it, as trying to preserve the military and economic arrangements that the US and its allies set up to prevent a third world war.”
The last sentence is obvious self-serving bs. They’ve done a shitty job keeping the peace since the end of World War 2. The number of wars started by the USA outstrips all other nations. I guess you have to start wars to keep the peace, i.e. world war 3.
“Russiagate: Woodward, famous for Watergate, says surprisingly little about Russiagate.”
Because, so far, it’s been hysterical nonsense from the Democrats. Russia is responsible for everything wrong with the USA, censorship is required to turn back the clock to the halcyon days when all USAers loved and respected each other. Hilarious.
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Refugees, my foot. They’re probably internally displaced persons at best and carry none of the connotations/burdens of refugee status. Bannon, Cohn, Dowd, Porter & Priebus are all going on to book deals of their own and cushy jobs at think tanks. Even Porter, whose domestic violence is swept under the rug so he would talk to Woodward, will end up just fine.
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