Subterms
Trump-Russia investigation
Peter Strzok was removed from Russia investigation and fired by the FBI over text messages critical of Trump
Rage: Will Bob Woodward’s tapes bring down Donald Trump? More
Donald Trump
President on tape: ‘I wanted to always play it down’
Republican chair: ‘History will look back on him well’
Rage: Will Bob Woodward’s tapes bring down Donald Trump? More
Heather Cox Richardson’s How the South Won the Civil War is not principally about that war. Instead, it is a broad sweep of American history on the theme of the struggle between democracy and oligarchy – between the vision that “all men are created equal” and the frequency with which power has accumulated in the hands of a few, who have then sought to thwart equality.What she terms the “paradox” of the founding – that “the principle of equality depended on inequality”, that democracy relied on the subjugation of others so that those who were considered “equal”, principally white men, could rule, led to this continuing struggle. She draws a line, more or less straight, between “the oligarchic principles of the Confederacy” based on the cotton economy and racial inequality, western oligarchs in agribusiness and mining, and “movement conservatives in the Republican party”.More specifically, she writes that the west was “based on hierarchies”. California was a free state but with racial inequality in its constitution. Racism was rife in the west, from lynchings of Mexicans and “Juan Crow” to killings of Native Americans and migrants who built the transcontinental railroad but were the target of the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882.There, aided by migration of white southerners, “Confederate ideology took on a new life, and from there over the course of the next 150 years, it came to dominate America.” This ranged from western Republicans working with southern Democrats on issues like agriculture, in opposition to eastern interests, to shared feelings on race.Does American democracy somehow require the subjugation and subordination of others?Once Reconstruction ended, and with it black voting in the south, Republicans looked west. Anti-lynching and voting rights legislation lost because of the votes of westerners, and new states aligned for decades more “with the hierarchical structure of the south than with the democratic principles of the civil war Republicans”, thanks to their reliance on extractive industries and agribusiness.For Richardson, Barry Goldwater’s opposition to the Civil Rights Act in 1964 was thus not an electoral strategy but a culmination of a century of history between the south and west, designed to preserve oligarchic government in “a world defined by hierarchies”. Richardson sees Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society and the reaction against it as “almost an exact replay of Reconstruction”. What she terms the “movement conservative” reaction promoted ideals of individualism – but cemented the power of oligarchies once again.But isn’t America the home of individualism? Richardson agrees, to a point. The images of the yeoman farmer before the civil war and the cowboy afterwards were defining tropes but ultimately only that, as oligarchies sought to maintain power. Indeed, she believes, during Reconstruction, “to oppose Republican policies, Democrats mythologized the cowboy, self-reliant and tough, making his way in the world on his own”, notably ignoring the brutal work required and the fact that about a third of cowboys were people of color.These tropes mattered: “Just as the image of the rising yeoman farmer had helped pave the way for the rise of wealthy southern planters, so the image of the independent rising westerner helped pave the way for the rise of industrialists.” And for Jim and Juan Crow and discrimination against other races and women, which put inequality firmly in American law once again.The flame was never fully extinguished, despite the burdens of inequality on so manyYet ironically, as in the movies, the archetype came to the rescue: “Inequality did not spell the triumph of oligarchy, though, for the simple reason that the emergence of the western individualist as a national archetype re-engaged the paradox at the core of America’s foundation.” In the Depression, “when for many the walls seemed to be closing in, John Wayne’s cowboy turned the American paradox into the American dream.” (Wayne’s Ringo Kid in Stagecoach marked the emergence of the western antihero as hero.)Indeed, the flame was never fully extinguished despite the burdens of inequality on so many. In Reconstruction, the Radical Republicans fought for equality for black people. The “liberal consensus” during and after the second world war promoted democracy and tolerance. Superman fought racial discrimination.In all it is a fascinating thesis, and Richardson marshals strong support for it in noting everything from personal connections to voting patterns in Congress over decades. She errs slightly at times. John Kennedy, not Ronald Reagan, first said “a rising tide lifts all boats” (it apparently derives from a marketing slogan for New England); she is too harsh on Theodore Roosevelt’s reforms; and William Jennings Bryan – a western populist Democrat who railed against oligarchy even as he did not support racial equality – belongs in the story. More
Donald Trump
Rage review: Will Bob Woodward’s tapes bring down Donald Trump?
The Watergate reporter offers a jaw-dropping portrait of a president he deems ‘the wrong man for the job’. But Trump’s electoral fate is far from clear
Woodward: allies tried to rein in ‘childish’ foreign policy
Opinion: Trump has spilled his biggest secret More
Donald Trump
US president gave Bob Woodward 18 interviews, forming basis of new book Rage, and said of virus: ‘This is deadly stuff’ More
Michael Cohen is no saint. Aside from the obvious, Donald Trump’s former fixer has never entered into a formal cooperation agreement with federal prosecutors, a fact duly noted by the US attorneys’ office for the southern district of New York in its sentencing memorandum. Because of that, the “inability to fully vet his criminal history and reliability impact his utility as a witness”.On top of that, Cohen boasts in his memoir of his exposure to the mob as a teenager, and even compares his reception in federal prison to that accorded to Al Capone and El Chapo.Yes, it’s easy to distrust Cohen. On that score, Disloyal should be taken with more than a grain of salt. Its author is no hero.But that doesn’t make the book any less interesting. For all its black-hearted opportunism and self-aggrandizement, it delivers a readable and bile-filled take on Trump and his minions.What the book lacks in genuine contrition is made up for with score-settling and name-calling. Like Omarosa Manigault Newman before him, Cohen entertains, albeit at the expense of others: Don Jr, Jared Kushner, Roger Stone and Steve Bannon, for starters.Right off the bat, Cohen shares that the president lacks respect for his namesake. According to Cohen, Trump Sr would repeatedly tell him Donnie possessed the “worst fucking judgment” of anyone he had ever met. That’s saying something.Organized crime pervades the book, and Cohen does not sound at all disapprovingLikewise, asked by his oldest son if he is nervous about appearing in a televised wrestling match with the WWE impresario Vince McMahon, Trump Sr banishes him and comments: “What kind of stupid fucking question is that?”Humiliation is central to Trump and Cohen’s MOs – and it doesn’t end there.Shown a photo of his sons’ hunting escapades, Trump is angered, and again tears into his hapless offspring: “You think you’re a fucking big man? Get the fuck out of my office.” He sounds a lot like Tony Soprano. More important, he shared Melania’s displeasure over junior’s penchant for big-game hunting.As it happens, an earlier book by Ivana Trump recorded that it was she who wanted to call their son Donald Jr, to which Donald Sr replied: “You can’t do that!”His explanation: “What if he’s a loser?”Ivanka Trump is immune from the president’s derision. After all, Donald once told Howard Stern that if he weren’t her father, he’d have dated her. Cohen is not her dad, though, so is less hesitant in tattling on the favorite child.After writing about how Ivanka once joined him and his wife for lasagne dinners, Cohen recalls a brush with the law in connection with Trump Soho, an ill-fated condominium hotel in Manhattan, and Ivanka’s elaborate plans for Trump Moscow. Once again, the Trumps are caught in the headlights of the Manhattan district attorney.In Cohen’s telling, after first adopting a “hands-off policy” to the Russia project, Ivanka became enthusiastic when she learned the building would contain a health and wellness center named for her. She was prepared to hire the architect Zaha Hadid, discarding drawings supplied by Cohen.William Barr’s efforts to be Roy Cohn 2.0 – Trump’s consigliere in corridors of power Cohen could never reach – are realIn the end, Cohen laments, “all three kids were starved for their father’s love”.Jared Kushner also emerges worse for wear. Words like “inexperienced” and “unqualified” tumble on to the page. Cohen observes that “Kushner was supremely arrogant, a real snob” with an “exaggerated sense of his importance and intelligence”.Elsewhere, however, Cohen expresses admiration for macho swagger and strut. So confusing.Speaking of which, Disloyal offers a window into the president’s views of Vladimir Putin. Cohen records that on numerous occasions Trump told him the Russian president was “the richest man in the world by a multiple”.Trump is quoted explaining: “If you think about it, Putin controls 25% of the Russian economy … imagine controlling 25% of the wealth of a country. Wouldn’t that be fucking amazing.”Consistent with that take, Trump muses that a Russian oligarch who bought property from him was actually doing Putin’s bidding.“The oligarchs are just fronts for Putin,” Trump purportedly said. “That’s all they are doing – investing Putin’s money.” More
Toward the end of Speaking for Myself, Sarah Huckabee Sanders recalls a conversation with Donald Trump in which she advises him her book will be aimed at defending his reputation.“I think you will like it,” says the president’s second press secretary. “You have been falsely attacked and misrepresented for too long and it’s time for America to know the real story.”An approving president replies: “Can’t wait. I’m sure it will be great.”Whether Sanders has succeeded is open to debate. Speaking for Myself does a better job in burnishing her brand in advance of a possible run for the Arkansas governorship in 2022. It is very much a would-be candidate’s autobiography, even as it devotes countless pages to its author’s time in the White House.Sanders shares her experiences of being the daughter of Mike Huckabee, governor of Arkansas and two-time candidate for the Republican presidential nomination. She also describes her time as a student, how she met her husband and life as a working mother. Personal normalcy and faith are the dominant themes, the narrative a mixture of whitewashing and score-settling but with the emphasis on the former.Sanders describes her father’s 2008 presidential run, including his win in the Iowa caucus. She heaps praise on a campaign ad featuring the martial-arts eminence Chuck Norris, and goes out of her way to knock Mitt Romney, a rival to her father who would win the nomination in 2012, for his “flip-flops” on “nearly every major issue”.The tension between Romney and the Huckabees predates his vote this year, as a senator from Utah, to convict Trump on impeachment charges. Rather, it is tribal.Unmentioned by Sanders is her father having attacked Romney’s faith. In the run-up to Iowa, Huckabee, an ordained Baptist minister, declared the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints a “religion”, not a “cult”. But in the next breath, he pondered whether Mormons believe “Jesus and the devil are brothers”. Evangelicals comprised three-fifths of Iowa’s Republican caucus-goers. Among them, Huckabee trounced Romney by more than 25 points.Not surprisingly, when Sanders describes her time in the Trump White House she goes full-bore at Robert Mueller, doing her best to play the victim. As is to be expected, she regurgitates the “no-collusion” party line and offers full-throated endorsements of Bill Barr, Trump’s second attorney general, and Pat Cipollone, his second White House counsel, for their defense of the president.This too is personal. In the aftermath of James Comey’s dismissal as FBI director in May 2017, Sanders did her best to trash his reputation, including falsely stating “the rank and file of the FBI had lost confidence in their director”. Questioned by a reporter on her version of reality, Sanders remained unyielding: “Look, we’ve heard from countless members of the FBI.”Pressed by the special counsel, Sanders characterized those remarks as a “slip of the tongue”, made “in the heat of the moment” and “not founded on anything”.Now, time has passed, an election looms and Sanders isn’t having any of it. She accuses Mueller’s staff of “totally” misrepresenting her statements, for no purpose other than to “vilify” and “falsely” attack her. Likewise, she draws no line between her baseless accusations and prosecutors’ concerns about obstruction of justice.Sanders remains silent about the fact Mueller issued a correction of Barr’s characterization of his report. Likewise, though she denies collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia, the Senate intelligence committee recently cast a different light on the operative facts.In its report, the committee confirmed Trump lied to the special counsel and that Paul Manafort – the campaign manager whose departure paved the way for Steve Bannon – worked hand in glove with a Russian intelligence officer in an effort to help his candidate.Whether any of it altered the election result is a different story. From the looks of things, Comey probably had a greater impact.In an act of grace, Sanders goes easy on Cliff Sims, a former White House staffer who lashed into her in Team of Vipers, his tell-all from 2019. As press secretary, Sims wrote, Sanders “didn’t press as hard as she could have for the rock-bottom truth”. He also said her “gymnastics with the truth would tax even the nimblest of prevaricators, and Sanders was not that”.Sanders turns the other cheek, acknowledging Sims as the author of the “script” she delivered at each daily briefing and crediting him as “an excellent writer and fellow southerner”. Sims was banished from the administration and sued the president, but recently worked as a speechwriter at the Republican convention.To Sanders, Jim Acosta of CNN and the former national security adviser John Bolton are different. Extracts attacking Bolton were leaked to coincide with the release of his book, The Room Where It Happened, this summer. Acosta is accused of “grandstanding to build his media profile”, Sanders questioning his commitment to getting the “story right”.Unfortunately, Sanders can go overboard with ethnic reductionism. Or, at least, she could have used some editing.Sanders does a cultural compare-and-contrast with Josh Raffel, a former staffer who handled public relations for Ivanka Trump and her husband, Jared Kushner. Raffel, Sanders observes, was a “liberal, aggressive, foulmouthed Jew from New York City”. Substitute, “non-church-going Presbyterian” for “Jew” and you would have a description of the 45th president.Sanders also lets the reader know she had “grown to love Josh” and heaps praise on his sense of humor.One of few Trump aides to leave the West Wing smiling and of her free will, Sanders’ spouse and children have not spoken out. This is as candid as we are going to get. It is not an audition for another Trump-tied gig. She has her eyes on a different executive mansion – in Little Rock, Arkansas. More
Interview
Martin Pengelly
Books
Interview
‘Trump has a different leadership style’: David Rubenstein plays it by the book
Martin Pengelly
The billionaire philanthropist has published How to Lead, a selection of interviews with famous figures. Does he think the US needs a change of leader? More
