Book Review/Heather Seggel

Fear … and Loathing, But Mostly Fear

Books really aren’t the appropriate medium with which to chronicle the Trump era. The president himself considers Twitter his direct line to the American people, or at least what remains of his base. And things change so quickly; weekly political roundups hit the highlights then get the bends, gasping, “Wait, did all that happen just last week?” We struggle to keep up and are overwhelmed when we succeed. I nevertheless picked up Fear: Trump in the White House (Simon and Schuster) in mid-December of last year. Knowing it would feel like old news to some extent, I was ultimately surprised by how informative and lucid it was, then jolted when I noted the publication date: September 11, 2018. Four months truly are a lifetime these days.

Bob Woodward has been at this for decades, and his reporting on deep background is shared in spare, dispassionate prose. He doesn’t need to sensationalize a White House where staff turnover rivals the seediest retail gig, backstabbing is par for the course, and the so-called adults in the room can be as mercurial as the guy in charge. The dishy parts happen without any need for exaggeration.

Trump is largely represented here as he appears in the media, as an incurious, paranoid blowhard. He won’t read important briefings, hires unqualified people who look good to him when he sees them on TV, golfs a lot and eats garbage. But there are times when a glimpse of humanity gets through. He can be moved by photos of the victims of violence, though it’s unlikely he’d admit as much if it was not politically expedient for him to do so (the children killed with chemical weapons in Syria upset him, but he has limited sympathy for those he has separated from their families and caged at our southern border.) There’s a brief moment when he allows a friend of his young son, Barron, to take a photo with him, that feels almost normal.

But the meta-normal of this White House is rotten to the core. Fear chronicles less than two years, but the number of staffers who have quit or been fired is mind-boggling. In many cases full preparations were made for a smooth transition that would preserve the dignity of the departing staffer, only to have Trump announce it via Tweet several days in advance. (Pour one out for Reince Priebus, whose six months as chief of staff were snuffed out in this manner.)

Fear came out after a slurry of books by former staffers and Michael Wolff’s Fire and Fury; they all had hot takes and stories that were heavily reported on, but also felt a little frivolous. Remember Sean Spicer asserting that Trump was like a unicorn riding another unicorn over a rainbow? Wouldn’t your life be better if you could forget? Woodward has soberly covered multiple presidents. It’s his job to gather information, organize it and present it, and Fear has the same workmanship in common with his other efforts, just scaled to accommodate a White House perpetually on the verge of a nervous breakdown. It’s straightforward, except for all the craziness.

If you follow the news closely, you will be ready for most of what you find here. Many people rush to read books of this sort as soon as they come out; they already know about John Kelly lamenting that the White House amounted to the worst job he ever had, noting, “We’re in crazytown.” (Kelly has since been relieved of his duties and added to the wall chart of departed staff.) There’s still a pitch to be made for reading Fear at this late date, though; we can’t defeat what we can’t understand, and seeing the president in action and at his worst does offer some insight.

While defending his partial government shutdown the president recently tweeted, “Elections have consequences!” NPR political correspondent Mara Liasson pointed out that while this truism may have worked to Trump’s favor in 2016, the midterm elections made it clear that a majority of Americans want his powers checked and balanced, a set of consequences Trump has yet to face. Fear is a coherent look at how things unfolded to get us here, and illuminates some of the weak spots for resistors to target as the heat is turned up on Trump. Given the speed at which things unfold it’s already an oldie, but still quite good.

Heather Seggel is a writer living in Northern California. Email heatherlseggel@gmail.com.

From The Progressive Populist, March 1, 2019

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