Posted on 01/09/2018 11:26:23 PM PST by Oshkalaboomboom
America desperately wanted this book. America desperately needed it, too.
That’s why “Fire and Fury,” by journalist Michael Wolff, which purported to be a fly-on-the-wall, inside view of life in the Trump White House, shot to Number One on Amazon.com last week after Donald Trump’s lawyers tried to suppress it. It’s why bookstores had to back order.
Unfortunately, Wolff did not deliver the book he promised. Granted, “Fire and Fury” is juicy as a summer peach, filled with gossipy takedowns of pretty much every boldface name in Trump Land. Anthony Scaramucci emerges as “a shameless self promoter,” Kellyanne Conway, as an antagonistic drama queen addicted to cable news cameras.
Trump himself, we are told, has a volcanic temper, a toddler’s restraint and likes to be in bed by 6:30, scarfing down cheeseburgers while monitoring cable news on three televisions and calling his billionaire friends to complain when CNN hurts his feelings.
And yes, Steve Bannon bannons all over everything. He’s quoted on the record calling Ivanka Trump “dumb as a brick” and her brother, Donald, Jr., “treasonous” (though he’s tried to walk back the latter assessment).
The book is entertaining. Too bad it’s not always true.
For example, Wolff reports a snub of the president by Senate Majority leader Mitch McConnell that a McConnell aide says never happened. Wolff has reporter Mark Berman breakfasting in a hotel restaurant Berman says he’s never been to. He misidentifies a nominee to Trump’s cabinet. There’s more, but you get the point.
Look, everybody makes mistakes. But this many of them suggests a reportorial sloppiness that cannot be wished away or ignored.
The sad part is, whatever his fact-checking failures, the consensus among Washington reporters seems to be that Wolff gets it exactly right in his overarching portrait of a chaotic, dysfunctional White House where the inept and the inexperienced are led by the unqualified. But because his credibility is so banged up, that bit of accuracy will be easy for Trump defenders to dismiss.
Yours truly had hoped this book would answer a nagging question about Trump’s White House: What should we make of these people? When they turn reality inside out like a sock, when they stand before calamity and assure us there is no calamity, when they insist Trump is a misunderstood genius whose only problem is our failure to see his greatness, are they lying to us — or to themselves?
The former would make them fools. The latter would make them something worse.
The book America wanted and needed might have answered that question. The book America got gives a media-hating president a new cudgel with which to batter honest reporters seeking to unearth inconvenient truths.
Not that even a factually impeccable book would have told us much we don’t already know. We already know that where Lincoln had a “team of rivals,” Trump has a team of incompetents. We already know that the biggest incompetent is the self-described “stable genius” himself, who once said he had no idea being president would be so hard.
But a book organizes what you know in linear form. There’s something about seeing it laid out in black and white, authoritatively analyzed and indexed, that affirms, confirms and makes it official.
That’s the book we want. That’s the book America needs. But that book has yet to be published.
Where have you gone, Bob Woodward? Our nation turns its lonely eyes to you.
Pitts speaks for America? Ha ha...what a coward. Can’t even speak for himself.
Bookmark.
His target is to boost sales of his book.
Crying Wolff.
It must be the pits being Pitts.
I’ve seen other lefties fume at Donald and their criticisms tend to the superficial. If he doesn’t have Teflon, he’s at least got that new copper colored ceramic pan coating.
Pitts is a big time leftie, but he is not a typical, foaming at the mouth, moronic liberal. He is right about the main point, the credibility of the author is in deep question.
OK, fine but other than the lies, sloppy fact-checking, political bias and fraud, what, really, is wrong with the book?
Democrat-Communists know they appear to be hypocrites, however their fact is that their political party is the most intellectual, most knowledgeable about issues & solutions, most compassionate, most diverse and ecologically sound.
The Democrat-Communists desperately needed this book so that we who support & voted for President Trump would realize that we erred - big time! That we should only vote for Democrat-Communists, even if they are criminals. Even if they commit treason. Even if this phony book was to aid them with their coup.
There is no reasoning with people who lack character, who are incapable of self-reflection, maintain transient values and loathe our country & it’s Constitution.
“Pitts is a big time leftie, but he is not a typical, foaming at the mouth, moronic liberal. “
“The book is entertaining. Too bad it’s not always true.” - Lenny ‘Stu’ Pitts
So it’s just playing the SAME game as Yahoo’s news, MSN’s news, Facbook’s news, and the MSM 24-7???
Ouch
He’s butthurt that Donald Trump is right when he calls out the media for #FakeNews.
This past week has been another prime example.
>>Democrat-Communists know they appear to be hypocrites
Stalinists lie. Always
There is no shame. There is no sense of hypocrisy.
There is no acknowledgement.
“The issue is never the issue. The issue is always the revolution.” - SDS-KGB
Hate to break this to you lefty snowflakes floating in your matrix pods, but Trump Towers actually physically exist and they are standing tall all over the planet. Your negative Trump constructs on the other hand, have all fallen flat and turned to dust in the wind. One construct is real. One construct is fake. One construct is correct. And one construct is wrong. You might want to wake up before the deep state flushes you down the drain.
Does America really need a male Kitty Kelley? Compared to him,Kelley was a thorough researcher who provided ample evidence.
Does America really need a male Kitty Kelley? Compared to him,Kelley was a thorough researcher who provided ample evidence.
There is a certain fear of their constituents who are not diehard commies getting woke. They can’t appear too horrific.
The Pitts you say?
>> Pitts: America desperately wanted this book. America desperately needed it, too.
No, Pitts. America rejected the crap you crave. Deal with it, and go FO.
Wow. When you lose the lefty columnist....
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.