Review of Bob Woodward's Book: "Fear"

I finally found time to read Bob Woodward's book "Fear: Trump in the White House." While avoiding sensationalism, the legendary Woodward instead focuses on the day-to-day operations of the Trump administration.  In his portrayal of the 45th President, Woodward paints the picture of someone who is ignorant and uneducated (not the same thing), especially when it comes to basic economics.  Impulsive and highly temperamental, Trump is depicted as lacking in any management skills, a person incapable of putting together a team to advance an agenda...not that Trump has a coherent or consistent agenda to advance.   Woodward makes it clear he does not.

Frankly, Woodward's book has been a snoozefest.  Nothing he reports about President Donald Trump
is any different from what I knew about candidate Donald Trump. What is surprising though is the degree - how bad it is. I knew Donald Trump was unfit to be elected to be President of the United States, but I assumed though Trump's incompetence would be softened by his learning on the job and having competent people around him.  Indeed Woodward's book talks at length about the "guardrails," advisers who worked behind the scenes to prevent the worse excesses of the President.

Unfortunately, since Woodward's book was released, most of those advisers have been fired or quit, replaced by Trump sycophants, like Attorney General Bill Barr and scores of officials who are so bad they are appointed in an "acting" capacity because even a Republican-majority Senate would not confirm them.

But it is not just Trump's ignorance, incompetence and his administration of sycophants.  Rather than "drain the swamp," Trump has taken D.C. corruption to an unprecedented level.   Trump, aided by a Republicans in Congress, has seized power from that branch.  Trump has repeatedly demonstrated he has no respect for American institutions, democratic norms or the Constitution, which he defecates on on a daily basis.   Trump has also shown he is willing to, again, cheat to win a Presidential election, by accepting help from a foreign country to defeat the Democratic nominee.  The notion that Trump is a "patriot" or has a foreign policy which puts "America first" is laughable.  Sucking up to brutal dictators and enemies while undermining our American allies at every turn, is not a pro-American foreign policy.   It's a foreign policy that Vietnam-era Jane Fonda would have been proud of.

Unfortunately, Woodward's book came too early, missing the dark turn the Trump presidency has taken during the last 18 months.

Trump insisted the 2018 election was a referendum on him and the GOP took it on the chin as a result.  In the mid-terms, Democrats made historic gains in the House and state legislatures.  With Trump's poor approval rate, Democrats are poised to win again in 2020.  All the Democrats have to do is run the same playbook the party ran in 2018, i.e. moderate the Democrats' message and reach out to suburban and highly educated voters who have been leaving the GOP in droves during the Trump era.  So simple.

Enter Democratic stupidity.  Democrats appear to be weeks away from throwing  away those 2018 gains by nominating a socialist, someone who is not even a Democrat!, as their presidential nominee.  While Trump is one of the few Republicans candidates who could actually lose to a socialist, the odds are those suburbanites and college educated voters are not going to be sold on Trumpism being replaced by socialism.  They will instead hold their noses and vote for four more years of Trump or stay home. Few will vote for Sanders.  Even if Sanders beats Trump (which is highly unlikely but not impossible), having a socialist at the top of the ticket will almost certainly mean the Democrats fail to win the Senate and possibly lose the House.

The 2020 election appears to be a contest between Trump incompetence and corruption and Democratic stupidity.   Who wins remains to be seen.