Book Review: Fire and Fury – Inside the Trump White House by Michael Wolff

I have just finished reading Fire and Fury. The reviews of the book have been pretty furious themselves starting with Trump calling it a work of fiction. I have blogged about Trump before:

15 September 2016 The Emotional Intelligence of Donald Trump

16 November 2016 What makes Donald Trump tick?

Nothing in the book causes me to retract what I have previously written. Trump is the quintessential GoGetter/Hustler. Three wives, always wearing a red tie, “truthful hyperbole”, desperate attempts to get favourable reviews in the media; all the signs are there.

My favourite Trump story in the book was this:

Once, coming back on his plane with a billionaire friend who had brought along a foreign model, Trump, trying to move in on his friend’s date, urged a stop in Atlantic City. He would provide a tour of his casino. His friend assured the model that there was nothing to recommend Atlantic City. It was a place overrun by white trash.

“What is this ‘white trash’?” asked the model.

“They’re people just like me,” said Trump, “only they’re poor.

While the book provides numerous anecdotes about Trump I found the interplay between Trump. Steve Bannon and Jarvanka the most interesting. (Jarvanka was a term coined by Bannon and refers to Trump’s daughter Ivanka and her husband Jared Kushner.) Bannon’s temperament is dominated by the Artist. He is a creative thinker, beats to a different drum and was the only person inside the Trump camp two weeks out before the election who sincerely believed Trump would win. This was the basis of his power post the election. According to the book the Trump’s plan was to lose the election claiming it was stolen but build on the celebrity coverage to form a new media channel. Bannon is well to the right in his political views.

Jarvanka contains a lot of GoGetter/Hustler. Ivanka’s is probably inherited (mainly from her father but her mother Ivana is in there pitching as well.) Jared also comes from a wealthy family, and has had an entrepreneurial background. Both hold Democratic political views. Both were very skilful in achieving their objectives by flattering Trump.

Given the number of references in the book to Bannon (almost the same as Trump) Wolff and Bannon must have been close together in the writing. Thus, while a lot of the book is unverifiable, it does seem to have the ring of truth. The book does give you an insight on the way Trump works and why he is having so much trouble. They say politicians campaign in poetry but govern in prose. As Trump finds reading so much a problem governing in prose will be very difficult for him. This is hearsay but I have heard that only way that his advisers get him to read a memo is to sprinkle his name throughout it.