Too Much and Never Enough: How My Family Created the World's Most Dangerous Man

by Mary L. Trump

As usual, the lesson Donald learned was the one that supported his preexisting assumption: no matter what happens, no matter how much damage he leaves in his wake, he will be okay. Knowing ahead of time that you’re going to be bailed out if you fail renders the narrative leading up to that moment meaningless. Claim that a failure is a tremendous victory, and the shameless grandiosity will retroactively make it so. That guaranteed that Donald would never change, even if he were capable of changing, because he simply didn’t need to. It also guaranteed a cascade of increasingly consequential failures that would ultimately render all of us collateral damage.