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October 27 - October 29, 2020
To Trump, life was a game, and all that mattered was winning.
Everything with the Trumps was always “very,”
Hyperbole was his instinctual method of communication, exaggerating his own talents and wealth and physical characteristics and achievements, as if by enlarging things he could make them real.
wasn’t going to be admired at home for the things I was doing for Donald Trump, and I knew
Trump viewed anything that could hurt his brand or name as a mortal threat. Saying he wasn’t as rich as he pretended to be was, in many ways, worse than calling him a sexual predator; calling out his buildings or branded products as third-rate was far more damaging, in his mind, than a story about grabbing women by the pussy.
he was always, always, always enveloped by crisis and teetering on the brink of disaster. It
I was his John Barron and Johnny Miller.
I’d never seen the Boss look so happy. He loved trafficking in violence, or the threat of violence, as could be seen during the election campaign, when he implored his followers to beat up a protestor at a rally in Las Vegas in 2016.
knew Trump would do whatever was necessary to win. I just lacked the imagination and moral purpose to actually think about what that would mean for America, the world, for me, and for my family.
Because here’s the thing: When you sell your soul, you do exactly that: sell your soul.
there were many times that he made racist comments. What he said in private was far worse than what he uttered in public.
There were really no words to describe Trump’s hatred and contempt for Barack Hussein Obama—always all three names and always with a disdainful emphasis on the middle. This was when I started to witness the increasingly reactionary and unhinged Archie Bunker racism that defined Trump and his views on modern America.
Why not? I’m bored with buildings, golf, and television. Being president would be very cool.”
What’s the worst that happens? We lose? So what. This can be the greatest infomercial in the history of politics.”
Trump had the innate ability to access the deepest prejudices and fears of people and exploit them for his benefit. He divided the world into Us vs. Them, mainlining the most emotional and irrational impulses of the masses,
was what Trump meant by loyalty, and what is still playing out nightly on the news as the Vice President and cabinet members repeat things that they know not to be true.
But it did seal Trump’s resolve to run,
he knew what they really cared about—the core, core, core beliefs. Anti-abortion laws, Supreme Court justices, opposition to gay marriage and civil rights, and the cultural war-like rhetoric aimed at godless liberals. That was Trump’s rat-like cunning, and it was a talent I knew then that he would ride all the way to the White House.
The more boorish elements of Trump’s shtick were directly relatable to wealthy oligarchs ripping off the resources of their countries, as if he was a universal role model. Trump’s lack of scruples and conspicuous consumption had long attracted Russian investors to buy into his condo projects in New York and Florida, using numbered companies to hide the true ownership of the properties.
He constantly referred to himself in the third person, a trait that I saw as a quirk at the time, but in hindsight was the indication of dissociative egomania
photographs of Albemarle and the rolling hills of
Trump is a master at getting otherwise seemingly sensible people to enter into his fantasyland because of the fear that failure to do so means banishment.
Trump had had a “cheap attack”
And make no mistake, the lack of ethics applied equally to his three children, despite Ivanka’s carefully tended image—all them are like jackals when it comes to harming innocent businesspeople.
To Trump, this represented winning, and I never once witnessed a glimmer of sympathy or humanity or regret or shame in his demeanor.
The sexist swagger was part of life inside Trump’s bubble, a juvenile redoubt that was proudly, defiantly, and most definitely Neanderthal about women.
I did see him corner pretty women in his office and forcibly kiss them as they recoiled;
Trump’s grandiose sense of self-importance, his need for constant praise, his exploitation of others without guilt or shame was the classic definition of a narcissistic sociopath.
Maybe I’ll self-fund the primary but do it cheap. I don’t need to spend a lot of money because we’ll get all the free press we want.”
The biggest influence by far—by a country mile—was the media.
Donald Trump’s presidency is a product of the free press.
he was the absolute opposite of Obama. Instead of No Drama, it was Drama All the Time.
but Trump didn’t bother with such trivialities. Lewandowski was forty-one and worked as an executive at the Koch-funded group Americans for Prosperity,
The atrium had grandeur and tying the campaign to the brand was the essential point of the entire campaign: running for president was going to be a long free informercial for the Trump Organization,
No one ever tells Trump the truth about his behavior and beliefs, or the consequences of his conduct and ignorance and arrogance, in business or in his personal life and now in politics. Trump truly is the boy in the bubble, impervious to the thoughts and feelings or others, entirely and utterly focused on his own desires and ambitions.
“Plus, I will never get the Hispanic vote,” Trump said. “Like the blacks, they’re too stupid to vote for Trump. They’re not my people.”
but he’d done no preparation for the simple reason that he never prepares for anything, ever. Reading reports, taking briefings, seeking context and background for professional encounters—Trump does none of that, trusting that he can fake his way through life. More than that, he preferred to be ignorant, as it allowed him to rely on his gut instincts.
What does Trump most admire or worship? The answer is money. Now,
Trump loved Putin because the Russian had the balls to take over an entire nation and run it like it was his personal company—like the Trump Organization,
What appeared to be collusion was really a confluence of shared interests in harming Hillary Clinton in any way possible, up to and including interfering in the American election—a subject
that caused Trump precisely zero unease.
the essence of the operation was to invert reality, to take an impious and vulgar man and make him appear god-fearing, and in turn magically transform Trump’s white nationalist impulses into the illusion of an open-minded and inclusive leader—putting
Trump’s entire life was one giant, or huuuuggggeeee tax deduction,
Trump could screw a law firm, or a paint vendor, or a salesperson, he’d do it almost as a matter of principle. It was like paying taxes: that was only for the little people.
Despite all the promises made to the public that he would recuse himself from running his companies, he never gave an inch of control to his kids.
