By Donald A. Collins | 3 August 2021
Church and State
Some people read novels, some like non-fiction. I must say that reading the recent magnificent books by seasoned reporters on the Trump years as President read like novels!
Even the most daunting stories of dangerous intrigue concocted by our best fiction writers couldn’t capture the narrative of Trump’s fiasco years. For one thing those tales of humongous fictional suspense have endings, but Trump’s tale is not yet because its climax and resolutions have yet to be determined.
Is he going to be sentenced to jail as he deserves? Can you imagine anyone promoting the overthrow of our democracy not being tried and convicted?
Meantime, we can only hope for the widest readership of books such as these here about Trump’s years and particularly about this final year.
“Landslide” by Michael Wolff
“I Alone Can Fix It” by Carol Leoninng and Philip Rucker
“Nightmare Scenario” by Yasmeen Abutaleb and Damian Paletta
“Frankly, We Did Win This Election” by Michael C. Bender
This is what was happening inside the Oval Office during the January 6 Capitol riot. An excerpt from @MichaelWolffNYC's "Landslide: The Final Days of the Trump Presidency" https://t.co/2ftpwe6rli
— New York Magazine (@NYMag) July 10, 2021
Frankly, We Did Win This Election review: a devastating dispatch from Trumpworld https://t.co/oW3gjDfq7I
— The Guardian (@guardian) July 10, 2021
Washington Post journalists Yasmeen Abutaleb and Damian Paletta join Post Live to discuss their new book “Nightmare Scenario: Inside the Trump Administration’s Response to the Pandemic That Changed History.” https://t.co/LC0iCG5odl
— The Washington Post (@washingtonpost) June 29, 2021
I have purchased and read them all. And have just published a book entitled “Trump Becoming Macbeth”, which can be found on Amazon. It is a collection of 41 0f my Op Eds written about the period from August 2020, when I counseled voters to choose Biden, the Biden’s election and the ignominious time afterwards with Trump’s instigation of the January 6th insurrection on the US Capitol and his 2nd impeachment.
I find that each of these 4 books I have cited above offers readers consistently plausible and meticulously confirmed evidence of Trump’s treasonous behavior.
Without prioritizing any of the books listed above, I found the 5 page Prologue in “I Alone Can Fix It” particularly helpful. The authors Carol Leonnig and Philip Rucker summarized perfectly the main points contained in these historically important books which document Trump’s responsibility for the most dangerous threat to our democracy since the Civil War.
I strongly encourage every American who cares about the future of our democracy to read any one of these books. Again to me they read almost like novels, but with endings yet unknown.
Any one of them will allow you to gain a frightening understanding of how close we have now come to the kind of behavior that allowed, as Leonnig and Rucker opine, the rise of Hitler in 1932 in Germany.
You can read a few excerpts from the Prologue of their book, “I Alone Can Fix It” here.
“The first years of Trump’s term revealed a presidency of one, in which the universal value was loyalty—not to the country, but to the President himself. Scandal, bluster, and uninhibited chaos reigned.”
“His assault on the rule of law degraded our institutions and left Americans reasonably fearful they could no longer take for granted civil rights and untainted justice.”
“This book chronicles Trump’s fourth and final year as president. The year 2020 will be remembered in the American epoch as one of anguish and abject failure”.
“Senator Mitt Romney, who often stood alone among fellow Republicans in his criticisms of Trump, said the president’s attacks on democratic institutions amounted to one of the greatest failings of any president.”
In his final year, these authors say, “He displayed his ignorance, his rah temper, his pettiness and his pique, his malice and cruelty, his utter absence of empathy, his narcism, his transgressive personality, his disloyalty, his sense of victim hood, his addiction to television, his suspicion and silencing of experts, and his deception and lies.”
The above traits are amply documented in all these books based on firsthand investigative reporting by seasoned reporters.
“The coronavirus changed the world…These profound changes were accelerated by the recession and heightened by the tensions in the aftermath of Floyd’s killing. Trump, however, principally governed for a minority of the country—hard-core political supporters/-and chose neither to try to unite the nation nor reimagine a post-pandemic America.”
“Throughout his presidency, Trump cast himself as a long suffering, tormented victim.”
“There were a number of good people who tried to prevent the worst at the White House over the years,” said a senior Republican lawmaker. “Clowns in one camp and people genuinely trying to prevent the worst in the other camp. There were some heroes here.”
“It is the story of how Trump stress-tested the republic, twisting the country’s institutions for personal gain and then pushing his followers too far. And it is the story of how voters, both fearful for their own futures and their finally discharged him.”
"You are an island unto yourself right now,” [JCS Chief Gen. Milley's] friend [told him Election Night]. 'You are not tethered. Your loyalty is to the Constitution. You represent the stability of this republic.'"https://t.co/zG918hmocP
— George Conway (@gtconway3d) July 13, 2021
Will these brilliant and persuasive books and the already subsequent revelations since their publication about the behavior of Trump and the top GOP leaders affect the outcome of the midterms in 2022 or the next Presidential election in 2024?
They better or our democracy will be mortally wounded!
The verdict of the Trump years is still very much up for grabs and our future still hangs in the balance pending the results of the midterms and 2024.
If Trump or one of his proxies are elected our republic may likely not survive or at least be painfully damaged for a long time to come.
Former US Navy officer, banker and venture capitalist, Donald A. Collins, a free lance writer living in Washington, DC, has spent over 40 years working for women’s reproductive health as a board member and/or officer of numerous family planning organizations including Planned Parenthood Federation of America, Guttmacher Institute, Family Health International and Ipas. Yale under graduate, NYU MBA. He is the author of From the Dissident Left: A Collection of Essays 2004-2013, Trump Becoming Macbeth: Will our democracy survive? and We Humans Overwhelm Our Earth: 11 or 2 Billion by 2100?."From the Dissident Left: A Collection of Essays 2004-2013": https://t.co/lkC2t3E1A9
"Trump Becoming Macbeth: Will our democracy survive?": https://t.co/tl3zSD7whn
"We Humans Overwhelm Our Earth: 11 or 2 Billion by 2100?": https://t.co/TA4j7cp1tE pic.twitter.com/mH1PSnoh17— Church and State (@ChurchAndStateN) July 1, 2021
The single most revealing fact in the new Trump books
Pulitzer-winning reporter Carol Leonnig on new Trump book: “I Alone Can Fix It”
DOJ Releases Notes Showing Trump Asked To Declare The Election Corrupt
Be sure to ‘like’ us on Facebook
