Will RAGE Mean Anything To Trump Supporters?

I don't want to spoil it for anyone, but do Trump supporters read books? The release of Woodward's book, right on top of The Atlantic's revelations about what Trump thinks of American military servicemembers, should be the coup de grâce. But we've all lost track of the instances that were the straw that broken the camel's back. They never are and never will be. Not the stuff from Michael Cohen, from Trump's niece, from Michael Wolff, from Brandy Lee, from Amanda Carpenter, Tim Alberta, Arlie Russell Hochschild, Phil Rucker and Carol Leonid, Jonathan Karl, Doug Wead, Neal Katyal, Alan Grayson, John Lithgow, Sarah Kendzior... So, as much as I am looking forward to reading Rage, I don't expect the revelations-- which were all over the news yesterday-- are going to change the minds-- the lizard brains-- of the hardcore 38-40% of voters who are addicted.

However... with all the TV channels-- even Fox-- running the tapes, maybe some of the congressional Republicans will... nah. Carl Bernstein termed Trump's lies about the virus "homicidal negligence." Where does that leave knee-jerk Trumpist governors Ron DeSantis (R-FL), Greg Abbott (R-TX), Brian Kemp (R-GA), Bill Lee (R-TN), Henry McMaster (R-SC), Kristi Noem (R-SD), Doug Ducey (R-AZ), Kim Reynolds (R-IA), Kevin Stitt (R-OK), Tate Reeves (R-MS), Kay Ivey (R-AL), Doug Burgum (R-ND), Mike Parson (R-MO), Gary Herbert (R-UT), Chris Sununu (R-NH)...

Chris Cillizza tackled the question many of us are asking: Why, why, why would the President grant Woodward so much access? And why would the famously denial-prone Trump allow Woodward to tape the conversations so that there can be no doubt about a) their authenticity or b) what he actually said? Obviously, it's all wound up in the sick Trump psyche.

For all the attacks he lobs at the media, there is NO president who has more closely followed how he is covered and treated by the press than Trump. And it's not even close. He is a voracious consumer of cable news as well as print newspapers. Cable TV has long been the lens through which he views the world and, since being elected president, the way that he analyzes-- in real time-- how he thinks he is doing.

That obsession with perception has naturally lead Trump into forever hunting out ways to cement his legacy in office. Whether that's the almost farcical attempt to buy Greenland or his fascination with the possibility of his face being added to Mount Rushmore, Trump has shown a unbending focus on creating and preserving his legacy. (Trump thinks like a real estate developer; he goes big!)

Aside from those attempts to secure a legacy in stone-- literally!-- Trump regularly uses campaign rallies, supposed policy speeches and his Twitter feed to promote the idea that he really deserves to be considered as one of the best presidents ever.

"I've always said I can be more presidential than any president in history except for Honest Abe Lincoln, when he's wearing the hat," Trump said in 2019. In a speech at the United Nations in 2018, Trump said that "in less than two years my administration has accomplished more than almost any administration in the history of our country." (The audience laughed.)

...Woodward is writing the history of each president as it happens. He is the most recognizable and famous political journalist in the country. When Bob Woodward says he wants to write about you-- even if you are a billionaire businessman or the president of the United States-- you are flattered. And you see opportunity, because if you can convince Woodward that the coverage of you is unfair and biased and that you are really doing a great job, well, then, maybe history starts remembering you the way you want it to.

...Trump has two Achilles heels in politics and life. The first is that he cares so desperately about how people think of him and remember him that he is willing to do almost anything to impact his legacy. The second is that he believes far too much in his own ability to persuade. Woodward (and the book he has produced) cuts at both of the heels.

Which means that Trump was essentially poking at his own weakest spots with every single word he uttered to Woodward. And yet, he couldn't stop himself.

Here are some reports of particularly damning revelations from the book, aside from the web of lies he wove about the coronavirus to deceive the public:

1- Dan Coats, a former very conservative Republican senator from Indiana who Trump hired and fired as director of national intelligence told Woodward that could not shake his "deep suspicions" that Putin "had something" on Señor Trumpanzee, seeing "no other explanation" for the president’s behavior. Coats and his staff examined the intelligence regarding Trump’s ties to Russia "as carefully as possible" and that he "still questions the relationship" between Trump and Putin despite the apparent absence of intelligence proof... "To him, a lie is not a lie. It's just what he thinks. He doesn't know the difference between the truth and a lie."

2- Trump spilled the beans to Woodward on a top secret new nuclear weapon, a very grave breach of national security. "I have built a nuclear-- a weapons system that nobody’s ever had in this country before. We have stuff that you haven’t even seen or heard about. We have stuff that Putin and Xi have never heard about before. There’s nobody-- what we have is incredible."

3- Former Defense Secretary James Mattis, who referred to Trump as "dangerous" and "unfit" with "no moral compass," told Woodward that Trump took foreign policy actions that showed adversaries "how to destroy America. That's what we're showing them. How to isolate us from all of our allies. How to take us down. And it's working very well."

4- Fauci was willing to go on record calling Trump's leadership on the virus "rudderless," saying his "sole purpose is to get reelected," and noting that "his attention span is like a minus number."