Bob Woodward has been a hero to generations for his courageous role in investigating Watergate and reports that helped bring down the Nixon administration. He’s also been a frustration for journalists and others as his series of books on George W. Bush presented a picture that often seemed highly favorable to Bush and highly accepting of statements about why the US needed to wage two, simultaneous, open-ended wars.
But next week Woodward releases his latest work, simply titled Fear. And if the books on Bush seemed too soft because they broadly reflected the views of the people inside the Bush White House, this new book reflects the view of people locked inside the building with Trump. And the one word title accurately reflects those views. The central theme of the book is how the people around Trump work constantly to keep the monster under cover and prevent his capricious impulses from sinking the nation.
Both the Washington Post and CNN have early copies of the book and are beginning to release scenes and incidents from the 448-page book. Those scenes have the quality of a nightmare, as they show Trump’s staff constantly attempting to work around his tirades, correct his misstatements, and dodge his daily attacks. Gary Cohn snatches a letter from the Resolute Desk to prevent a trade war with South Korea. Rob Porter struggles to keep Trump from arbitrarily ending NAFTA. Everyone conspires to prevent Trump from using the military to club at any perceived slight overseas.
None of this makes the members of Trump’s White House staff heroes in any sense. The best thing any of them could do would be to publicly resign their positions, voice their objections to Trump, and reveal the events that are taking the nation to the brink openly, not under “deep cover” in the pages of Woodward’s book. But of course, none of them are out to stop Trump. They’re there to see that Trump’s anger is steered in the right directions, like giving tax breaks to billionaires and inflating nationalism, and keep him from wandering too deeply into the weeds of his own ego.
That’s how people like John Kelly, who encourages Cohn to deliver his resignation letter to Trump by “shoving it up his ass six different times” and who calls Trump “unhinged” as well as “an idiot” nevertheless remains in his chair. Unresigned and praising Trump publicly at every opportunity.
In one scene from Woodward’s book, a confused and vindictive Trump calls John McCain “a coward” after he mistakenly believes that McCain accepted early release from a prisoner-of-war camp. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis quickly corrects Trump, but that label could much more easily be applied to Mattis, and Kelly, and everyone whose who is more concerned about the benefits of being on Trump’s team than in helping end Trump’s reign.
Mattis certainly understands the stakes and the risk of keeping Trump in his position. In one scene detailed in the Post’s look at Woodward’s book, Trump advocates removing all military resources from South Korea—including the radar facilities that allow the US to immediately detect when North Korea launches a missile. Trump bellows that he can’t understand why they’re spending this money. Mattis reminds him that they’re doing it “to prevent World War III.”
After Trump left the meeting, Woodward recounts, “Mattis was particularly exasperated and alarmed, telling close associates that the president acted like — and had the understanding of — ‘a fifth- or sixth-grader.’ ”
And yet Mattis didn’t emerge from that meeting, resign, and make a statement to the nation. He sat down under Trump and continued to support a regime that he understands is a risk to the security of the nation and the stability of the world.
In CNN’s quotes from the book, Mattis is seen fuming following a nonsensical decision at a staff meeting.
Kelly: He's an idiot. It's pointless to try to convince him of anything. He's gone off the rails. We're in crazytown. I don't even know why any of us are here. This is the worst job I've ever had.
Still ... Kelly is there. And the idea that he, or Mattis, or anyone else is holding down a chair in Trump’s cabinet to protect the nation doesn’t hold water. Their best path to defend the nation is to leave. To explain what’s happening inside the White House. To reveal their personal experience in working with Trump. To make it clear that so long as he is in the Oval Office, the nation cannot be made safe.
But they don’t leave. Even as Trump lurches from one disaster to another, they hold onto the spot that’s best for their future careers at Fox News and future positions on the boards of conservative “think tanks.”
Trump may have been mistaken when he threw the word “coward” and John McCain. But it certainly seems applicable for those who know who Trump is, and still serve his agenda.