Michael Wolff’s Tell-All Book: Five Astonishing Details About Trump World You Didn’t Know
(Writer’s note: The source for this article is Michael Wolff’s new book, Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House. The writer of this article has paraphrased the journalist’s observations, and in some cases conclusions, reached at by Wolff himself.)
Political journalist Michael Wolff’s groundbreaking book, Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House, has the entire Trump world on tenterhooks. It is not so much the overarching picture of a president incompetent to perform his job, but more the unflattering opinions about Trump held by his senior most staff members that seems to have drawn such ire from him. Even more so, there is a treasure trove of political and tabloid talking points that has the president worried, not only about his political future but also about the world he inhabits, that Trump did not want leaked — not least because he doesn’t want his strong man image tarnished for his core base.
Here are five astonishing details Wolff reveals, from Trump’s unusual relationship with Melania to the so-called collusion between his campaign with Russia, with which you might not be aware. So sit back, grab a glass of your favorite drink, and revel in this insider details gauged by Wolff after a year of hankering around the president and his coterie.
Donald Trump and Melania Trump’s unusual marriage
By any stretch of imagination, Donald Trump and Melania share an unusual marriage. The Slovenian model is Trump’s third wife and has one son with him, Barron Trump. She only moved to the White House this year after spending a major chunk of last year in her Trump Tower home. Unlike other first ladies of the past, Melania is not known for advocacy or the influence she exerts at the Oval Office. She prefers being out of the spotlight, and from the account that Michael Wolff details in his book, one can imagine why.
According to Wolff, during the campaign trail, there were many times that Melania and Donald would not meet each other for days even though they both lived in Trump Tower. During those times, Melania did not seem interested in meeting Trump at all, instead preferring to focus her attention on her son. Trump, who is prone to moving between residences, did not keep her abreast about his plans, and Melania did not appear to mind it.
In fact, Trump had often confided in his billionaire friends that Melania and him had been able to unlock the secret of a happy married life: “Do your own thing!”
On another occasion, Trump told his friends that younger woman like Melania (she is 25 years younger to him) did not mind if their older hubbies cheated on them. How convenient!
https://twitter.com/Wewdrshug/status/949713693901717504
Donald Trump, his family, his campaign and his friends had all expected him to lose
According to Wolff, everyone in the Trump world, including Trump himself, had premised the entire campaign on losing the elections. Trump had already been looking forward to increasing his riches with spectacular TV and business deals following the election. His only intention, Wolff contends, was to be able to amplify the Trump brand in United States and the world, which he had been superbly successful at.
Wolff draws an interesting allegory. Like Mel Brooks’ comedy classic, The Producers, where two Broadway producers raise significant funds for a show based on the premise that their show will be so outrageous that it will bomb, thereby abdicating them from their duty to pay back their donors. But what happens is that the show is so crazy that people like it, creating a lot of trouble for our heroes. Seems like something quite similar has happened with the Trump campaign.
Wolff provides a lot of examples to back up his claim. But perhaps the biggest example is the fact that after the Billy Bush scandal, Steve Bannon told Trump that they would need $50 million just to cover the costs till the election. Trump had no intention of pouring his money in his own campaign!
When pressured, Trump loaned out $10 million on the promise that he would be paid back as soon as the money was raised. So much for his confidence.
https://twitter.com/margcellent/status/948632814181867520
The aspirations of New York socialites, or Jarvanka’s power trip
Michael Wolff’s book also sheds an unflattering light on Washington’s most recent power couple, Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump. According to Wolff, neither the first daughter or her husband harbor particularly affectionate views about the president, although they do indulge him.
Wolff charts out the unexpected rise of Jared and Ivanka as the power couple in Washington. They both first met during a party at New York, shortly after a 25-year-old Jared had purchased the Manhattan-based New York Observer. He led the media company down the rabbit hole, but his connections helped him get in touch with Ivanka, who also fell for him. Their shared ambition at the time, and throughout the next decade, was to climb the New York social ladder.
The couple, who are both Democrats, like everyone else around them, did not expect Trump to win. But when the impossible happened, they realized it was a good opportunity to exercise their newfound power by being closest to Trump. Now, even though they have never done anything significant in their whole careers on their own, they are the ultimate power couple.
There was no active Russia-Trump collusion, only stupidity and incompetence
For all of us who were expecting to find some evidence of active collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia, Wolff has a simple observation: you are expecting the wrong kind of cake!
In fact, Wolff points out that Trump’s campaign was so inept and disorganized that they could not have conspired with Russia in any active way at all.
But there is a catch. According to Wolff, what they could have done, and most likely have done, is coordinate with Russian officials without the understanding that it could be an ethical or legal misstep. Don Jr’s meeting with Russian lawyers, or Michael Flynn’s discussions with the Russian ambassador, were all premised on the fact that Trump will lose. They believed that it wouldn’t draw any scrutiny because they won’t win.
What has got Trump really worried, though, is that the Russian link will make investigators uncover multiple instances of the Trump empire indulging in “gray money” transactions, something which could spell the end of his presidency.
Trump’s mental health
Finally, although there are a whole host of issues discussed in Wolff’s book which are all impossible to cover here, the political journo makes the wry prediction that Trump will be ousted not because of his Russian links, but because of his sheer incompetence and the deterioration of his mental health under the immense stress he has to contend with on a daily basis. Wolff points out multiple instances where Trump behaved like a child (for example, when he locks himself in his room with cheeseburgers, much to the annoyance of Secret Service), or like a man who is in a state of mental decline. This particular allegation has shook the Trump world, the media world, and Trump himself, as was evident when the president took to Twitter to proclaim that he was a “stable genius.”
— Sam Stein (@samstein) January 6, 2018
