The Making of Donald Trump

77. The Making of Donald Trump by David Cay Johnston
reader: Joe Barrett
published: 2016
format: 5:47 digital audio
acquired: library
read: Dec 16-29
rating: 4

This was not a great book for me to read because I'm already overly worked up about what's going to happen to this world with this thing as our president and the book was terribly depressing, making him out to be much worse of a person than I had realized. But I'm trying not to hide under a friendly rock, trying to become informed.

I can knock the book around a little, but I should be gentle because it's important. If you like the idea of Donald Trump as president, you are not well informed. Period. There is no other answer. And...as a follow up, I would like to try to figure out why show more so many of us are ill informed, many willfully.

We all know he's narcissist in a class by himself, that he has a force of personality, is a highly effective salesman, that he goes his own way and doesn't listen to anyone, that he's all about his money and himself. That, however, does not make you informed. He's far worse. He perennial liar, and manipulator with adolescent ethics, no sense of consequences, a man with a wreckage in his wake everywhere, and who denies everything. He's someone that won't listen to anyone he doesn't agree with, and will listen to practically anyone who offers him the right kind of praise and loyalty. He has a long record of association with large-scale criminal and mafia elements, not to mention numerous scams, generally in the theme of real estate, but also in his charities and "university". This is the guy who will cause problems everywhere, and then blame everyone else, and get away with it. He more or less never suffers consequences. His record is a bit insane.

The book itself suffers a little because of its snark and the arrogance of Johnston. He's really well informed about Trump and really dedicated to his craft as a journalist, and that gives this book a lot of value. For this reason I recommend it, highly. But as you read it becomes clear that Johnston feels he can do no wrong as long he is honorable to the journalist's code of ethics. This is at best an incomplete story, and, if you like, a selection of highlights of the Donald Trump horror stories. It's rushed, and short, which is nice. But what is lost is much of the context in which all this stuff was taking place. I finished feeling very scared by Trump, aware of how bad he can get, but not feeling like I had a good sense of who he was day-to-day.

end rant.

2016
https://www.librarything.com/topic/226898#5862463 show less

Here the investigated journalist compiles a chronology of Trump's associations with criminals (American, not Russian so much), mismanagement of his casino, defrauding suppliers and employees, pushing tax avoidance far into unethical if not illegal areas and more. This was supposed to be for the would-be voter in the 2016 election. Trump comes across as a hopeless narcissist, frequent liar, and one that objectifies women.

As I write, Donald J. Trump is one of two major-party nominees for President of the United States and, therefore, has a non-negligible chance of winning the election. This, despite his being perhaps the most unsuitable candidate in American history for the office. The major theme of David Cay Johnston's book is demonstrating just how unsuitable Trump is, by exploring the man's career and character.

Johnston is a Pulitzer-winning reporter, whose beat is how the rich and powerful employ the fine details of law and regulation to maintain their positions and to exploit the poor, weak, and unsophisticated. He has covered Trump for decades, and has benefited from the coverage of others; the sources are in the book's extensive end notes. He show more supplies a long list of problems with Trump and how the man does business. He writes about sweetheart relationships with gangsters, broken obligations to business partners and customers, deception, and apparently-sociopathic dealings in every part of Trump's life, both in business and personally.

If many of these issues were already known to people who follow Trump's candidacy, it's often because Johnston broke those stories. That Trump won the nomination anyway illustrates Johnston's secondary theme, the irresponsibility of the institutions of society that allowed the man's career to proceed, despite his flaws. Trump was a major player in the Atlantic City, New Jersey gambling industry despite underworld associations that should have cost him his casino license; the feckless New Jersey Division of Gaming Enforcement is certainly one of the institutions that did not do its job. More generally the news media have been vulnerable to Trump's ability to influence what is written about him. Johnston notes that Trump is skilled at "...exploiting the fact that most reporters accurately quote what people say without understanding legal rules or regulatory practice." Easily fooled, ignorant of important issues - of bankruptcy, among other matters. Decades of failure along these lines, not only in Trump's case but with respect to the US right wing generally, have brought us to this point.

Of the numerous episodes that I was not previously aware of, the most shocking concerned Trump's great-nephew Wiliam Trump. Born in 1999 to Fred Trump III, who was the son of Donald's deceased older brother Fred Trump Jr., William had severe neurological problems from birth. These conditions were expensive to treat, but were covered by the Trump family medical plan. The Trump paterfamilias, Fred Senior, died in 1999, and William's branch of the family was left out of Fred's will. They sued - and Donald tried to cancel William's medical benefits.

If you would be unable possibly to condemn an infant to death to retaliate against his parents, I'm afraid you're just not in Donald's league. And good for you.

Much of what we've learned about Trump is not covered here: the Russian connections, the appeals to the most racist groups in the electorate. Johnston concentrates on the parts of the story he can tell best. But what Johnston tells, tells us enough. show less

This is brilliantly conveyed research on the many layers of corruption that Trump has brazenly wrapped himself in, revealing a narcissistic character that, on the one hand, is rather fascinating (in a tragic Shakespearean kind of way) and wildly frightening (in a President-elect kind of way). I understand the urge to "investigate" Trump, but Johnston reminds us that there are more than enough conviction-worthy facts already known.

This morning I finished The Making of Donald Trump, a book I never intended to read. My husband bought it and it was hanging about the house, and you know what they say about curiosity. It's an amazingly succinct book—200 pages*—that I found...er...riveting, and beyond the obvious subject matter, this might be why: In the acknowledgements, Johnston says, while writing this book, he kept in mind two "critical lessons" for writers generally, and a third for investigative reporters specifically: one, brevity; two, action is character (a lesson, he says, from F. Scott Fitzgerald) and three, "if your mother says she loves you, check it out. Then cross-check and cross-check again and again until you have facts bolted in their proper place show more within the universe of the verifiable."

Johnston begins briefly with the grandfather, followed by the father, before tackling Trump himself. Just as Johnston intended, we come to know Donald Trump by his actions. One story leads the open-mouthed, slightly dazed reader into the next, and then the next. From any other writer, one might think each story incredible, but Johnston has been covering Trump for decades, and has his "facts bolted in their proper place." It's difficult to summarize any of the stories in a sentence or two, so I won't attempt it. Donald Trump is right, he is fascinating, but not in the way he thinks. In The Making of Donald Trump, he's fascinating because of his oversized ego, his agility at "doing what he wants and getting away with it," and for his lack of scruples, honor and empathy.

*A few pages for introduction & acknowledgments, 200 pages on Trump, and about 50 pages of notes/source listings. show less

This is a profoundly sobering history of an American president. Johnston has followed Trump for decades, long before he became a candidate for U.S. president. The trail begins with Trump's grandfather, goes through his father and up to present day. It was finished in a first edition long before Trump's candidacy and updated in the present version.

What is disturbing is that Trump is shown as a con-artist. Whether this is true or not, it is strongly supported by exhaustive documentation and sources. Most disturbing is the portrait that emerges as the author follows Trump's abortive and questionable educational history, his frequent failures and bailouts by his father, his thousands of law suits linked to his treatment of contractors and show more sub-contractors, and his obvious pathological lying to further his own ends.

This should be a must read for anyone even remotely interested in this man and the future of the United States. show less

So here is the book that dishes all the dirt on Donald Trump. It was released before the election and despite all its lurid claims we now have President-Elect Trump. Johnston reveals in chapter after chapter that Trump may be the most evil, vile, contemptible man to walk the face of the earth. Certainly many of the things laid out here are disturbing. Yet despite all of this voters were faced with the alternative choice of Hillary Clinton, and her loss should probably also reflect on what they saw there.

Time will tell whether what we see here in the book will carry on to the Presidency and if it does we may not see its completion. One thing is for sure there will be many like this author lined up in their quest to bring it down.