Most of the discussion of Bob Woodward’s new book, Rage, has been around President Trump’s handling of COVID-19 and his “love letters” from Kim Jong Un.

But as I point out in my Arirang News interview of September 17 (see my previous post), a lot less attention has been paid to Woodward’s two chapters (33-34) on son-in-law Jared Kushner’s views of Trump’s political perception and media management, and they are probably the most important chapters in the book. What journalists have written on these chapters focuses on specific examples Kushner gives rather than the larger picture he paints. Chapters 33-34 are based on Woodward’s own taped interview with Kushner (that Kushner disputes) and other sources.

Woodward says Kushner expressed awe at Trump’s dominance of the media: “If the president didn’t tweet it, it didn’t happen” sums up Jared’s estimation of his father-in-law’s ability to redefine political and other realities by his constant 24/7 exposure to mass media via Twitter, television and print media. The implication is if Trump receives incessant media exposure, good or bad, he still comes out the winner; lack of media exposure for Trump could be his political death knell.

Woodward writes, “On February 8, 2020, Kushner advised others on the four texts he said someone in a quest to understand Trump needed to absorb”:

1. Kushner says to read a March 8, 2018 opinion column by Wall Street Journal columnist and Pulitzer-winner Peggy Noonan. Her column argued Trump’s style is “crazy…and it’s kind of working.” Kushner made it clear to Woodward that his endorsement of the column was central to understanding Trump.
2. Kushner explicitly states that Alice in Wonderland is a guiding text for Trump’s presidency. Jared paraphrased the Cheshire Cat: “If you don’t know where you’re going, any path will get you there.” This is tantamount to admitting Trump’s presidency is directionless — except that directionless is considered “flexibility” rather than rigidity.
3. Kushner recommends reading The Gatekeepers: How the White House Chiefs of Staff Define Every Presidency. Author Chris Whipple’s chapter on Trump notes the President had no idea how to govern but was reluctant to follow the advice of his first two chiefs of staff (he’s on number four now).  Thus, “Trump will be Trump, no matter his chief of staff.”
4. The last text Kushner considers necessary to understand Trump is Win Bigly: Persuasion in a World Where Facts Don’t Matter by Scott Adams. Adams contends Trump’s misstatements of fact are not errors but part of a technique called “intentional wrongness persuasion.” In the end, according to Adams, Trump “can invent any reality…and all you will remember is that he provided his reasons, he didn’t apologize, and his opponents called him a liar” like always. 

Woodward summarizes Kushner: “Controversy elevates message” which is the core understanding of communication strategy in the Internet age and Trump. 

The four texts combined, in Woodward’s view, paint Trump as “crazy, aimless, stubborn and manipulative,” and he found it hard that anyone would recommend these as ways to understand the President. Later, he quotes Kushner: “[The President] somehow manages to have his enemies self-destruct and make stupid mistakes. He’s just able to play the media like a fiddle, and the Democrats too. They run like dogs after a fire truck, chasing whatever he throws out there. And he solves the problem” and goes on to the next thing.

My take is that Kushner’s comments inform us on Trump’s approach to North Korea. The only real goal in his three meetings with Kim Jong Un in 2018-19 was to make sure there was a media circus showing Trump engaging with Kim, because almost no one (he thinks) cares about the details. So, after not even a partial agreement on the nuclear issue (only a halt to nuclear and ICBM tests), and no peace declaration to end the 70-year-old Korean War, Trump credits himself in the current campaign as having reduced tensions — tensions he himself was at least 50% responsible for in 2017, beginning with his “fire and fury” statements and UNGA speech.

Woodward repeatedly quotes Trump blasting our ally since 1954, South Korea, for taking “advantage of us,” the President even exclaiming that Seoul’s skyscrapers could only be built because America provided the money for the country’s protection.

Trump does not provide the public with tangible success — only the image of success — because Trump is always “winning.” Trump’s only goal is to continue to appear to win, to appear to be on top of issues (and pull back and wash his hands when nothing he tries works, as with COVID-19), and always remind people that only he can do the job and everyone else is a jerk or a wimp. So, in the end, the joke’s on us, because Trump wants (at least) four more years to continue to “win” and MAGA, but it is only for his and his family’s (and cronies’) benefit, and it will be at our expense.

In the end, as famed jazz trumpeter Wynton Marsalis has been saying, “we’re being hustled,” and that “keeps us at each other’s throats and prevents us from working together to build a more equitable and friendly world.” We’re the mark in the con, period.

After you read Woodward’s chapters on Kushner, read Matt Taibbi on Trump. ♦