In a rush to get ahead of Trump’s attorneys, a new book that claims to expose the chaotic mess of the Trump Administration was released early on Friday, January 5 to an eager audience and a firestorm of Trump tweets. The book raises questions about Trump’s mental capability, collusion with Russia and relationships with his advisors.
Trump quickly tweeted after the release of the book, “Michael Wolff is a total loser who made up stories in order to sell this really boring and untruthful book. He used Sloppy Steve Bannon, who cried when he got fired and begged for his job. Now Sloppy Steve has been dumped like a dog by almost everyone. Too bad!” This heated reaction from Trump makes the book seem more than a bunch of lies.
Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House was written by Michael Wolff and marks the first anniversary of the Trump presidency. Readers find the book to confirm their preexisting assumptions both in favor or against the president. Wolff used Fire and Fury as a full on attack against everything Trump. This technique may have been a major mistake on his part in an effort to sway Trump supporters’ beliefs. “Individuals have a tendency to favor information which reinforces their pre-existing views while avoiding contradictory information,” it is an example of selective exposure theory in audiences. Even if people do not read the book themselves, they will be exposed to their choice of media around the book that will feed their personal beliefs about Trump.
In Fire and Fury, Wolff says, “If Trump is incapable of sounding like a president, Bannon was incapable of sounding like a presidential aide.” He goes on to report that Trump mocks his son’s lack of intellectual ability, calls Jared Kushner a suck-up and says Melania Trump cried in sorrow on election night over her husband’s electoral college win.
Trump supporters believe they can discredit Fire and Fury because of the book’s first excerpt. It claims that Trump never actually wanted to be president. News organizations are using that line to say it does not make sense if he was also “working” with Russia to try to win. However, Trump opponents quickly point out that it is not Trump that is being investigated for connections with Russia but his staff. If Trump really did not want to win, it did not stop his staff from doing illegal dealings. The flip flop of news and reviews surrounding this book could give any reader whiplash. It is hard to know what is fact or fiction in this book. However, even if only a small percentage of the book is true, we have a lot to fear about our President.
If this was an ordinary presidency, a book that depicted a white house in chaos and a lunatic president would be a public relations nightmare. However, this presidency is anything but ordinary. The competitive nature of the media business caters towards every audiences beliefs. If you want to think the Earth is flat and the sky is red, you can find a news source that will agree with you. Unfortunately this book ultimately benefits Trump by freezing the current party divisions.
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