Rage was written in a hurry, and at times it shows. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, was no more complimentary, commenting privately that Trump’s “attention span is like a minus number.” Trump, Coats reportedly told Mattis, “doesn’t know the difference between the truth and a lie”. Meanwhile, Woodward reveals, former director of national intelligence Dan Coats took seriously the possibility that Trump was “in Putin’s pocket” and “suspected the worst” of the president. For his part, Trump told White House trade adviser Peter Navarro that he considered his “f***ing generals” to be “a bunch of pussies”.

He tells us, for instance, that Mattis viewed Trump as “dangerous” and “unfit” for office, and ultimately resigned when he thought that Trump’s directives had shifted from merely stupid to “felony stupid”. Woodward offers a detailed portrait of the president and some of his top aides.

'I didn't lie': Trump rages at claim he misled Americans over coronavirus following sensational Woodward tapes.We even knew that Trump considers America’s war dead “losers” and “suckers”. We knew about Trump’s repeated assurances that the coronavirus would soon “disappear … like a miracle” and about his “perfect” phone call with Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky, which led to his impeachment.

We knew that other senior officials have decried Trump’s “amorality” and “erratic behaviour”, and that Jim Mattis, his former secretary of defence, was “angry and appalled” by what he saw as Trumpian behaviour that made “a mockery of our Constitution”. He takes no responsibility for anything, boasts repeatedly about his wealth and genius, and shows nothing but contempt for those who happen to get in his way.īut we knew all this already, didn’t we? We already knew that Rex Tillerson, Trump’s former secretary of state, told colleagues that the president was “a moron” and that John Kelly, Trump’s former chief of staff, often referred to him as an “idiot”. Trump blithely minimises the lethality of the coronavirus because he doesn’t want to look bad. What new insights does Bob Woodward's latest book, Rage, offer? We learn that President Donald Trump is not the sharpest tool in the shed members of his cabinet consider him a narcissistic fool, devoid of empathy and incapable of distinguishing between truth and falsehood.

Rage woodward review