Confidence Man (2022)

The subtitle says it all: the making of Donald Trump and the breaking of America. Honestly, how has it come to this?

I’ve only just started to read this book, and already there are a couple of quotes I want to share with you.

The first one relates to Donald Trump’s tactics:

There is the counterattack, there is the quick lie, there is the shift of blame, there is the distraction or misdirection, there is the outburst of rage, there is the performative anger, there is the designed-just-for-headlines action or claim, there is the indecisiveness masked by a compensatory lunge, there is the backbiting about one adviser with another adviser, creating a wedge between them. The challenge is figuring out at any given moment which trick he is using.

Haberman, Maggie. Confidence Man: The Making of Donald Trump and the Breaking of America (p. 10). Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

The second one relates to his attributes:

Among his most consistent attributes are a desire to grind down his opponents; his refusal to be shamed, or to voluntarily step away from the fight; his projection that things will somehow always work out in his favor; and his refusal to accept the way life in business or politics has traditionally been conducted. These qualities have been his edge, as is wearing on his sleeve that which other people strive to keep hidden.

Haberman, Maggie. Confidence Man: The Making of Donald Trump and the Breaking of America (p. 11). Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

It’s not as if we didn’t know these things; it’s just startling to see them enumerated in print.

How Did He Become the Way He Is Now?

Maggie Haberman tells little stories from Trump’s youth that show trends in his actions and thinking:

The family settled into life in a house that Fred had built on Midland Parkway in Jamaica Estates. An older Donald Trump would describe the area as an “oasis” from the “rough” areas throughout Queens. The children were coddled in ways that others on the street were not. Servants tended to the home, with a chauffeur at the ready; neighbors recalled Donald being driven along his paper delivery route when the weather was poor. Two cars sat in the driveway, both with vanity plates bearing Fred Trump’s initials.

Haberman, Maggie. Confidence Man: The Making of Donald Trump and the Breaking of America (p. 24). Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

And this one, which says a lot about how he’s managed to get other people to pay for his wealth:

Trump left only scattered impressions on classmates. One recalled Trump somehow managing to avoid paying the Triborough Bridge’s twenty-five-cent toll and leaving it to a friend with considerably less economic means to pay each time.

Haberman, Maggie. Confidence Man: The Making of Donald Trump and the Breaking of America (p. 27). Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

His mouth has had a downturned tendency since he was a wee tucker. And his forehead has always been high. Fortunately, he wasn’t introduced to bronzer until much later in life. To him, it was always about…

But now he’s just a caricature of himself.