A Possible Turning Point in the Trump Presidency

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FRED WERTHEIMER’S WEEKLY NOTE | August 30, 2018freadshot

“We find ourselves again with one more eerie reminder of the parallels between the Trump presidency and the Nixon Watergate scandals that ended with President Nixon’s resignation.”

This week may go down as the turning point in the Trump presidency.

It started on Saturday with the funeral of Senator John McCain.

Former Republican President George W. Bush and Democratic President Barack Obama gave eulogies for McCain that pointedly reminded Americans about the values that have defined our nation. Without mentioning President Trump by name, the speeches of Bush and Obama sharply contrasted with the failed and destructive Trump presidency.

McCain’s daughter, Meghan, also without mentioning Trump by name, gave a eulogy that powerfully and directly attacked Trump and reminded us that Senator McCain’s fighting spirit has now passed to his daughter.

Then came explosive excerpts from Bob Woodward’s new groundbreaking book Fear, documenting the “nervous breakdown” of Trump’s presidency.

Trump’s response was to attack Woodward’s credibility. But that won’t fly; Woodward has established credibility beyond a reasonable doubt, from his historic reporting on the Watergate scandals with Carl Bernstein, to his numerous books on past Presidents.

Trump, on the other hand, has established that he has no credibility.

From the day he took office until September 4, 2018, according to a running Washington Post tally, Trump has made an astounding 4,713 false or misleading claims, an average of about eight per day. In the last three months alone, Trump has averaged 15.4 false or misleading claims per day, including 79 such claims on July 5.

I think I’ll go with Woodward on this one.

Then, late yesterday, came the stunning anonymous op-ed in The New York Times from a writer only identified as a senior administration official, which described President Trump as amoral, erratic, and “impetuous, adversarial, petty, and ineffective.” The writer said that many senior administration officials were “working diligently from within to frustrate parts of [Trump’s] agenda and his worst inclinations.”

During Watergate, Woodward and Bernstein had an ongoing source known as “Deep Throat.” He wasn’t identified until decades later.

We find ourselves again with one more eerie reminder of the parallels between the Trump presidency and the Nixon Watergate scandals that ended with President Nixon’s resignation. 

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Fred Wertheimer is the Founder and President of Democracy 21, a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization that works to strengthen our democracy and ensure the integrity and fairness of government decisions and elections. See previous Notes from Fred here.