Tom Walsh's Reviews > Siege: Trump Under Fire

Interesting, but not for the reasons you think.

I assumed that in this book Wolff would follow the same furrow of tabloid gossip he plowed in Fire & Fury. The tidbits of gossip are scattered throughout the work but it’s really a very different exposé. The Resistance can find plenty of evidence of Trump’s madness, stupidity and greed uncovered during his two years. The Administration is shown to be as chaotic as expected and filled with even more liars, thieves and fools than we thought. Whether Wolff’s sources are completely accurate or accurately quoted or not, the reader can taste the Special Sauce and Aroma of Trumpworld.

But the essence of Siege is elsewhere. The title itself is a distraction. This book was “dictated”by Steve Bannon. Every page is filled with Bannon’s take on each event and decision of the first two years and Bannon’s take is almost never positive. Trump is nothing but a tool for Bannon’s Populist Vision of Armageddon. Trump’s greed, duplicity, narcissism and stupidity was ruining his Dream and he is vicious in his anger and frustration.

This is the real value of the book. Not the crazy quotes and revelations of insecurity, fear and lust but rather a peek inside the fearsome Bannon Worldview. Americans should understand this view and fear it.

As we should have come to understand since 2015, Trump is only a distraction, a batshit crazy, narcissistic sociopathic distraction, but a distraction nonetheless. He’s not the greatest danger. The Destruction of Liberal Democracy of the type planned by Bannon is the greater peril.