The Corner<\/p>\n
The one and only.<\/p>\n
by Victor Davis Hanson\/\/ National Review<\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n I agree with most commentators that Michael Wolff\u2019s sensational mythologies in Fire and Fury<\/em> will be largely forgotten within three weeks \u2014 with one caveat (see below).<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Wolff confirmed what most already knew about the Left\u2019s abandonment of standards of journalistic integrity in order to \u201cprove\u201d that Trump is unfit (an \u201coppositional\u201d Jim Rutenberg or Jorge Ramos had already warned us that \u201cthe norms of journalistic objectivity\u201d in the case of Trump no longer necessarily entailed disinterested reporting [as opposed to the straight reporting, say, of Susan Rice\u2019s post facto explanations for Benghazi or for the echo-chamber Iran Deal]), while Wolff\u2019s most sensational charges that Trump can be gluttonous, na\u00efve, and narcissistic were long ago either rumored or detectable within Trump\u2019s own tweets.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Instead, the only point of interest in Fire and Fury<\/em> is how someone like a Wolff in sheep\u2019s clothing ever talked his way into the West Wing \u2014 sort of in the manner that an otherwise savvy General Stanley McChrystal once allowed the flamboyant, left-wing late Michael Hastings of Rolling Stone<\/em> into his inner circle to sensationalize off-the-record venting about the Obama White House.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Three explanations are plausible (and not mutually exclusive): Some in the Trump West Wing (perhaps worried about post-Trump careers) wanted to establish their maverick fides and undermine their own president; or some wished to sandbag their own rivals in the administration; or some were simply so na\u00efve, so egocentric, or so outright stupid to think that they could charm someone with Wolff\u2019s record and flip him into writing a book that would make them look fairly good.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n The first two Talleyrand-like \u201ccrimes\u201d of disloyalty are what we expect from West Wing intrigue, but the third is unforgivable as a blunder.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The Corner The one and only. by Victor Davis Hanson\/\/ National Review I agree with most commentators that Michael Wolff\u2019s sensational mythologies in Fire and Fury will be largely forgotten within three weeks \u2014 with one caveat (see below). Wolff confirmed what most already knew about the Left\u2019s abandonment of standards of journalistic […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[1092,1],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p466Sb-2Po","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":10868,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/is-trump-really-crazy\/","url_meta":{"origin":10874,"position":0},"title":"Is Trump Really Crazy?","author":"victorhanson","date":"January 8, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"By Victor Davis Hanson| January 8, 2018 American Greatness Michael Wolff\u2019s sensational expos\u00e9 of the supposed chaos of the Trump White House is no doubt largely a mix of fantasy, exaggeration, and some accidental truth. The postmodernist author even admits that his own methodologies defy verification, and so leave it\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Trump"","block_context":{"text":"Trump","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/trump\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":9688,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/the-trump-nail-in-the-media-coffin\/","url_meta":{"origin":10874,"position":1},"title":"The Trump Nail in the Media Coffin","author":"Megan Ring","date":"January 4, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"By Victor Davis Hanson\/\/ Town Hall | President-elect Donald Trump probably will not often communicate with the nation via traditional press conferences. Nor will Trump likely field many questions from New York\/Washington journalists.What we know as \"the media\" never imagined a Trump victory. It has become unhinged at the reality\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Trump"","block_context":{"text":"Trump","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/trump\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"The Trump Nail in the Media Coffin","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/media.townhall.com\/townhall\/reu\/ha\/2016\/356\/8ea9ea18-4f78-4127-92a8-b6fa0321f3dc.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":9917,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/talk-radio-cable-news-the-mainstream-media-and-the-news-revolution\/","url_meta":{"origin":10874,"position":2},"title":"Talk Radio, Cable News, the Mainstream Media, and the News Revolution","author":"victorhanson","date":"March 8, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"The Corner The one and only. by Victor Davis Hanson\/\/ National Review In the hubbub over Trump\u2019s attack on the media, we sometimes forget that Barack Obama et al. customarily went after talk-radio and cable-news conservatives \u2014 whose job, after all, was opinion journalism \u2014 as biased, whereas Trump went\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Trump"","block_context":{"text":"Trump","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/trump\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":12154,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/progressive-petards\/","url_meta":{"origin":10874,"position":3},"title":"Progressive Petards","author":"victorhanson","date":"January 23, 2020","format":false,"excerpt":"Victor Davis Hanson \/\/ American Greatness Since at least 2016, CNN has mostly ceased being a news agency, but that hasn\u2019t stopped it from being an active participant in #TheResistance. The network is so caught up in the fervor of this movement that many of its guests and regular hosts\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":10340,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/trumps-morning-joe-tweets\/","url_meta":{"origin":10874,"position":4},"title":"Trump\u2019s Morning Joe Tweets","author":"victorhanson","date":"June 30, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"By Victor Davis Hanson National Review's The Corner: The one and only. Just when the media take-out of Trump has backfired and exposed an endemic absence of journalistic ethics and chronic malpractice, Trump goes on another crass and extraneous Twitter attack against the increasing irrelevant MSNBC morning hosts (who have\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Trump"","block_context":{"text":"Trump","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/trump\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":11425,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/the-truths-behind-our-current-political-turmoil\/","url_meta":{"origin":10874,"position":5},"title":"The Truths Behind Our Current Political Turmoil","author":"victorhanson","date":"September 27, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"Victor Davis Hanson \/\/ National Review Are there any guiding principles that can make sense of the sensational news that now overwhelms the senses seemingly every hour? 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