A Higher Loyalty
I enjoyed this review in The Sunday Times of former FBI director James Comey's new book - 'A Higher Loyalty: Truth, Lies and Leadership'.
The reviewer Michael Wolff has a memorable turn of phrase himself and describes Donald Trump as:
"the inattentive, emotionally stunted, self-focused, absent-from-any-civic-sense, absurd fellow almost anyone who has had contact with him knows him to be."
Sounds spot on if you ask me - I think I'll buy myself a copy of Comey's book which is at the top of the New York Times 'best-seller' list.
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/a-higher-loyalty-truth-lies-and-leadership-by-james-comey-the-boy-scout-s-revenge-on-the-president-michael-wolff-review-8g98r2f6p
Review: A Higher Loyalty: Truth, Lies, and Leadership by James Comey — an insubordinate revenge on president Trump
The former FBI director burnishes his own reputation in this attack on Trump. Review by Michael Wolff, the author of Fire and Fury
Testifying: Comey in 2014 - BASRI SAHIN/GETTY IMAGEs - The Sunday Times
James Comey, the former director of the FBI fired by President Trump, delivered most of his headlines about the president nearly a year ago in statements to the press and then in testimony before Congress. But returning now in his new book, A Higher Loyalty, to his handful of meetings with Trump, he deftly, sometimes comically, captures the president as the inattentive, emotionally stunted, self-focused, absent-from-any-civic-sense, absurd fellow almost anyone who has had contact with him knows him to be.
My favourite Comey bits involve descriptions of Trump’s astounding logorrhoea, a sort of defensive ploy in which his wall of words, uttered without pause and often without connection to each other, effectively keeps anybody from telling him anything.
James Comey, the former director of the FBI fired by President Trump, delivered most of his headlines about the president nearly a year ago in statements to the press and then in testimony before Congress. But returning now in his new book, A Higher Loyalty, to his handful of meetings with Trump, he deftly, sometimes comically, captures the president as the inattentive, emotionally stunted, self-focused, absent-from-any-civic-sense, absurd fellow almost anyone who has had contact with him knows him to be.
My favourite Comey bits involve descriptions of Trump’s astounding logorrhoea, a sort of defensive ploy in which his wall of words, uttered without pause and often without connection to each other, effectively keeps anybody from telling him anything.
The memos and memoirs that might blight Trump
Comey is a beneficiary of the Trump endorsement, a kind of Oprah’s Book Club in reverse in which Trump’s slurs and insults inspire millions of book sales. But many book buyers who might reasonably see Trump as the book’s main subject will be puzzled. And perhaps miffed. In a 277-page book, the 214 pages that precede Comey’s portrait of Trump hardly mention the errant president.
As readers, we’re greedy for more tales of that riveting and revolting figure of mendacity and preposterousness. But the book, launched with leaks about Trump and interviews focused on Comey’s interactions with the president, is a bait and switch. It offers quite a bit more than we might otherwise want to know about Comey himself, a long-time prosecutor, justice department bureaucrat and short-serving FBI director, a self-anointed figure of by-the-book civic rectitude. On that juxtaposition, and sleight of hand, Comey seems to be running for president.
Trouble ahead: President Trump with the then director of the FBI, James Comey, 2017 - ANDREW HARRER/GETTY IMAGES
That would make Comey the poetic justice president. Firing Comey was Trump’s way to derail the FBI’s Russian investigation; instead it turned the wrath of the entire FBI on him — with Comey as the bureau’s martyred symbol. Now, compounding his original error, Trump’s daily vilifications give Comey a global opportunity to offer his own story as a hero’s tale.
It is a story of probity, honour and virtue. Of course, it’s a self-serving one. The book has been packaged, marketed, and presumably fine-tuned, by a company called Javelin, a book agent and public relations firm that helps politicians tell their “unique” stories. Hence this one, like all campaign autobiographies, has a greater purpose beyond telling us simply what happened. Its message is about “leadership”. Comey is a model leader, Trump a foul one.
Comey, unlike Trump, is against lying, and the book offers several George Washington-type personal experiences that convinced a young Comey that lying is bad and a guilty conscience the result. Comey, unlike Trump, is a family man, with five children and a wife he met at college, who lives frugally on a government salary (except for a few years at a leading hedge fund). Comey, unlike Trump, is a concerned and attentive manager, “laughing, teasing, arguing” with his colleagues. He is a mob prosecutor, and, as he repeats over and over again, mob bosses are much like Trump. Although we do not know Comey’s party affiliation, if any, or his place on the ideological spectrum (we suspect moderate Republican), his wife voted for Barack Obama — the one politician in the book rewarded respectful treatment.
All right, Comey is a boy scout. At the same time, this is a curious story of something close to consistent insubordination. Comey means this to read as independence — a man and leader who cannot be cowed. But it also appears to be an opportunistic chafing against and undermining of rules and conventions. Comey seems never to have met a boss, other than Obama, who he liked, or, perhaps, who liked him. Trump was the one who fired him. But President George W Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney and attorney-general Loretta Lynch had probably wanted to; they all had to deal with a self-righteous Comey.
That would make Comey the poetic justice president. Firing Comey was Trump’s way to derail the FBI’s Russian investigation; instead it turned the wrath of the entire FBI on him — with Comey as the bureau’s martyred symbol. Now, compounding his original error, Trump’s daily vilifications give Comey a global opportunity to offer his own story as a hero’s tale.
It is a story of probity, honour and virtue. Of course, it’s a self-serving one. The book has been packaged, marketed, and presumably fine-tuned, by a company called Javelin, a book agent and public relations firm that helps politicians tell their “unique” stories. Hence this one, like all campaign autobiographies, has a greater purpose beyond telling us simply what happened. Its message is about “leadership”. Comey is a model leader, Trump a foul one.
Comey, unlike Trump, is against lying, and the book offers several George Washington-type personal experiences that convinced a young Comey that lying is bad and a guilty conscience the result. Comey, unlike Trump, is a family man, with five children and a wife he met at college, who lives frugally on a government salary (except for a few years at a leading hedge fund). Comey, unlike Trump, is a concerned and attentive manager, “laughing, teasing, arguing” with his colleagues. He is a mob prosecutor, and, as he repeats over and over again, mob bosses are much like Trump. Although we do not know Comey’s party affiliation, if any, or his place on the ideological spectrum (we suspect moderate Republican), his wife voted for Barack Obama — the one politician in the book rewarded respectful treatment.
All right, Comey is a boy scout. At the same time, this is a curious story of something close to consistent insubordination. Comey means this to read as independence — a man and leader who cannot be cowed. But it also appears to be an opportunistic chafing against and undermining of rules and conventions. Comey seems never to have met a boss, other than Obama, who he liked, or, perhaps, who liked him. Trump was the one who fired him. But President George W Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney and attorney-general Loretta Lynch had probably wanted to; they all had to deal with a self-righteous Comey.
Tangled relationships: Comey had strained ties with attorney general Loretta Lynch, left, but liked Barack Obama - ERIK S LESSER/EPA/REX/SHUTTERSTOCK
Then there’s Hillary Clinton. Few of the many people now buying this book as an anti-Trump amulet would, before his Trump dust-up, have bought a book by Comey, that Clinton scourge. As much as he tries to build an acceptable rationale for his dramatic intrusions in the Clinton email debacle, Comey remains an icky figure. He avoids telling his justice department superiors that, in his plans in July 2016 for announcing that no charges will be filed against Clinton, he intends to personally condemn her (he acknowledges his bosses would have stopped him). Two weeks before the election, he reopens the email investigation for reasons that will shortly prove entirely unwarranted — a move that obviously helps lead to Trump’s election.
What surely seems like moral superiority to Comey might reasonably seem like a lack of common sense to everyone else.
Much of the argument in this book is about the importance of the FBI’s independence and Comey’s herculean efforts to maintain it. He is clearly not that sensitive to the bureaucratic conundrum: the FBI wants as much independence as it can seize; but that does not mean it is entitled to all the independence it seeks. The FBI is part of the executive branch, which is obligated to control it. It is part of the justice department, which supervises it. Granted, at the same time, the FBI is also, often, charged with investigating principals of the executive branch or circumstances in which those principals have an interest. Since Watergate, an artful balance has been maintained by mostly unwritten and often awkward standards of ritual and propriety — although Obama was Comey’s boss, he did not believe he should speak to the FBI director.
And then Trump walked in.
There were certainly ample reasons for the new president to dismiss Comey immediately, given his questionable choices in the Clinton investigation. Many of Trump’s advisers urged him to do just that. But precisely because of Comey’s perceived vulnerability, Trump believed that not firing him would put Comey in his debt.
If Trump had fired Comey on day one, it probably would not have made much difference. Whoever led the FBI would have inherited the allegations and evidence of Russia’s interference in the US election and of Trump and his associates’ possible involvement, and likely taken any investigation down a similar path (Comey was only a remote supervisor of the investigation). Then there were all the other irregularities of Trump’s business and personal escapades. Being elected president exposed him for all to see, inviting investigations. Trump would have fired whoever was looking into him.
The only variable here is Comey himself. It is Trump’s bad luck to have fired an antagonist who, like him, is unhampered by bureaucratic constraints and humility. He does not see himself as merely an institutional representative. Comey is an avenger.
Macmillan £20 pp277
Michael Wolff is the author of Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House
Then there’s Hillary Clinton. Few of the many people now buying this book as an anti-Trump amulet would, before his Trump dust-up, have bought a book by Comey, that Clinton scourge. As much as he tries to build an acceptable rationale for his dramatic intrusions in the Clinton email debacle, Comey remains an icky figure. He avoids telling his justice department superiors that, in his plans in July 2016 for announcing that no charges will be filed against Clinton, he intends to personally condemn her (he acknowledges his bosses would have stopped him). Two weeks before the election, he reopens the email investigation for reasons that will shortly prove entirely unwarranted — a move that obviously helps lead to Trump’s election.
What surely seems like moral superiority to Comey might reasonably seem like a lack of common sense to everyone else.
Much of the argument in this book is about the importance of the FBI’s independence and Comey’s herculean efforts to maintain it. He is clearly not that sensitive to the bureaucratic conundrum: the FBI wants as much independence as it can seize; but that does not mean it is entitled to all the independence it seeks. The FBI is part of the executive branch, which is obligated to control it. It is part of the justice department, which supervises it. Granted, at the same time, the FBI is also, often, charged with investigating principals of the executive branch or circumstances in which those principals have an interest. Since Watergate, an artful balance has been maintained by mostly unwritten and often awkward standards of ritual and propriety — although Obama was Comey’s boss, he did not believe he should speak to the FBI director.
And then Trump walked in.
There were certainly ample reasons for the new president to dismiss Comey immediately, given his questionable choices in the Clinton investigation. Many of Trump’s advisers urged him to do just that. But precisely because of Comey’s perceived vulnerability, Trump believed that not firing him would put Comey in his debt.
If Trump had fired Comey on day one, it probably would not have made much difference. Whoever led the FBI would have inherited the allegations and evidence of Russia’s interference in the US election and of Trump and his associates’ possible involvement, and likely taken any investigation down a similar path (Comey was only a remote supervisor of the investigation). Then there were all the other irregularities of Trump’s business and personal escapades. Being elected president exposed him for all to see, inviting investigations. Trump would have fired whoever was looking into him.
The only variable here is Comey himself. It is Trump’s bad luck to have fired an antagonist who, like him, is unhampered by bureaucratic constraints and humility. He does not see himself as merely an institutional representative. Comey is an avenger.
Macmillan £20 pp277
Michael Wolff is the author of Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House
