The I Index

Front Row at the Trump Show

Maybe someday

41

/100

I Index Overall Rating

Readers

82/100

Critics

1/100

Scholars

N/A

Author:

Jonathan Karl

Publisher:

Dutton Books

Date:

March 31, 2020

An account from a White House reporter who has known President Donald Trump for more than 25 years.

What The Reviewers Say

Lloyd Green,
The Guardian (UK)
... an attempt to capture the madness that is the Trump presidency and the danger to democracy it poses. Aided by measured prose and healthy skepticism, Karl succeeds.
Annalisa Quinn,
NPR
... Karl follows Trump in his first years as president, reporting with accuracy and clarity but little new insight. To be fair, it's not Karl's fault that we've visited these spots again and again like weary pilgrims traversing the Via Dolorosa.
Linda Killian,
The Washington Post
One senses in this account that, like many others, Karl is both attracted and somewhat repelled by Trump largely because of his propensity to lie.
Steve Donoghue,
The Open Letters Review
If Trump takes the podium in the White House briefing room and delivers a rambling, muttering completely incoherent slew of resentment, innuendo, and spite, Karl and his network behave like clockwork: they seize on a couple of semi-coherent half-sentences, they stitch together various semi-points often separated by 30 minutes of garbled nonsense, and they tediously rebut 'factual inaccuracies' they know perfectly well are fully conscious lies. In other words, they normalize Trump, again and again...That is not informing the public. That is not asking tough questions. That is certainly not holding those in power accountable.