This Is Why Trump's Aides Endure his Endless Rage

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How's the weather is what's his mood? There are no restraints here. This is if he feels it, if he thinks it, he expresses it. His powers of expression are blunt force. There's no pretense that they are there for any other reason but the succor of Donald Trump. They are there to be his comfort blanket. Michael. Joanna. How nice to see you. We are going to be live in LA at the Terragram Ballroom on October the 20th. Tickets are on sale now. You can just go to beast.pub slash ith live. That's beast.pub slash ith. That's for Inside Trump's Head live. Go to Ticketmasters and search on Inside Trump's Head. You just search on Inside Trump's Head. Come and see us. You can meet and greet us. We're looking forward to it. And as Michael is always saying, he's very good live. You won't believe it. We have a sort of special episode today. Every now and then we want to focus on one or two themes about Trump. And today's theme is really about, well, Michael, you describe it, his flunkies, right? All the king's flunkies. I mean, this is really one. Among the many totally anomalous things about this administration is that it is staffed with a whole set of not only unqualified people, but people whose chief qualification for the job is that they are willing to suck up to the boss in a way that brokes no real conversation. No real relationship. No real input of expertise, which most of them don't have anyway. But even if they had it, they would not be able to offer it because that's not what Donald Trump wants. He just wants flunkies, people who just stand there and take orders and abuse and do what he wants. I mean, without any, without reservation. Without question. I mean, this is, this is, I can't, any, any, I can't imagine any chief executive of a major company who would get away with this kind of thing. I mean, these are people who are, again, not just unqualified, but people willing to be sycophants at a, at a, at an astounding level. And I'm dying to sort of know as well the level. The level they go in, the level of sycophancy they have going in, and does he bully them into changing? Do they sublimate themselves further? We're going to get into all of it. But before we do, just a reminder to please subscribe to the Daily Beast podcast. Wherever you get your podcasts, be it Apple, be it Spotify, be it YouTube, please subscribe. The reason we can have these independent conversations is because of your support. There are various tiers of membership. And you get extra exclusive content, ad-free content, if you join. So, Michael, a question. Do people know how bad it's going to be working for Donald Trump before they, before they go in there? Can they, is it possible to prepare yourself for the crazy of working for him, do you think? No, I don't. I don't think it is because I think the relationship you have with Donald Trump is unlike the relationship you've ever had with anyone else. Now, by this point, people ought to be, there ought to be an expectation that this is going to be an experience unlike any you've ever had. Certainly a working experience. That was not the case in the first administration. In the first administration, it was really bewildering to people. I mean, I mean, they, they, there's a whole set of. People in the first administration who profoundly misunderstood their function. But at this point, and I mean, and as we point out, we are, we are more than 10 years into this. Everybody knows who this guy is. Yeah. I mean, I think, I think now you would, you would go into it and say, okay, I know what I've got to do. I mean, I have got to be an. Abject loyalist. And even that dignifies it. I'm going to be, have to be an abject suck up. So in the first administration, people joined, and we've referred to this before in the podcast. I mean, very serious people joined the administration because they thought, well, Donald Trump isn't a politician. He doesn't know DC. He's only been there seven times, so less than once a decade. And he's not expecting to be. President. The assumption is Hillary Clinton, because she's a, uh, you know, she's of the system is going to win. She doesn't. And people sort of flock to help Donald Trump to support him. Um, who do you think, you know, of the people you talked to who worked with, with him and you don't have to give us names, but who do you think sort of came out the most broken from the first administration? Jesus, that's a good question. Um, and, and that's. It's hard because in, in, in the end, almost, I mean, everybody was broken by this. Everybody, I mean, from the, uh, everybody's, nobody's careers, um, are really benefited. Um, everybody who was in the first administration came out of this certainly feeling, um, cheated or feeling that they were, um, yeah, humiliated. Mm-hmm. I mean, that was, that was it. Every, every interaction with this man, if you are some, anything more than an abject suck up, and even then, and we'll get into that, um, he will humiliate you. And I think all of these McMasters, Gary Cohn, Mattis, Tillerson, John Kelly, all of these people came out with a, with a, I think a high degree. of, of shock and bitterness. Shock and bitterness, not shock and awe, shock and bitterness. And one, one can't help thinking, I mean, particularly of someone like Rex Tillerson, who was the CEO of Exxon, uh, who gave that role up to be secretary of state, a sort of fabulous opportunity in a, in a normal government, um, even if he wasn't particularly qualified for it. But a man who'd certainly traveled the world doing business, complicated business, uh, so requires a, you know, a degree of, of intelligence and smarts and sophistication who, you know, very quickly was caught saying that he thought Trump was an absolute moron and was then famously fired. And obviously it was the administration that leaked the details of him being fired as he was sitting on the toilet. So again, this sense of, of. Not just the humiliation of firing you, but then leaking the details of how you were fired. And, and remember, most of these people were then fired via social media. So they would discover they were being fired on social media too, right? No, and it isn't as if, as if he had the, uh, the, the courtesy, um, you know, to call people in and say, listen, this isn't working out. is never with Trump, a feeling on his part that he has to treat someone with any level of respect and dignity and um professionalism right doesn't exist you're just just you're you're you're just irrelevant to him you're just a piece of player you know a nothing well you're programming right you're programming until you sort of fail to draw the audience still and then you're dismissed i mean i remember when mcmaster's when when he was hot when he hired mcmaster's he didn't want to hire mcmaster's and he hired him to run national security yes and and remember so the first director of national security mike flynn turned out to have had conversations with the russians he hadn't bothered to tell anybody about so mike flynn was the first director who lasted a matter of weeks really um and then because he was being investigated by the fbi because he had conversations with the russians so he was he was out of there so they had to find someone quickly and they got um mcmaster's who was a you know who was a four-star general i believe hugely respected figure from the military and and and he came in in his first interview was he was in uniform and trump was like was like oh that guy that looks that guy looks good um and uh and then the next time he was in a suit and trump was like what what are you wearing now you look like uh i think it was you look like a mattress salesman um and then basically he was told mcmaster's was told you gotta you gotta go put the uniform back on or he's not gonna hire you so wow why didn't mcmaster's tell him to go put the uniform back on or he's not gonna hire you at that point understand and that's the interesting thing within minutes of talking to trump you understand that there is something here that is not like other situations you have ever been in and why then would you not would you not say hey i i can't be with i can't be with somebody like um who's talking to me like this well and the answer that's a rhetorical question and the answer is um uh because it's the white house because he's the president of the united states because you actually believe that this is uh that that that you're stepping into a moment of history instead of into a moment of absurdity if a genie gave me three wishes i would use all my wishes to wish for my cats this one is waffles to live forever but since genies don't exist i feed my cats smalls smalls is human grade cat food that does so much more than just feed your cat it helps them to live a full healthy life that sounds good doesn't it most cat food out there is made with meat byproducts cheap fillers and artificial ingredients basically stuff that isn't great for your cat big pet food does this because it's cheaper to make but what they save on cost your cat pays for with their health smalls is different their fresh cat food is protein packed recipes made with free 100 human grade ingredients you'd find in your fridge and it's delivered right to your door so stop serving your little carnival a bowl of processed shortcuts for a limited time because you're an inside trump's head listener get 60 off your first order plus free shipping and free treats for life when you head to smalls.com head that's 60 off your first order plus free shipping and free treats for life when you head to smalls.com slash head so can we talk about the anticipatory obedience that people have around donald trump i mean partly it is that he's the president partly it is it's the white house it's real power and you've talked about this before and i find it really interesting and then we'll come on to our current cabinet and who is the most egregious of the suck-ups but but this sense of trump using his physical power in the room i i know he's not or he's no longer six foot three he seems to be shrinking every time we see him but but he's physically a big man he's an intimidating man he shouts at people humiliates people thinks nothing of grinding people down in front of an audience to what extent does that impact the behavior of those around him even those who are four-star generals and they're they're sort of anticipating him going on a ramp or something well i would say that there are two things i mean there is his his his size and his bulk um and his i i don't know if you want to call it energy or um or i i don't know what it is but there is certainly something when you are in the room with donald trump um and i don't know if you're in the room with donald trump and i remember this from days in new york so prior to the to the to the presidency that there is this physical sense of him um looming and you you you pull back instinctively you pull back from from from the space around him you don't want to be in this space is it like a sort of electromagnetic kind of force field i don't want to over dramatize it but but he does seem to have this physical as you say there is just a thing is somebody who has takes up too much space and usually people who actually even large people they they learn how to minimize that because it's because it's intimidating to other people and it's and it it interrupts your own relationships with other people but not donald trump he kind of however he maximizes that and i would i would connect that to this other element of of being with donald trump he doesn't care about you he barely acknowledges you you are for him not really there or they're only in a like a piece of furniture is there and not a very interesting piece of furniture at that um you are disposable you are um um you are you are you are you are you are Nobody that comes into his field of interest, field of concern, field of any kind of sense that you and he are on the same level. I mean, it's kind of extraordinary. And I think, I don't know how anyone can quite feel this. I mean, anyone can quite not feel this, although it gets confusing in the moment, too, because suddenly he's heaping flattery on you, like you are the greatest. But then you, of course, realize, and it takes a minute, and now you're doubly confused that he's heaping this flattery on you, but then you realize it doesn't, it's just, you're replaceable. And he would do that with anyone. It means nothing. So that is this. This thing that goes on with him, this very large man, and then when you're in his presence, you feel, well, you feel small because he doesn't care about you. He doesn't care about you. He is really not addressing you. He is not seeing you as anyone distinct from anyone else. I think there's a psychological term for what people try to look for when they're working with someone. Like Donald Trump, which is, I think, called intermittent reinforcement, where because he's unpredictable and because he is, for the most part, uncaring, you don't feature on his radar. Every now and then he can sprinkle a little attention towards you or praise towards you, and it has a disproportionate impact because it's such an unusual thing. It somehow distorts how people behave with him. Because like dogs, they're trying to, they're trying to get these treats from him. Does that sound plausible in terms of how people actually behave with him? Except then there's this other piece of jujitsu. So the first step is, I don't really care about you. But then suddenly I'm flattering you. And you get confused by that. Yeah. But then the further jujitsu is that you realize that he's not really talking to you individually. It's meaningless. So you're, you're, you're whipsawed by, by this. When I went down to Mar-a-Lago and suddenly I'm in, you know, I mean, this is, this is a, you know, we have had, we had this, had this issue when I, my first book came out and he tried to stop publication and then he tried to sue me. And then, um, uh, but that's so that sold a lot of copies. So then I was suddenly like, oh, you know, that guy gets ratings. And, um, and then I go down there and suddenly he's introducing me to everything. Everybody is the best writer in America. You know, Michael Wolf, he's the best writer in America and you're suddenly thinking, okay, yeah. But then you realize, wait a minute, he has never read a word that I have written. He doesn't even know what that notion is. And then so what do you do with that? I mean, is it real praise? Is it mockery? And it's not direct mockery, but it basically becomes a kind of mockery. I mean, this spreading flattery, this spreading meaningless flattery wherever he goes. Okay, so let's look at the people he's got around him at the moment. Who are, well, how do you think of them in terms of sort of psychological groups? And I'm assuming that almost everybody thinks they can go in there and somehow manage him. Is that fair? Do they all think, oh, I got this guy, I see him? You know, I think that that was the case. I don't really think that's the case anymore. I mean, if you think that at this point in time, you have really gotten the wrong information. I mean, somehow that's a profound misunderstanding. And I think you have to go into this relationship understanding that it will be painful. And you know what is required of you. And you have to be willing to do this. And that's one of the reasons I think the cast of characters is so astoundingly weak, that there is almost nobody here who rises to any level of the kind of professionalism you would expect, even, you know, even a B minus professional. I mean, everybody's an F, a flunky. And so I think that's what, that understanding eliminates all of the people who do have any expertise, who do have any pride, who do have something meaningful to offer. So you've gotten rid of all those people because everybody understands you can't, you can't go into this job unless you are, you are ready to accept the kind of humiliation that he's going to hand out, that you are really going to have almost no, no independent input. You will not be able to be a, at any level, a genuine professional around Donald Trump. If you've ever landed in another country and immediately started desperately searching for airport Wi-Fi or realized you now have to figure out how to get a local SIM, there's a much easier way. It's called Saley, the eSIM solution from the security pros behind NordVPN. You can get affordable data in more than 200 destinations and setting it up is incredibly simple. You download the Saley app, pick a plan, install the eSIM and it activates when you arrive. 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If I am, you know, I'm stuck in the Senate here. I am stuck in the Senate. I have nowhere to go. The only move I have is to accept this job. And it's not going to be pretty. And I am going to have to be all the kinds of things that my whole life has been spent trying not to be. I mean, I'm a United States senator. I have run for president. But here, because I'm up against it, I'm going to accept being reduced to a flunky. And we hope, Marco Rubio hopes that at the end of this, he will have a way to go forward. Is Marco Rubio then like Lindsey Graham in this regard that, you know, at one point he was saying, you know, Donald Trump is a disgrace to the Republican Party. We need to get rid of him. You know, he's debated him in the primaries for the Republican leadership. He then fully succumbs. He then fully praises him. He's as abject as he can be publicly. Do you think privately Marco Rubio is doing what Lindsey Graham did and telling everybody about the actual madness of working with Donald Trump? Yeah, I don't. I mean, I know that Lindsey Graham did this because I spoke to him and he told me, as he told many, many others. I think probably, I don't know if Marco Rubio is doing that. I suspect he is not. Remember, Lindsey Graham was the United States senator. So he had an amount of, quite a bit of independence. I mean, he had to, he was in a transactional relationship with Donald Trump. I'm going to flatter you. I'm going to do this. And then you're going to give me at least a little of what I want. Marco Rubio isn't in that kind of relationship. He doesn't have an independent, he doesn't have any independence. If he is, if he displeases Donald Trump in any way, he's going to, feel it. And he won't necessarily be fired, although that would eventually happen. But first he will be humiliated. He will be excluded. He will be, his life will be made miserable. I mean, his life will, in many respects, Donald Trump has the ability to end, and it's not only your career, but I think to end your, belief in yourself. Right. And so what about J.D. Vance then? Because J.D. Vance has actually managed to separate himself a little bit from Donald Trump. He appears at least on surface value to have more independence. He has clearly, he talks to the authors of Regime Change, Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan, to make it clear that he wasn't in favor of the war. He's done that elsewhere. Well, Well, J.D. Vance has a job. J.D. Vance can't be fired. So he does have some. So he is playing this. You know, he's threading a needle here. And and because he is the vice president, he he you know, that's everybody. Everybody understands this. This is that he can he can gain some. I mean, I'm thinking this through now because I'm you know, I'm because Donald Trump doesn't understand this, the the fine distinction that we are making here. And I'm not sure. I mean, I think that J.D. Vance has to whatever he is doing and whoever he is talking to, he is at the same time. Bending over as unctuous as on his belly, as on the floor as anyone else. And if at the same time he can do that and get away with having other conversations or suggesting that that he may not be he may be less for the war than other people in the administration. You know, again, you know, we'll we'll see if he gets away with that. I mean, he did go from saying that Donald Trump was the new Hitler, which is his famous quote, to being his vice president, to talking about the president in these hallowed terms. Yeah, no, there was a complete conversion here. If you now speak to J.D. Vance and he he will tell you about essentially, you know, on the road to Damascus and he's struck down and he realizes that Donald Trump is is the new Messiah. Yeah. Yeah. If you're sitting around the cabinet table and Donald Trump is sitting there and intermittently he's dozing off or whatever, are there sort of signals going on between the different cabinet ministers about, OK, we know this is crazy? Is is there a sort of bonding? No, I mean, there. everybody is very atomized in their humiliation. And remember how terrible this situation is. You're with somebody who doesn't listen to you, who doesn't have any respect for you, any concern for you. And at any moment, any moment, he will ridicule you and mock you and dismiss you. So everybody in the situation when they are with Donald Trump is in fear of their life, essentially. I mean, they don't know what's going to happen. You're with this very, very volatile person. And if he directs it at you, if you come into that field of focus, you know, you may not recover. You know, I remember in the first administration, the joke about Kellyanne Conway was that she did everything possible not to be in the room. Now, of course, you know, in common White House mythology, what you're doing there to be in the room is to have power. That's what you want to be, a person in the room. With Donald Trump, I think it's really the opposite. It's like, get, stay out of his way. So you want to stay out of the room. And do you divide, I mean, I, you know, did Pam Bondi go in there? How could she have mishandled the Epstein files so badly? How could she have said, oh, I've got them all sitting on my desk. I've got the files sitting on my desk. How could she have not anticipated that Donald Trump was going to outmaneuver her? Fire her because he knew he was in the files. She knew he was in the files. Why didn't she just say, you know, there's nothing in the file. We're not going to release them or whatever. But the moment she said they were on her desk, she was cooked. Well, yeah, possibly. But remember, I'm not sure that she knew what was in the files at that point. She was. And remember, we're just in that in that Trump thing. You just say, oh, yeah, the files. I got the files on my desk. Very Trumpy. And and and the fact, you know, and and and this is not just true of her, but true of many people in the Republican Party. Donald Trump had given assurances. I barely knew the guy actually. So the the incredibly strange thing is that people kind of believed him. And then, of course, that that turned out to not to be true. And and then that escalated into suddenly, you know, these files which are on my desk, I then have to produce them. So I'm not sure that that was this was that thing we're doing. We're trying to do what Donald what we think Donald Trump wants us to do. And then and then that turns out and that probably is, you know, again, a perfectly Trumpian thing. We have the files this we're going to do this and then we're going to move on to something else. And it will go away. And then but when this didn't go away, then you get blamed. I mean, Donald Trump is certainly not going to take the blame. Right. Right. As you say, he just doubles down on the blame. So Pam Bondi gone. What about Kristi Noem? Kristi Noem seemed just a ridiculous character, you know, monumentally ill-equipped to deal with the Department of Homeland Security spent as we've. Referred to, you know, quarter of a billion dollars on an ad campaign, which was really her riding around on a horse with Mount Rushmore in the background. Were those two women the first two to be fired from his cabinet? I just I noticed that she just filed for divorce. Oh, she did. Yes. Well, that's never that's never a happy day. The Pam Bondi and the Kristi Noem things. So these were not only not only people who were in the. Who who understood they had to suck up to Donald Trump, but they were also kind of uniquely ill-equipped. I mean, they were the kind of I mean, I think almost you can separate the people out from the hopeless people to the mendacious people. And and, you know, I think Pam Bondi and Kristi Noem, it's like, you know, I'm going to get this job. I'm not going to do anything. I'm just going to try to, you know, what whatever he wants will do. I'm not here to I'm not here really to think I'm not here really to try to accomplish anything. I'm not even here really to advance my own career. I am just grateful that I got this job, which I would not have otherwise gotten in any other administration. Well, they were both probably incredulous that they had a cabinet position. Incredulous. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, never in their wildest dreams would they have imagined that they would end up at a seat with the American president until, of course, you find out that the American president is Donald Trump. And so it's more like a reality show. But if they're the incompetent ones, and I think I would probably throw in, would we throw in the former labor secretary who also got fired? I mean, all the people he's fired so far, we can safely say, have been winners. Yeah, and there are other, you know, kind of blitheringly incompetent people around him. You know, Sean Duffy, you know, Kelly Loeffler. Loeffler, is that how we say her name? Kelly Loeffler, yeah. The small businesses secretary. Oh, my God. You know, Mark Wayne Mullen, another. Oh, my God. Mark Wayne Mullen, who, of course, came in to replace Kristi Noem and then tried to sneak in his head of ice, Lance Schroer, while Susie Wiles was out of town. Trump said yes. And Lance Schroer, former highway patrolman and a member of Mark Wayne Mullen's security team, put in to run ICE. I mean, it's so embarrassing. It's just so embarrassing. Yeah, you know, other and then, you know, there's there's a whole group of people. There's people who really just try to stay out of head down as far as possible. Scott Turner, you know, he is the secretary of housing and urban development. You know, a total zero. A total zero. And what about Scott Besson? Where are you on our treasury secretary? You know, well, I think that's an interesting thing. I mean, obviously, as somebody who's not not not a not a stupid guy, has qualifications. And so why would he have taken this job? You know, also also, you know, openly, proudly gay in an administration in which that is clearly a clearly a drawback. Why? I don't know. I mean, I genuinely do not know, cannot at this point in time fathom why someone would take this job, why they would be think that they are somehow different enough that they will emerge. From this, this job ahead rather than behind. I don't get it. OK, what about Howard Lutnick? Howard Lutnick seems to be humiliated by Donald Trump. Howard Lutnick, who told people that he, as you know, lived next door to Jeffrey Epstein, went briefly to Jeffrey Epstein's house, saw a massage bed in one of the rooms and was like, I will never, ever talk to this man again. And then, of course, was discovered to have taken his entire family and another family with children. I think four children among them or possibly even eight children among them to Jeffrey Epstein's island for lunch. You know, you get a it's a sort of a different category around Donald Trump when you're a billionaire. He certainly doesn't doesn't listen to you more. He does not openly humiliate you like other people. So you can't you're not really going to get to. To do a do the job you might do in that position in another administration. But you are kind of protected a bit because you're a billionaire. Because Donald Trump respects money. He respects billionaires, particularly if you have the title billionaire, then then you are kind of on Donald Trump's side of the of the line. But you're not going to be on Donald Trump's side of the line as everyone else is not. OK, so let's talk about our secretary of war slash defense slash forever wars slash Colonel Vodka, as Roger Ailes called him, as you've pointed out. Where is he on Pete Hegseth? And he would fall clearly into the mendacious category. And so what's the I mean, the opera? I mean, OK, remember, Pete Hegseth is the is the. I would say we're in safe territory to say he's the least qualified secretary of defense in the history of the office that must be true i don't think we're over saying i mean we don't have a list in front of us of everyone who's done the job but remember he was he was in in the um a reserve army lieutenant um did two chores of duty in Iraq and then became a co-host of a weekend television show. So no management experience, no administrative experience, no strategic experience, no any experience relevant to running a one of them, certainly one of the most management intense positions on earth. I think that is probably also safe to say. Well, I think he's got reverse management experience, right? He ran two veterans affairs organizations and the staff of both rebelled against him. And he was taken out of both under, you know, financial and organizational shenanigans because he couldn't cope with either. He was intoxicated on the jobs. And he's also referred to within the Pentagon as no tab Pete because he doesn't have any tabs on his uniform. A part of his qualifications and that and this was a subject of of great discussion in the first administration was that he was a demonstrator. He had demonstrated his suck up credentials to Donald Trump that and this was notable because everybody at Fox was trying to suck up to Donald. Trump and Pete Hegseth was named the leading suck up of all the suck ups at Fox. He was a joke. In other words, Ryan Reynolds here from it mobile, the message for everyone paying big wireless way too much. Please for the love of everything good in this world. Stop with mint, you can get premium wireless for just $15 a month. Of course, if you enjoy overpaying no judgments, but that's weird. Okay, one judgment. Anyway, give it a try at mint. mobile.com/switch. upfront payment of $45 for three month plan equivalent to $15 per month required intro rate first three months only then full price plan options available taxes and fees extra see full terms at mint mobile.com. You know, I saw someone sucking up yesterday to trample earlier this week. And I just thought why are you doing this and then you could just see the fear still in her eyes. So Senator Joni Ernst from Iowa, they're getting a new steel plant. And she was falling over herself to praise the president say this was only happening because of the good graces of the president. It really was a an egregious display. She's leaving the Senate she was going to be at one point she was holding out against Pete exit because she's been in the military. She knows that Pete exit is completely ill equipped to do this job. She knows he would be harmful in the job. She herself talked about being attacked by, you know, having a sexual experiencing sexual abuse in the military. She knows that this is a man who's been accused of sexual abuse. His own mother wrote him a note saying you are an abuser of women. She held out. They leaked details of her divorce to get her to vote in favor of Pete hex ethos Secretary of Defense. She's since decided to leave the Senate altogether. And she's standing there sucking up to the president? You think, have you got no pride left? You know, one of the curious things about Donald Trump, I mean, you know, these are people in power, people who have enormous amounts of power are often very difficult to get along with, and they are very demanding. But the thing about people in power is that they recognize other people's power. They recognize how those people might diminish their own power. It's everybody weighing the power equation. Donald Trump doesn't do that. It's kind of fascinating. Nobody else's power matters to him. And in some sense, he can't quite understand anyone else's power. Or because he is so narcissistic, he can't quite understand anyone else's power. He's so narcissistic that he dismisses the idea that anyone else could have power. So Johnny Ernst is a United States senator. There are many actual United States senators who Trump needs. I mean, they can damage his ability to do his job. That never crosses his mind. It just is a, it's like a DNA piece that he doesn't have. Oh, this person could hurt me. Doesn't have it, doesn't feel it. I mean, it's one of, it's a kind of a broader sense of cause and effect, which he can't grasp. One of the things I find really fascinating is this idea of groupthink, that you know that there are people sitting around that cabinet table who individually think Donald Trump is probably incompetent. They probably dislike him intensely if they don't have the power to do so. They hate him. They understand they might be grateful for this current elevation to cabinet minister. And yet there's a sort of groupthink amongst them. They lose their individuality. And it's almost like there's a sort of pluralistic ignorance about what he's doing to people. Well, yeah, I think that they just understand the rules. There is no flexibility here. There is no, we're not on the spectrum, a long spectrum here. It's a very precise place on the spectrum. This is, this is the, this is the behavior that is required. And if you try to do anything else, first thing, he will, he will attack you. I mean, he will shoot you down. You will know it. You will know if you've stepped out of line. So, so each, each person, each, each in their, in their atomized fear of humiliation, they know what they have to do and they don't ever try to do anything else. And is this a gradual realization? I mean, because people don't, for the most part, I don't think wake up and, and think, well, I'm just going to be prepared to be humiliated. That's, that's the cost of this. I mean, I think that you see it the first time you go into, into a room with, with Donald Trump. Um, and mostly you're not in the room alone. So you see how other people are, are reacting to him. The, um, the, the whole Trump ecosystem becomes very clear. And, and, you know, if you know, you know, enough not to try to, uh, one up that or disrupt this point. So we've talked about the flunkies that he's handpicked around him. So he's got control of that environment. He can fire them. What about the group of tech guys who now seem to be surrounding him? I mean, we saw after his lunch with them on Tuesday that the sort of, they provide the background for him. He leans forward and says, we're not calling it artificial intelligence anymore. We're calling it super intelligence. Mark Zuckerberg from Meta has already adopted the new terminology. I mean, how, well, this goes just, this goes to show you how powerful this is that even these guys who are in themselves vastly powerful and vastly rich are, are playing the part that they know they have to play. Why? Um, yeah, you know, I mean, I think, I think, I think the why is, is, uh, you know, is probably pretty basic. It's because they have, they have large corporations that can, that can, um, materially more than materially, um, you know, trillions of dollars worth of materiality benefit from Donald Trump's favor that right now at this point, they're looking at this, I'm sure. And saying, we let's, let's get what we can, whether getting is good. And all that is required here is for us to play the part. And we don't have to play the part that long. I mean, we're not like Marco Rubio, who's, who, who, who, who must vibrate with anxiety the whole day. We just have to go in and for a couple of hours, play our part, but they all at the same time know that they're, that they can't go beyond that. There is no pretext. There is no sense on their part that they can, that they can step forward, that they can change Donald Trump's mind, that they can, that they can dominate the conversation. I mean, I think Elon Musk at, at certain moments clearly tried to do that. that. And look what happened to him. And now he's back doing what he is allowed to do, what he is supposed to do. And do you think they are also atomized in their anxiety about the president or frustration with the president or abject, you know, we'll do whatever he needs us to do right now? Or do you think they're all, you know, after Tuesday's lunch, did they all leave just sort of laughing together? Is there a camaraderie, do you think? No, I don't think so. I mean, I think that's the nature, the structural nature of these guys with their individual corporations. They are all competitors at some level. And I mean, they're like the kind of, you know, the dukes of the kingdom. And they're going back to their fiefdoms. And they realize that at any point, you know, they may be at odds with, or they're trying not to be at odds with Donald Trump. And they may be at odds with each other at any point. So I suspect that they keep their own counsel because they look forward to the possibility that Donald Trump might be their ally one of the other, one of their other peers. Right. And presumably Donald Trump, and I think we've talked about this before, but Donald Trump likes nothing better than to divide people. So he's, as you say, he's constantly calling people, calling people and just spreading gossip, or you say, so, you know, bad things about each other. Yes, yes, no. And that's what everybody knows. So the anxiety is that he's going to hear, someone will tell him that Donald Trump called somebody and says, and said, what do you think of little Marco? And you know, and that is, that's not good news for anybody. Right. So always, always undermining people, constantly doing that, constantly sending messages, which are all about, I am, I am the dominant person. And you cannot at any moment, forget that you cannot for at any moment, forget the fact that I could flick you away. You mean nothing to me. So where does this leave Susie Wiles? Someone who you've often said has treated her role as chief of staff very differently to those who came before her. She's already outlasted the previous chiefs of staff from the first administration. She keeps a, you know, a quiet profile. She's not trying to get the camera. She's not competing for attention with him. How is she, how is she treated by him? Yeah, that's a good, a good question. How is, because it's, it's different and it's different because she has made it different. I mean, she has, she has a role that she has fashioned into the chief administrator. I mean, she's the faceless person. She is the person who, who, um, uh, you know, make sure she makes sure that, um, uh, you know, that the chairs are set up. Um, she, that's so depressing. That's so depressing for the first female chief of staff to be organizing the chairs. Yeah, no, in the campaign, you know, she was, um, she had a modicum of, of independence and dare I say, even respect because she kept the books. Um, and, and he was very pleased because he always feels that people are stealing from him. So he came to trust that, that she would have a tight rein on the money coming in and going out. And, and she has, she has continued in that role. Her role is not policy. Her role is not, really advice. Her, her role is not, uh, in, in any way as, as chiefs of staff often see it as the chief operating officer of the executive branch. She is the, the administrator. You know that person in any office, they become kind of, kind of necessary, but faceless. Michael, on Tuesday, we saw photos that had been leaked of Trump yelling and, and he was completely downloading on her. She looked like she was conscious that there were cameras. And so she was sort of laughing and, and, and looking like she was frankly taking abuse. Well, everybody takes abuse. It's a kind of one of those other things, you know, you got you have to realize that he will focus on you at some point. And how's the weather is what's his mood? You know, this is this is a man who is wholly unfiltered. And his powers of expression are are blunt force. That's it. You're going to get it. It's going to come at you. I mean, I have I have seen this. There's a there's a scene in in my last book, All or Nothing, when he when he takes out. After one of his key aides, a guy by the name of Jason Miller. And it was it was horrendous. And in fact, Jason Miller did not go one of the closest people to Trump. And then he he he seems not to have gone into the White House. And I I wonder if that was it, if that was his breaking point. But certainly now. Natalie, the wrath has come on her and it comes on her often. This was true about Hope Hicks, Margo Martin, all of these all of these women around him. And let's remember, these women around him, they're they're speaking of flunkies. They are there in in this in the most abject capacity. It is. I mean, it is. There's no there's no pretense that they are there. For any other reason but the succor of Donald Trump, they are there to be his comfort blanket. Ryan Reynolds here from Mint Mobile. I don't know if you knew this, but anyone can get the same premium wireless for fifteen dollars a month plan that I've been enjoying. It's not just for celebrities. So do like I did and have one of your assistants assistants switch you to Mint Mobile today. I'm told it's super easy to do at Mint Mobile. Dot com slash switch up front payment of forty five dollars for three month plan equivalent to fifteen dollars per month required intro rate first three months only then full price plan options available taxes and fees extra fee full terms at Mint Mobile dot com. So the inevitable question then is how does Donald Trump behave when he's with equals? Well, I know he's the president of the United States. He's Donald Trump. He there are no equals, which he profoundly believes. Does he not? Does he not think that Xi Jinping is an equal? No, he thinks he thinks I think she is Chinese. That's probably something. Right. Yeah, it's another another universe. He doesn't even he doesn't get that. You know, Putin, maybe he thinks that Putin is. And obviously, that's a that's a that's an issue and a thematic issue. Why is he seem to be always bending, bending over for Vladimir Putin? So maybe maybe that maybe I can't think of anybody else, however. So Putin and she are well, she's Chinese, so he doesn't really count. And Putin, because of the long history of the Cold War, because Russia's bailed Donald Trump out. So many times, who knows why? But but Vladimir Putin is really the only person that I mean, I don't get the impression that he would. He has been with with there have been periods where he's felt he seems to feel that similarly to Rupert Murdoch no longer because he's decided that Rupert is senile. So so he's he's of of less concern. But there are periods in Trump's life when Rupert. Rupert Murdoch was the I think he recognized Rupert as having a power far superior to his. Did he think he was senile when the Wall Street Journal released the birthday letters from the Jeffrey Epstein book? Yeah, well, yeah, I mean, I think he does. He otherwise they wouldn't have done it. I mean, that he believes. that Murdoch no longer has control over his company. And are there any other business people that you think he feels that about that are somehow beyond his reach? I can't, I don't think anyone, he feels that about anyone now. He's the president of the United States. He is the president of the United States twice. And I think that's part of what we're seeing and part of the nature of this second term is a level of whatever we want to call it, arrogance, hubris, that he has entered a dimension even extreme for Donald Trump. And the only time I've seen him being what appears to be deferential is when he's in the company of other presidents, say like Jimmy Carter's funeral. Is there any sense in which he thinks the other presidents, because they're often hanging out without him? Actually, mostly he's not in the company of other presidents. I mean, he's either not invited or he's snubbed by other presidents. And he certainly in general has only contempt for them, which he expresses. George Bush, contempt. Barack Obama, contempt. Bill Clinton. I think that there was a time in the 90s when Bill Clinton was impressed Donald Trump. But that, of course, has long since passed. And he refers to his little office of the White House where he sells all his, or where he keeps all his merch, the USA hats, the Trump 2028 hats, as the Lewinsky closet. Probably all presidents do. Oh, Michael. It's so fascinating. It's so fascinating. What an extraordinary man he's turned out to be in all sorts of ways and not what we could ever have predicted 10 years ago. Well, thank you so much. Have a great trip to London. We will see each other again on Saturday, but at which point you will be in London. I look forward to seeing whatever background you have. If you're going to the country, all I beg is that you have good Wi-Fi. Because you know what it's like. When I'm in the British countryside, I have terrible Wi-Fi. I've now started taking my own portable satellite. We should have given it to you for your trip. I think I'm good. Famous last words about Wi-Fi. Good. Well, let's hope you have more modern Wi-Fi than I do when I'm in Yorkshire. I'm confident. Good. All right. Well, I will look forward to seeing you on Saturday. And we will go once more inside Donald Trump's head. And we'll see you in L.A. We will see you in L.A. I will see you in L.A. I'll see you before that. But everybody, L.A. is going to be fun. Yeah. If you need a trip, if you need a reason for a trip to L.A., come to the Terragram Ballroom, October the 20th. You can find tickets at Ticketmaster inside Trump's head. I will thank you for listening or viewing. If you have been, don't forget, subscribe to The Daily Beast. And a big thank you to our crew, John Romero, Ryan Murray, Rachel Passer, Heather Pissarro, and Neil Rosenhaus. So the good news is, we have so many B-Beast tier members now. There are too many names to read out. And we really appreciate your support. So do like I did and have one of your assistant's assistants switch you to Mint Mobile today. Intro rate first three months only. Then full price plan options available. When an intruder approaches a home, they expect a camera. What they don't expect. Stop. This is simply safe. Police are on the way. Using smart AI cameras, live US-based agents help deter intruders in under 30 seconds. Don't just record a break-in. Stop it from ever happening. Plan starting around a dollar a day. 30 seconds response time requires monitoring plan with outdoor protection starting at $49.99 a month. Still waiting in line? Again? 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