Michael Wolff has stirred up quite the storm with his book, Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House, in which he attacked the competency of the Trump administration. And just after he accused CNN of colluding with the White House to smear his image, President Donald Trump has apparently decided to launch his own personal crusade against the author.
Trump lashed out at Wolff, insulting his intellect and questioning his credibility, something which he appeared on CNN to specifically address. According to Trump, this is all part of the recent wave of fake news, and he implied that much of what is written in the book is untrue.
As can be expected, Trump’s own statements were taken in a very controversial way, and it did not take long for responses to start pouring in. At this point, the situation is quickly devolving to mudslinging on both sides, and some neutral voices say it would be unfortunate to see Wolff’s book being dragged down in this context.
Those people argue that although some things were not factual, the book remains an important piece of work one year into the Trump presidency.
However, in the end, this could be precisely what Trump intended to do. Distracting from the real discussions that the book brings up is an excellent way to avoid facing the criticism for those things, and Trump certainly knows a thing or two about keeping people distracted for his benefit.
Some have spoken in defense of Trump, on the other hand, claiming that everyone should be more critical of statements being published publicly like that, as it is not hard for someone to make up claims that benefit an agenda they might have. Whether this has any relation to the current state of affairs is hard to tell though.