Not salacious at all. Couldn't put it down. We are well and truly screwed. Thanks for the confirmation, Bob. Highly recommend.

Bob Woodward is certifiably THE most respected investigative journalist of the last 50 years and has covered countless administrations. The man has certifiably no agenda against Trump or the current administration (as could be inferred from Comney's book) that would call into question the integrity of the stories contained.That being said, however, this book isn't exactly full of breaking news. We know Trump was and remains unprepared to be the president. We know he won through the extremist right wing media coverage. We know the economy is doing well but that many of the decisions were made outside of his own direct understanding.That being said, this book offers a very official feeling look into Trump's current predicament and inability and unfitness for the job. The most shocking parts of this book however, had not previously been covered. i.e. his own staff hiding documents and his Twitter causing international tensions, the level of which not previously understood.While many on the right will scream that many of the sources in this book denied quotes or stories about them, I mean, who wouldn't? If you were caught by your boss for talking about them behind their back or undermining their authority, who wouldn't lie to save their own position? Let's be real. "Yes sir/Mam'n I took documents off your desk to save our company and hid them." No one would do that. The evidence and amount of corroboration outweighs any half-denials. Both Rob Porter and Gary Cohn issued lengthy statements of denial regarding taking documents, but never actually denied taking the documents. Everything else can be corroborated as Bob is known for his due diligence.I find a small sense of relief and a strong appreciation for having Bob Woodward to continue to investigate in the same manner that brought down the Nixon administration during Watergate during this complex and inconceivable time in American history.I'll end this with one food for thought; Bob Woodward has some of the highest journalistic credentials and his work has been lauded for decades for it's integrity and truthfulness, covering every president from Nixon to Clinton, to Bush and Obama. Trump has been caught in lie after lie. I'll shape my opinions accordingly. I hope everyone else in this country turns off Fox News and other strongly biased news sources (on both sides) and does the same.

The title is for those of you who remember the line from H. G. Wells' War of the Worlds. I couldn't resist.I bought and read Hillary Clinton’s book, which I found rather tedious, repetitive, and lacking in some of the same crucial insights missing during her 2016 campaign. I bought and read Ivanka Trump’s book of hints ad cheerleading for working women, which I thought was an amazing and banal pastiche of clichés and platitudes from someone largely clueless about real working women. I bought and read Sean Spicer’s book about his short-lived career as press secretary and thought it was a valid, albeit overly apologetic and whitewashed, window into how he functioned in a milieu like no other. I can’t be bothered with Omarosa and others like her who peddle gossip and sleaze like a political “Upstairs Downstairs.” Honesty, verisimilitude, and even a smidgin of gravitas are as absent from those tell-alls as they are from the Oval Office.Bob Woodward is another story altogether. I was in my late twenties during the Watergate saga, and watched it all, from the June 1972 break-in to the final, sordid act of August 9, 1974. Since then, just to provide a sort of check and balance for what I remembered, I’d read a stack of books about Watergate, including Woodward’s and Bernstein’s seminal and spare recounting of “how they did it.” And what I learned from these experiences was that Woodward delivered the truth as he found it, documented it, multi-sourced it, taped it, and explained it. He presented the truth in few words—adjectives and adverbs, like the hyperbole so beloved of some journalists and op-ed writers, are not Woodward’s friends. Instead, we get page after page of “Just the facts, ma’am” story-telling, and in this rather stark literary environment, the fear is real and believable. So are the admissions of what has, by design and necessity, been going on in the West Wing, with some admissions more outspoken than others,I’ve lived through the 1962 Cuban missile crisis, the 1963 Kennedy assassination, the cataclysms of 1968, and every amazing national upheaval through 1975, and survived all of it. I’m no delicate snowflake, but I will admit that what I read here, in one interview after another, one incident of subterfuge and deceit after another, endless attempts to thwart and manipulate what goes on in the Oval Office and outside it, and of allegedly trying to protect the country from its president to be more fear-inducing than Khrushchev’s missiles parked 90 miles from the US coast.Don’t expect a book that reads like an expanded National Enquirer or Daily Mail. Don’t expect a laundry list of bombshell revelations never before seen or heard. Don’t read this book to be amazed, titillated, or appalled. If that’s what you prefer, go cuddle up with Omarosa.However, if you want your worst fears confirmed in the most straightforward and unadorned manner, the bits and pieces you’ve been hearing from assorted cable news bobbleheads repeated but this time from a position of credibility, and what we might expect in the near future, this is your book. Readers already disposed to accept, with or without a certain degree of credulity, will be agreeing with every page. Readers who adamantly oppose the very idea of criticism large or small of this president might want to take a look at Woodward’s book, just in case.This book is not entitled “Fear” without good cause.

Finished the first seven chapters of the book and I can't stop reading! First-hand accounts of those who created the Trump Presidency and "MAGA". Those who fed the monster and later regretted it.Edit: 15 Chapters into the book, I can't help but notice that Trump's Administration is so out of wack, that Steve Bannon none other is portraited unintentionally by Woodward as "a voice of reason"! This is deeply disturbing.Edit: Done reading the book. One thing that I find impressing about Trump (to be fair) is his insistence on keeping his promises to his base that got him into the WH. Needle to say that most of these promises are stupid and potentially very harmful to the American Life, American Economy and American national security. I couldn't record this book enough. However, I wish there was more coverage of the WH's role in bringing North Korean to the negotiations' table.

How did we ever, got to this point, should be the question to ALL of us.