ANONYMOUS NYTimes Op Ed – a “senior official”? Are you SURE, New York Times?
You know you’re in trouble, as a reader, when you face apocalyptic rhetoric trying to pretend it’s measured, as in,
President Trump is facing a test to his presidency unlike any faced by a modern American leader.
This is that instantly famous anonymous op-ed in the New York Times, of course. I can’t help feeling curious about the author, and I’m going into such slight clues as I perceive, below. But there is no way I’m condoning the Times’ cheap trick–even as I get sucked in by it. This op-ed would never have been famous on the merits, regardless of positions espoused. Nobody would have paid attention to it without that anonymous insinuation that President Trump is being fervently betrayed by everyone around him.
(I am reading the prose style for clues, not as a literary critic. But someone could have recommended fewer -ly endings. The country here is not “divided,” but “bitterly divided.” One does not “grasp,” or fail to grasp, but “fully grasp.” People are not “working,” but “working diligently.” And so on. Did the NYTimes get rid of its editors along with its copy people?)
On to the slight clues, such as they are. Author’s sentences are in the quote boxes; my inferences are in editorial brackets:
It’s not just that . . . his party might well lose the House to an opposition hellbent on his downfall.
[anti-Democrats] [anti-‘left’] [does not know how to hyphenate or thinks hyphenating is too female-like]
The language is peppered with those idioms, modifiers, and prepositional phrases that seem to be grandchildren of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, Cold-War era. Could be a clue there as to who some of his college professors were.
The dilemma . . . not fully grasp . . .
[male, white, age between 40 and 60]
The Times identifies the author thus: “The writer is a senior official in the Trump administration.” Yet when referring to people in the administration, the author separates them from himself:
. . . many of the senior officials in his own administration are working diligently from within . . .
He also separates himself from people politically to his left:
. . . ours is not the popular “resistance” of the left. We . . . think that many of its policies have already made America safer and more prosperous.
[GOP, finance wing of the party or working on it]
Although he was elected as a Republican, the president shows little affinity for . . . free minds, free markets and free people.
[ Cf https://kirkcenter.org/symposia/free-minds-free-markets-and-free-people/]
. . . President Trump’s impulses are generally anti-trade and anti-democratic.
[pro- ‘free trade’] [anti-organized labor]
Don’t get me wrong. There are bright spots that the near-ceaseless negative coverage of the administration fails to capture: effective deregulation, historic tax reform, a more robust military . . .
[pro-redistributing wealth upward] [pro-militarism, or at least not against it]
But these successes have come despite — not because of — the president’s leadership style, which is impetuous, adversarial, petty and ineffective.
[recently snubbed, ignored, or dismissed by Trump?]
From the White House to executive branch departments and agencies, senior officials will privately admit their daily disbelief . . .
[not a senior official himself? isn’t he allegedly one of them?] [writes as an outsider]
“There is literally no telling whether he might change his mind from one minute to the next,” a top official complained to me recently . . .
[sorry, but this does not sound like the voice of “a top official” himself. This is true Evans-and-Novak stuff ] [sounds like someone overhearing or querying a top official]
Take foreign policy: In public and in private, President Trump shows a preference for autocrats and dictators, such as President Vladimir Putin of Russia and North Korea’s leader, Kim Jong-un . . .
[not a fan of international negotiation]
On Russia, for instance, the president was reluctant to expel so many of Mr. Putin’s spies . . . But his national security team knew better — such actions had to be taken, to hold Moscow accountable.
[anti-Russia] [pro-‘national security team’]
. . . there were early whispers within the cabinet of invoking the 25th Amendment, . . .
[Probably started the minute after Trump up-ended every prediction about the 2016 election.]
As a reader, I look forward to learning more about the definition of “senior official.” And of “public editor.”
[Update September 5: The author does seem to feel stung by something. Maybe another clue: he could be one of the few people not interviewed by WaPo reporter Bob Woodward for his new book on the Trump White House. Of course, this does seem a bit like NYTimes’ stealing WaPo’s thunder.]
[Update September 7: Per my earlier tweet–does anyone else remember the furor over Joe Klein’s Primary Colors? Everyone was sure it was someone close to Bill Clinton.]