Discussion about this post

User's avatar
Julie A Thompson's avatar

In A Very Stable Genius: Donald J. Trump’s Testing of America (by Philip Rucker & Carol Leonnig, © 2021, p. 169), Trump’s ignorance about American history would almost be laughable if it weren’t so shocking. Once, on a trip home from Asia, the presidential entourage landed in Honolulu to refuel and visit Pearl Harbor, and to make a somber pilgrimage to the USS Arizona Memorial (as other presidents had done), Trump had to ask his (then) Chief of Staff, John Kelly, “Hey, John, what’s this all about? What is this a tour of?” Kelly was stunned and had to give Trump a quick history lesson on what happened on Dec. 7, 1941. If Trump had learned about “a date which will live in infamy” in school, it hadn’t really pierced his consciousness or stuck with him.

Expand full comment

No posts