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Running Against the Devil: A Plot to Save America from Trump — And Democrats from Themselves
The longtime Republican strategist and #1 New York Times bestselling author of Everything Trump Touches Dies is back with a guidebook for beating Trump's tricks, traps, and Twitter feed in 2020.
Donald Trump is exactly the disaster we feared for America. Hated by a majority of Americans, Trump's administration is rocked by daily scandals, and he's embarrassed us at home and abroad.
Trump can't win in 2020, right?
Wrong. As 2016 proved, Trump can't win, but the Democrats can sure as hell lose. Only one thing can save Trump, and that's a Democratic candidate who runs the race Trump wants them to run instead of the campaign they must run to win in 2020.
Wilson combines decades of national political experience and insight in his take-no-prisoners analysis, hammering Trump's destructive and dangerous first term in a case-by-case takedown of the worst president in history and describing the terrifying prospect of four more years of Trump.
Like no one else can, Wilson blows the lid off Trump's 2020 Republican war machine, showing the exact strategies and tactics they'll use against the Democratic nominee... and how the Democrats can avoid the catastrophe waiting for them if they fall into Trump's trap.
Running Against the Devil is sharply funny, brutally honest, and infused with his biting commentary. It's a vital indictment of Trump, a no-nonsense, no-holds-barred road map to saving America, and the guide to making Donald Trump a one-term president.
The stakes are too high to do anything less.
Donald Trump is exactly the disaster we feared for America. Hated by a majority of Americans, Trump's administration is rocked by daily scandals, and he's embarrassed us at home and abroad.
Trump can't win in 2020, right?
Wrong. As 2016 proved, Trump can't win, but the Democrats can sure as hell lose. Only one thing can save Trump, and that's a Democratic candidate who runs the race Trump wants them to run instead of the campaign they must run to win in 2020.
Wilson combines decades of national political experience and insight in his take-no-prisoners analysis, hammering Trump's destructive and dangerous first term in a case-by-case takedown of the worst president in history and describing the terrifying prospect of four more years of Trump.
Like no one else can, Wilson blows the lid off Trump's 2020 Republican war machine, showing the exact strategies and tactics they'll use against the Democratic nominee... and how the Democrats can avoid the catastrophe waiting for them if they fall into Trump's trap.
Running Against the Devil is sharply funny, brutally honest, and infused with his biting commentary. It's a vital indictment of Trump, a no-nonsense, no-holds-barred road map to saving America, and the guide to making Donald Trump a one-term president.
The stakes are too high to do anything less.
352 pages, Hardcover
First published January 14, 2020
About the author
Rick Wilson
2 books114 followersRick Wilson spent 30 years as a Republican ad-makers, political strategist and campaign consultant helping elect conservatives across America. In 2015, Rick was one of the founders of the Never Trump movement. He's a contributor to The Daily Beast, Rolling Stone, and The New York Daily News and a frequent guest on CNN, MSNBC, and the networks.
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February 15, 2024
Why this Book? To paraphrase the political scientist Liam Neeson: “I have a very particular set of skills. Skills that I acquired over a very long career. Skills that make me a nightmare for people like you.”
…I no longer use those skills to serve the party I once loved. That party is gone…I’m telling you this because Democrats are going to lose to Donald Trump in 2020 unless they understand what my former team is about to do.
…Think of it this way: When a senior KGB officer who decided he’d had enough of throwing people into the gulag or supporting a corrupt kleptocracy walked into an American embassy during the Cold War, the right response wasn’t “Fuck you.” The correct response was “Hey, we’d LOVE to check out this boatload of intel, plans, strategies, and data you’ve collected while you’ve been kicking our asses.” It was “Oh, so that’s how you did it.”
I’m coming in from the cold, whether you like it or not. I have a low tolerance for stupidity, and by God I will overcome your stubborn resistance to the truth.
Rick Wilson - image from Fast Company – photo credit - Celine Grouard
Rick Wilson is the Don Rickles (Mister Warmth) of political punditry. They are both laugh out loud funny and extremely caustic. Rickles, who died in 2017 after a very long and successful career as a stand-up comedian and actor made his living by making people laugh while saying terrible things about them, to their faces. Wilson could probably have a career in comedy if he wanted one, but he has other ambitions. Thankfully they are not the same as his old ambitions. Wilson has made a career of advising Republican candidates for office, and working as an opinion writer. He advised Rudy Giuliani while he was mayor of New York City, and in his campaign against Hillary Clinton for Senate. He was a field director in George H.W. Bush’s 1988 presidential run. In 2002 he was a media advisor to Georgia Senator Saxby Chambliss. In that campaign, he attacked Democratic Senator Max Cleland, who had lost three limbs to a grenade in Viet Nam, as soft on defense, dishonestly linking him with Osama bin Laden. He created an ad in the 2008 presidential race that attacked Obama for his association with Reverend Jeremiah Wright. In 2014 he crafted a GOP ad that used hatred of Obama as motivation for voting against other Dems. In 2016 he worked for Carlos Cantera’s unsuccessful campaign for the Senate in Washington, and also worked for Marco Rubio in his successful Senatorial bid. His efforts have been characterized by negativity, delight in going after opponents with whatever weapons work, and a feckless disregard for the truth. In 2016, however, this paragon of virtue was among many Republicans whose tolerance for awfulness was pretty high, who found Donald Trump an unacceptable candidate, and became what we now refer to as a never-Trumper.
Yeah, unfortunately, there was always a dynamic pressure inside the party. The fiscal people and the individual liberty people would keep the social conservatives from getting too out of control. The social conservatives would keep the fiscal people from getting too out of control. The foreign policy people, this tripartite internal, the three-legged stool they used to call it. Well with Trump, that all fell apart. It's all gone. It's all id. It's everything that's in their heads. They're told, "You can have whatever you want, we're going to burn it all down." And that's what they're doing. - from the Salon interviewThere are many who fit that description, Republicans who will never support Trump. Of course, these days, while some such folks remain Republican, a growing number have abandoned the GOP, as the party they loved has become the party of Trump, a cult-like organization that bears little resemblance, in their minds, to its predecessor. (See the link in EXTRA STUFF to The Lincoln Project, an organization of erstwhile Republican Never-Trumpers that seeks to help end the Reign of the Suntan King) These folks still support a host of policy positions that I, and most of my fellow and sister Democrats, find unacceptable, appalling, and often inhuman. Nevertheless, while we may flip birds and scream epithets at each other across a river, we share a common cause in not allowing that river to rise up like the Great Mississippi Flood of 1927 and destroy us all. Donald Jessica Trump (name variant courtesy of Randy Rainbow) is that flood and we need to make common cause with some of those awful people on the other side to prevent an existential catastrophe. While merrily hurling insults at Democrats, Rick Wilson, former GOP mischief-maker, current Never-Trumper, and really funny guy, now offers his acquired wisdom to Democrats.
I recognize that the next two paragraphs (about 450 words) constitute an aside, so am tucking them under a spoiler tag to spare those who object to my leisurely pace. There is nothing remotely spoilerish here.
The core can be distilled down to a few nuggets. Donald Trump is a menace to the nation we love, and we need to work together to remove him from the White House. Wilson can help, and he knows what he is talking about. The only real issue in the 2020 presidential race is Donald Trump, keep him or dump him. Those who are in his camp are not worth your time and energy. Ditto for those who are firmly against him. It boils down to fifteen states where the outcome is not already assured. Focus almost all your campaigning energy there. Wilson goes into detail about the best ways to attack Trump, both in the content of one’s media approach and in the need to tailor that approach to each locale. There is a lot to learn here about the details of the campaigning craft. Of particular interest was a breakdown of voters into “hidden tribes within the electorate.” Identifying where people fall in this sorting helps define how candidates might try to reach them.
Q - If you were advising on the economy to these Democrats, what would you recommend?He talks about the horrific downside of a second Trump term, including the grooming of Ivanka and Don Jr to take over in 2024, the expansive corruption of all that is not already corrupt, the further degradation of the planet, and our remaining civil liberties, the jailing of his opponents, and more, none of it pretty.
A - First off, I would talk about the stories of real people in the swing states. "I'm farmer X, I am a soybean farmer in Iowa. Donald Trump said that this trade war was going to help me. My farm is in foreclosure now." And we do have record farm foreclosures in Wisconsin and Iowa right now. "I'm a steelworker in Pennsylvania. Donald Trump promised his trade war was going to help me. Instead, our plant is closed." - from the Salon interview
Wilson offers a list of Trumpian issues to focus on, depending on the location, corruption, misogyny and sexual aggression, paying off porn stars, kids in cages, alienating our allies while cozying up to authoritarians, and so much more. Hammer his ego, his declining mental capacity, weight, tiny hands, his actual net worth, his enslavement by Putin. And now his ongoing corruption of the Justice Department.
Rick's theory is not (yet) endorsed by any Gallup poll. But it makes sense. So how would Rick hit Trump? "I'd hit him on his mental instability, because he thinks he's smart and sane and he's not. He thinks he's a remarkable communicator ... he's not, he's a 70-year-old asshole from Queens." Then Rick would go after his "reputation for wealth, which is unfounded in large measure, and that's a soft spot for him ..." A billionaire client of Rick's once said: "I'm a billionaire. Trump is a clown living on credit." So having real billionaires like Mark Cuban attack Trump in an ad would be an effective tactic. - from Cracked interviewWilson also offers advice that is fairly useless, urging Dems to start, before they can really turn their attention and their remaining funds to, going after the cheating Cheeto President. Not everyone is Michael Bloomburg, with, essentially, endless funds. (Mayor Mike entered the race too late to be considered in the book.) He urges Dems to minimize talk of policy. Again, this ignores the primary season. An ability to kick Trump in the nuts as needed is a talent to be admired, but there still needs to be some policy vetting by Democratic voters. I expect the central party is hurting for funds, (pure guesswork on my part) as most available contributions are probably going to candidates, so even the Democratic Party itself likely lacks the means to implement an attack-early-and-often strategy as soon as would be desirable.
The book is divided into Six Parts. Within each part the chapters are introduced by what are frequently LOL short comedic pieces. Part One chapter intros are Tweets From Donald Trump’s Second Term, Part Two chapter intros are from White House Diaries: Melania Trump, and so on. A sample from Part One:
@realDonaldTrump: some lying liberal media who are DFAILING BADLY and will soon be bankrupt like the Bezos Washington Post are reporting that Stephen Miller was arrested for making a suit from a woman’s skin and eating her. FAKE NEWS. He did NOT EAT HER! Stephen is doing a GRATE job!There are plenty of well-deserved shots taken at Democratic campaigners and some less-deserved snark directed at Democratic values and programs, but that is part of the package. Overall, this is one of those books that anyone involved in politics in any way should read. It is funny, profane, and wildly insightful and useful. Every Democratic political operative should have a copy and I expect to see those copies heavily dog-eared. For the rest of us, if you enjoy a good dose of laughter and cynicism with your political writings, this is the book for you. Wilson may be the demon spawn of Roger Ailes and Lee Atwater, but he is one funny, smart sulfur-scented writer. His book not only explains what has gone wrong before but offers the tools to see why the political ads that bombard your TV and other screens are working or failing. We cannot afford four more years of the Turd Reich. Read this book!
@PressSec: Correction: Mr Miller did not eat the woman in question raw. Unlike degenerate migrants, Mr. Miller cooks his food.
He will always be with us, to the end of our days, either as a warning or as a boot stomping on our faces, forever.
Review first posted – February 21, 2020
Publication date – January 14, 2020
==========In the summer of 2019 GR reduced the allowable review size by 25%, from 20,000 to 15,000 characters. In order to accommodate the text beyond that I have moved it to the comments section directly below, in comment #1
November 7, 2020
”Donald Trump broke something fundamental in our politics: the value of facts and truth. He alters the truth based on whims, and spreads both accidental and deliberate misinformation. His more cynical followers view this as part of his five-dimensional chess game, but America is now a post-truth republic, to our detriment.
In 2020, Trump is counting on his ability to lie his way to a second term. He will do so shamelessly, constantly, and even proudly.
Trump’s endless, torrential outpouring of outright bullshit has become a primary feature of American political life, a Colorado River of mendacity slowly carving itself into a Grand Canyon of lies. This corrosion of value and power of truth is a political weapon in the hands of a man with so little regard for it.”
Americans have replaced truth with what they want to believe to the point that what they want to believe becomes the truth. Truth is irrelevant. If truth is irrelevant, what point is there in being truthful? Why should a politician admit he was wrong? They might as well deny, deny, and deny some more, and wait for another media event to shift the spotlight from their misdeeds to someone else’s. We used to hold politicians to some level of accountability, but this is the post-Trump era, and believe me, I want the Trump era to end as soon as possible. He has warped and corrupted any sense we once had about the proper way a person of honor (and yes people snicker now when we use words like honor) should conduct themselves.
If Trump read that sentence, he’d laugh and think...what a rube.
Speaking of conducting oneself with integrity, I don’t trust Rick Wilson. There I go using that word “trust” that rides in the sidecar with “truth.” He is one of those people who never found a line in the sand he wouldn’t brush away or ever embraced any idea of morality to use as a guiding star. When he was working for Republican candidates, he was willing to do anything to win, and he is telling Democrats they need to understand they are not in a fair race governed by rules, but a junkyard dog fight and the dog has rabies. Wilson says in this book that, when Trump won the election, he grew a soul. Maybe so, or maybe this is just one more way for Rick Wilson to win...by selling books to those people most concerned with Trump winning four more years of power. Regardless of his motivations, I have to admit that most of his advice is sound, and we would do well to follow it.
Even though I think of myself as a jaded political junkie, there was one thing that Wilson revealed that rocked me back on my heels. ”A meaningful fraction of the Green Party candidates you see in races around the country are creations of people like me. Not all of them, to be sure, but enough. They can break off 3 or 4 percent in the odd race here and there, particularly in swing districts. There are GOP consultants who specialize in finding the local college-age dipshit who wants to sit in his apartment, smoke weed, and play Fortnite in exchange for a check for his ‘campaign committee.’” So those of you who were so smugly proud of yourself for voting for a third party candidate, how do you feel about that vote now? You weren’t protesting the two party system; you were shoring it by giving Republicans oxygen. Take for example three states who swung the election for Trump, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania. Michigan 4.7% of voters voted either for the Independent or the Green Party Candidate...Clinton lost by .3%. Wisconsin 4.6%, and Clinton lost by .7%. Pennsylvania 3.2%, and Clinton lost by .7%. If a fraction of those “protest” voters had voted for Clinton, then Trump’s smirky face would be... out of our faces.
The other surprise for me on election night was when the results started coming in from white suburban women. I wasn’t alone; Rick Wilson was, too. ”Let’s be honest with ourselves. The number that blew every campaign analysis in the 2016 exit polling was that educated, suburban women voted for Donald ‘Pussy Grabber’ Trump. It was a shock to the system because he was every single thing we were told women hated: a vulgar, abusive bully.” In the midst of the #metoo movement, these women voted in alarmingly large numbers for the poster child of a white privileged male who believes women were put on this planet first and foremost for his pleasure. It is simply baffling.
Wilson calls Trump a lot of creative names in the process of making fun of him. I know there are a lot of comedians who make a living out of Trump standup routines, but I don’t find anything funny about him, at all, and sometimes I believe these liberal comedians, by making everything he does into a joke, are making politics into a joke. We have a hard time getting people to take it seriously without them believing politics is just another part of their entertainment package of being an American citizen. Trump would be hilarious and frankly unbelievable if he were cast as a fictional character in a novel, but the fact of the matter is, he is not fictional, even as he is fictitious. ”For Democrats, this really is a Flight 93 election--except the emergency isn’t to elect Trump, but to beat him. Unless Democrats put aside their internal grievances, beefs, ideological wish lists, and purity-posse threats to stay home in November, they might as well expect Trump for another four years, and his spawn in the White house for decades after.” We have to stop Trump here and now.
Needless to say, I was relieved when Wilson switched from his stand up comedian routine and started talking about the nuts and bolts of running successful political campaigns.
We can not afford to be naive about politics anymore. We can not believe what we want to believe and reject what we don’t want to believe so that we can live in a bubble of our own making. If a story sounds like bullshit, even if it is about a candidate you don’t agree with, don’t repost it and send it forward. We need to start demanding truth from our journalists, from our social media, and stop being click bait morons for Russian trolls. If a story says Clinton was running an abortion ring in the Midwest, you can probably ascertain that isn’t true. You can dislike someone or disagree with someone without believing the absolute worst things said about them. Do not be part of the problem, because by being part of the problem, you are in league with Russian trolls or guys like Rick Wilson, who are chortling as they send out what they call a “good deep fake.” They know enough people will believe it because they will want to believe it. They call it the power of dumb.
So as Democrats, let's try to understand the very people we want to vote for our candidates.
”They hate politics, but they love leadership. They hate partisanship, but they love passion. They’re flawed and frail and uncertain much of the time, but they still imagine a bigger, better life. Tell them you’re listening. Tell them they matter. For once, tell them it’s not about you, or your party, or some book of policy proposals but about them.”
We can’t help them if we are sitting on the sidelines. We’ve got to get in the game and pull them onto the playing field with us. We have to win the game by convincing them that we CAN win the game. We have to assure them that we will do a better job, that we will listen to them, and that we will act. Pick one person you know who is a family member or a friend and convince them to give the Democrats a chance. You won’t sway Uncle Ralph because he is convinced that Democrats are pinko commie faggots coming after his guns, but how about cousin Charlie or your niece Natalie or your FB friend Sarah? We need every vote we can get. We can’t afford to lose, because if we lose this time… the nation loses, the world loses, the planet loses. Everyone loses.
If you wish to see more of my most recent book and movie reviews, visit http://www.jeffreykeeten.com
I also have a Facebook blogger page at:https://www.facebook.com/JeffreyKeeten and an Instagram account https://www.instagram.com/jeffreykeeten/
In 2020, Trump is counting on his ability to lie his way to a second term. He will do so shamelessly, constantly, and even proudly.
Trump’s endless, torrential outpouring of outright bullshit has become a primary feature of American political life, a Colorado River of mendacity slowly carving itself into a Grand Canyon of lies. This corrosion of value and power of truth is a political weapon in the hands of a man with so little regard for it.”
Americans have replaced truth with what they want to believe to the point that what they want to believe becomes the truth. Truth is irrelevant. If truth is irrelevant, what point is there in being truthful? Why should a politician admit he was wrong? They might as well deny, deny, and deny some more, and wait for another media event to shift the spotlight from their misdeeds to someone else’s. We used to hold politicians to some level of accountability, but this is the post-Trump era, and believe me, I want the Trump era to end as soon as possible. He has warped and corrupted any sense we once had about the proper way a person of honor (and yes people snicker now when we use words like honor) should conduct themselves.
If Trump read that sentence, he’d laugh and think...what a rube.
Speaking of conducting oneself with integrity, I don’t trust Rick Wilson. There I go using that word “trust” that rides in the sidecar with “truth.” He is one of those people who never found a line in the sand he wouldn’t brush away or ever embraced any idea of morality to use as a guiding star. When he was working for Republican candidates, he was willing to do anything to win, and he is telling Democrats they need to understand they are not in a fair race governed by rules, but a junkyard dog fight and the dog has rabies. Wilson says in this book that, when Trump won the election, he grew a soul. Maybe so, or maybe this is just one more way for Rick Wilson to win...by selling books to those people most concerned with Trump winning four more years of power. Regardless of his motivations, I have to admit that most of his advice is sound, and we would do well to follow it.
Even though I think of myself as a jaded political junkie, there was one thing that Wilson revealed that rocked me back on my heels. ”A meaningful fraction of the Green Party candidates you see in races around the country are creations of people like me. Not all of them, to be sure, but enough. They can break off 3 or 4 percent in the odd race here and there, particularly in swing districts. There are GOP consultants who specialize in finding the local college-age dipshit who wants to sit in his apartment, smoke weed, and play Fortnite in exchange for a check for his ‘campaign committee.’” So those of you who were so smugly proud of yourself for voting for a third party candidate, how do you feel about that vote now? You weren’t protesting the two party system; you were shoring it by giving Republicans oxygen. Take for example three states who swung the election for Trump, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania. Michigan 4.7% of voters voted either for the Independent or the Green Party Candidate...Clinton lost by .3%. Wisconsin 4.6%, and Clinton lost by .7%. Pennsylvania 3.2%, and Clinton lost by .7%. If a fraction of those “protest” voters had voted for Clinton, then Trump’s smirky face would be... out of our faces.
The other surprise for me on election night was when the results started coming in from white suburban women. I wasn’t alone; Rick Wilson was, too. ”Let’s be honest with ourselves. The number that blew every campaign analysis in the 2016 exit polling was that educated, suburban women voted for Donald ‘Pussy Grabber’ Trump. It was a shock to the system because he was every single thing we were told women hated: a vulgar, abusive bully.” In the midst of the #metoo movement, these women voted in alarmingly large numbers for the poster child of a white privileged male who believes women were put on this planet first and foremost for his pleasure. It is simply baffling.
Wilson calls Trump a lot of creative names in the process of making fun of him. I know there are a lot of comedians who make a living out of Trump standup routines, but I don’t find anything funny about him, at all, and sometimes I believe these liberal comedians, by making everything he does into a joke, are making politics into a joke. We have a hard time getting people to take it seriously without them believing politics is just another part of their entertainment package of being an American citizen. Trump would be hilarious and frankly unbelievable if he were cast as a fictional character in a novel, but the fact of the matter is, he is not fictional, even as he is fictitious. ”For Democrats, this really is a Flight 93 election--except the emergency isn’t to elect Trump, but to beat him. Unless Democrats put aside their internal grievances, beefs, ideological wish lists, and purity-posse threats to stay home in November, they might as well expect Trump for another four years, and his spawn in the White house for decades after.” We have to stop Trump here and now.
Needless to say, I was relieved when Wilson switched from his stand up comedian routine and started talking about the nuts and bolts of running successful political campaigns.
We can not afford to be naive about politics anymore. We can not believe what we want to believe and reject what we don’t want to believe so that we can live in a bubble of our own making. If a story sounds like bullshit, even if it is about a candidate you don’t agree with, don’t repost it and send it forward. We need to start demanding truth from our journalists, from our social media, and stop being click bait morons for Russian trolls. If a story says Clinton was running an abortion ring in the Midwest, you can probably ascertain that isn’t true. You can dislike someone or disagree with someone without believing the absolute worst things said about them. Do not be part of the problem, because by being part of the problem, you are in league with Russian trolls or guys like Rick Wilson, who are chortling as they send out what they call a “good deep fake.” They know enough people will believe it because they will want to believe it. They call it the power of dumb.
So as Democrats, let's try to understand the very people we want to vote for our candidates.
”They hate politics, but they love leadership. They hate partisanship, but they love passion. They’re flawed and frail and uncertain much of the time, but they still imagine a bigger, better life. Tell them you’re listening. Tell them they matter. For once, tell them it’s not about you, or your party, or some book of policy proposals but about them.”
We can’t help them if we are sitting on the sidelines. We’ve got to get in the game and pull them onto the playing field with us. We have to win the game by convincing them that we CAN win the game. We have to assure them that we will do a better job, that we will listen to them, and that we will act. Pick one person you know who is a family member or a friend and convince them to give the Democrats a chance. You won’t sway Uncle Ralph because he is convinced that Democrats are pinko commie faggots coming after his guns, but how about cousin Charlie or your niece Natalie or your FB friend Sarah? We need every vote we can get. We can’t afford to lose, because if we lose this time… the nation loses, the world loses, the planet loses. Everyone loses.
If you wish to see more of my most recent book and movie reviews, visit http://www.jeffreykeeten.com
I also have a Facebook blogger page at:https://www.facebook.com/JeffreyKeeten and an Instagram account https://www.instagram.com/jeffreykeeten/
April 26, 2020
Rick Wilson’s Everything Trump Touches Dies was the funniest political book of the 2018. It was grim humor, certainly, but robust grim humor, filled with vicious takedowns of all the human caricatures scribbled in the margins of the Trumpian universe—including an expert demolition of the Orange Julius Caesar himself.
Wilson has done it again, but I find I’m not laughing quite as hard this time.
But I don’t think that this is Wilson’s fault. This endless farce we call the Trump Administration, this crapapolooza festival, just isn’t funny anymore. The melancholy minders (Kelly, Tillerson, Mattis) and minor looney-tuners (Gorka, Omorosa, Scaramucci) have given way to a legion of pallid yes-men cheering on the apocalypse, and it is not only the fecal pharaoh himself, but each one of us charioteers who is drowning in the Brown Sea of incompetence, and guess what?—oh, lookie, lookie!—now the plague itself has arrived!
Sorry about the strained attempt at humor. I sound a little hysterical, don’t I? But it seems that humor gets a little harder every day. And I think this may be part of the problem with Rick Wilson’s new book too.
But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t read it. You should. Because Wilson—a self-styled Republican political hack and determined never-Trumper—gives Democrats much useful, sobering advice about how to win the 2020 presidential election, stuff that many of us—including a devoted Elizabeth Warren supporter like me—definitely don’t want to hear.
Stop looking at the national polls—Wilson says—and exulting in the President’s bad numbers, for this is the United States, where—thanks to the electoral college (which--sorry--isn't going away)—there’s no such thing as a real American national election. Instead, there are series of individual swing-state elections, roughly fifteen in number, held on the same day in November, and this is where you must concentrate all your money, expertise, and volunteer strength. Forget California (you’ll win it!), and forget Idaho (you’ll lose it!). Instead, concentrate on where the game is … Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Florida, Arizona, Colorado, Virginia, Iowa, Maine, Minnesota, North Carolina, New Hampshire, and Nevada. (And maybe Ohio too, but I wouldn’t bet the farm on it.)
And don’t bother talking about all that commie-sounding stuff like Medicare-for-All, gun buy-backs and abortion rights. Instead, talk like an American about things swing-voters care about:
Speaking American isn’t tricky. It isn’t secret. It isn’t an act. It’s a recognition that leaving the confines of Washington and new York shows you a world where voters curse, spit, love their dogs and their kids, play sports, drink beer, talk shit, recycle, pray, work, sing bad karaoke, and worry about the future but push on every day. It’s a social media cliché that authenticity sells, but it’s not wrong.
They hate politics, but they love leadership. They hate partisanship but they love passion. They’re flawed and frail and uncertain much of the time, but they still imagine a bigger, better life. Tell them you’re listening. Tell them they matter. For once, tell them it’s not about you, or the party, or some book of policy proposals but about THEM.
January 16, 2020
Rick Wilson is crass and obnoxious, but this direct "come to Jesus" talk seems to be exactly what democrats need to win 2020. He makes a very sensible argument here, and he seems to have the expertise and experience to back it up. He does an excellent job hitting home on some key takeaways for strategizing in 2020 while being an equal opportunity offender in his humor.
To summarize, democrats should be playing the election as a referendum against Donald Trump (prepare for this phrase to be repeated many, many times) and focus on the electoral college map (the only game in town, another oft-repeated mantra). Essentially, Wilson warns democrats against running a democratic socialist candidate (read: Bernie), encouraging the party to lay off far-left talking points (Medicare for All, Green New Deal, etc.) in order to appeal to the actual demographic that votes--old people. In other words, be careful harping on key social issues (abortion, LGBTQ+ issues, etc.) that energize the farthest reaches of your base because they're already in your corner, and they're not the ones you need to win over. Wilson notes that he is not making a value judgment of these positions; however, he is arguing that maintaining ideological purity across the party, with zero exceptions for voters who don't toe either party line, ostracizes the majority of votes needed in swing states and is therefore incompatible with political victory, particularly in 2020.
Ultimately, this book is valuable in that it outlines pretty clear steps (though not easy to accomplish) for beating Trump, without sugarcoating the difficulty of democrats adjusting to this political strategy. He challenges conventional wisdom on assumptions about the nature of the political landscape: Young voters probably won't turn out in massive droves, don't bother "going high" when your opponent is Donald Trump, and minorities, particularly African Americans, are not a locked-down demographic you can take for granted. In sum, Wilson encourages democrats to be ruthless in their political strategy and to play the game like the future of the country depends on it--because it does.
To summarize, democrats should be playing the election as a referendum against Donald Trump (prepare for this phrase to be repeated many, many times) and focus on the electoral college map (the only game in town, another oft-repeated mantra). Essentially, Wilson warns democrats against running a democratic socialist candidate (read: Bernie), encouraging the party to lay off far-left talking points (Medicare for All, Green New Deal, etc.) in order to appeal to the actual demographic that votes--old people. In other words, be careful harping on key social issues (abortion, LGBTQ+ issues, etc.) that energize the farthest reaches of your base because they're already in your corner, and they're not the ones you need to win over. Wilson notes that he is not making a value judgment of these positions; however, he is arguing that maintaining ideological purity across the party, with zero exceptions for voters who don't toe either party line, ostracizes the majority of votes needed in swing states and is therefore incompatible with political victory, particularly in 2020.
Ultimately, this book is valuable in that it outlines pretty clear steps (though not easy to accomplish) for beating Trump, without sugarcoating the difficulty of democrats adjusting to this political strategy. He challenges conventional wisdom on assumptions about the nature of the political landscape: Young voters probably won't turn out in massive droves, don't bother "going high" when your opponent is Donald Trump, and minorities, particularly African Americans, are not a locked-down demographic you can take for granted. In sum, Wilson encourages democrats to be ruthless in their political strategy and to play the game like the future of the country depends on it--because it does.
January 19, 2020
Just finished RUNNING AGAINST THE DEVIL by Rick Wilson (former Republican strategist, former Republican, all-around hilarious bastard), and I'm not suggesting you all read it, if you care about the 2020 Presidential election.
I'm ordering you to do so, I'm ordering you to take notes, and I'm ordering you to get this book into the hands of every Democratic strategist, organization, and influencer you can find. Wilson lays out perhaps the only way we can keep trump from winning again. I'm not exaggerating--this kind of strategy may be the last, only hope decent human beings have of stopping the plunge towards another Dark Ages.
I'm paraphrasing him, here--the election will not be a noble argument between noble people about noble ideas. It will be a bicycle-chain fight in the parking lot of a bar outside Bugfuck, Georgia.
I'm ordering you to do so, I'm ordering you to take notes, and I'm ordering you to get this book into the hands of every Democratic strategist, organization, and influencer you can find. Wilson lays out perhaps the only way we can keep trump from winning again. I'm not exaggerating--this kind of strategy may be the last, only hope decent human beings have of stopping the plunge towards another Dark Ages.
I'm paraphrasing him, here--the election will not be a noble argument between noble people about noble ideas. It will be a bicycle-chain fight in the parking lot of a bar outside Bugfuck, Georgia.
June 21, 2020
After finishing it, I upped it 1/2 star to 4 stars.
I quit reading at 95%, but later finished it. I did like it, but it was a bit repetitive, and already getting dated. It was informative, and humorous at times, but I live in the California Bay Area, and can't do much to affect the next election. But I'll do what I can, and perhaps make use of some of his tips. I've looked out for some of his interviews and appearances since reading the book, and I like him more as I get to know him (EDIT: "Him" being the author). He's certainly irreverent, and sometimes gets carried away, but considering his mission this is nothing unusual. In fact, it may be necessary. Also, a lot of stuff that seemed made up actually turns out to be true. He just makes it sound like a joke.
The audiobook was narrated by the author, which made it more interesting, I think.
I quit reading at 95%, but later finished it. I did like it, but it was a bit repetitive, and already getting dated. It was informative, and humorous at times, but I live in the California Bay Area, and can't do much to affect the next election. But I'll do what I can, and perhaps make use of some of his tips. I've looked out for some of his interviews and appearances since reading the book, and I like him more as I get to know him (EDIT: "Him" being the author). He's certainly irreverent, and sometimes gets carried away, but considering his mission this is nothing unusual. In fact, it may be necessary. Also, a lot of stuff that seemed made up actually turns out to be true. He just makes it sound like a joke.
The audiobook was narrated by the author, which made it more interesting, I think.
March 29, 2020
(Finished Feb. 2. But six weeks later, and the plague has overtaken everything. And now this book seems almost like a period piece.)
If you can ignore the jokey schtick that Wilson likes to indulge in, this is a damned smart piece of political consultancy in action. And for those Dems who find themselves confused by the current situation, he will provide both clarity and relentlessly realistic roadmap of what must be done.
If you can ignore the jokey schtick that Wilson likes to indulge in, this is a damned smart piece of political consultancy in action. And for those Dems who find themselves confused by the current situation, he will provide both clarity and relentlessly realistic roadmap of what must be done.
January 19, 2020
God, I hope democrats working in the campaign of the eventual nominee read this book! Rick is my favorite conservative in the age of Trump, and listening to his snark and humor in this book was highly entertaining.
January 28, 2020
This book hates Trump. That is all this is. He is just another lying hater. His idea and description of how he feels southerners are stupid, making fun of their accents indicates he is a wounded liberal. This is a very sick book full of hate if I could give it zero stars I would
January 29, 2020
When, as in a John LeCarre novel, an agent from the KGB comes to the West and offers all the goods, one must pause. Members of the CIA or MI6 must ask: "How can we know that we can trust this guy, that what he's the real thing and not a plant for sowing misinformation? Are we being played? Perhaps he's a mole. Why should we trust someone who's done us in so many times in the past?" Democrats should be asking these questions of Rick Wilson, a Republican operative since the 1980s who's been slaying Democrat candidates for almost three decades. "Why should we trust him, the dirty, stinkkin' Republican?"
Wilson realizes that he needs to prove his bona fides before anyone will heed his plea, and he has done so by publishing a previous book by the title
Everything Trump Touches Dies: A Republican Strategist Gets Real About the Worst President Ever (2019 update) and by spending about the first 75 pages of the current book bad-mouthing (even foul-mouthing) Trump. His public recantation of Trump establishes his Never-Trumper credentials. He's proven--at least for the 2020 election--that he wants to see the Democrats vanquish Trump and his ilk. One may suspect that he won't retain this attitude if the Republican Party returns to a vision of center-right normalcy and fidelity to constitutional and democratic norms. But for now, Wilson and those steadfast few who've remained Never-Trumpers have earned their place in the fight against this nefarious foe of constitutional government, the rule of law, and democratic norms.
Indeed, I became impatient with his recitation of Trump's almost innumerable sins: tell me something I don't know. It's like a KGB agent spending his de-briefing explaining how bad life is inside the Soviet Union. We already know that, let's get to giving us your playbook. When Wilson gets down to giving us his tradecraft and analysis, the message he provides isn't so secret. In some sense, it's already in the open but Democrats don't want to believe it. Here's an executive summary:
1. The president is elected by the Electoral College and only the Electoral College. To say that Hillary Clinton or Al Gore won the popular vote is like commenting upon how big, bright, and shiny your runner-up trophy is. It means nothing. All power goes to the winner of the Electoral College.
2. A corollary of the first point: the election will be won or lost in 15 states that could go either red or blue. The Democrat nominee must kiss California and New York and all the loyal blue states good-bye at the convention and tell them "I'll be back right after the election." After the nomination up to Election Day, the nominee will need to focus--even obsess--on 15 states.
3. For the record, I list the states Wilson identifies as controlling the outcome of the 2020 election. I list them in their order of Electoral College magnitude. I include the 2016 winner and electoral votes:
Florida (T-29)
Pennsylvania (T-20)
Ohio (T-18)
Georgia (T-16)
Michigan (T-16)
North Carolina (T-15)
Virginia (C-13)
Arizona (T-11)
Minnesota (C-10)
Wisconsin (T-10)
Colorado (C-9)
Iowa (T-6)
Nevada (C-6)
Maine (C-4)
NewHamphsire (C-4)
Of these 15 states, Trump carried nine of them in 2016 for a total of 141 electoral votes. Clinton received only 46 electoral votes from the in-play states. Wow. For the Democrats to beat Trump in 2020, they will need to drastically change this list and hang-on to their other states. But as Wilson notes, most Democrats will crawl over broken glass to vote against Trump, so there's little reason to believe that solid blue states will defect.
3. Democrats must focus on winning the Electoral College. (This mantra repeats throughout the book.)
4. This upcoming election will not be like a Federer-Nadal tennis final with the contestants holding a deep respect for one another and the game of tennis while playing under carefully delineated rules governed by an umpire, line-judges, and infallible re-plays. Oh no. It will be a knife-fight with Butch Cassidy rules--it's the only way Trump fights, it's the only method by which he can win. If the Democrat nominee doesn't come ready for a knife fight, he or she will be gutted before realizing what happened.
5. Like all presidential elections involving an incumbent, the election will be a referendum on the incumbent. The election will have one issue: Donald Trump. The best thing that the Democrat can do is run against Donald Trump: his corruption, his ineptitude, his ignorance, his cruelty, his lying. Details about issues may play for some in the primaries, not in the general election. No voter reads the party platform and decides how to vote based upon it. Most voters are only marginally informed and are motivated by feelings like trust and fear. Trump feeds on fear, Fox News feeds on fear. The Democrats must neutralize the fear factor by promoting a candidate who disarms fear and instills trust. Wilson sums-up his point:
"This race has absolutely nothing to do with policy. This race is about Trump and a competing candidate’s personality and presentation, not about soon-forgotten policy papers and the administrivia of running a government. . . . Policy is a luxury good in this election because this race is against a man, not a party, a platform, or an ideology. Democrats are fighting a cult and a cult leader, until they realize that the referendum against Trump is about Trump, he has the winning hand."
6. Democrats gained control of the House by winning over suburbanites, women, and disaffected Republicans. The Democrat nominee can't afford to alienate these groups. Also, there are Obama-Trump voters out there who can be won back. Farmers, businesses, and wage-earners have all taken economic hits with Trump's trade shenanigans, the stock market and overall favorable economy news notwithstanding. These folks, too, can be won back. But the Democrats need to figure out one big problem.
7. The Culture Wars. Democrats will have to set aside long-running habits, accentuated by some of late, toward ideological purity. The great temptation is to mirror the Republicans who have exiled (as all revolutionaries do) those who might challenge the most extreme ideological purity, who might taint the revolution by questioning the leadership or confusing the masses. Instead, the Democrats will need to find a way to defuse topics like abortion, immigration, guns, and other like emotional issues. What might this entail? Wilson makes some suggestions that don't seem unreasonable. Democrats must find a way to make anti-abortion, immigration, and "2nd Amendment" voters realize that Democrats won't take radical steps on these issues but will act in ways that are reasoned and sensible. (By the way, such positions of a moderate, reasoned nature will sell well with most folks who self-identify as Democrats.) Wilson suggests that Democrats will need to change some minds and that what sells in Berkeley, Boston, and Bronx-Queens won't sell so well in the heartland areas of the swing states. Dems are going to win in Berkeley, Boston, and Bronx-Queens (AOC's district) in any event. Wilson makes his point:
"What do you think sells in western Pennsylvania? Mike Rowe, or some stern-faced, super-woke, commissar telling a white working-class guy he’s got to give up eating meat, driving a truck, and hunting? You may want him to, but how well do you think that sells? The guy who used to make $37 an hour in a union auto-parts manufacturer doesn’t give a flip flying f#@k about climate change, genderless bathroom mandates, or paper straws. He does care about getting and keeping a real job that can support his family and--stop me if you’ve heard this one before – his guns and religion." 276
I could go on at length about various other perspectives and recommendations, but this sampling should provide a sense of Wilson's offering. He writes in blunt words that are at times rough and scatological. One non-scatological example: "Trump loves digital advertising. He loves it like a fat kid loves cake." Certainly a vivid image, but perhaps not the best register of discourse in a book about a very serious topic. He describes his recommendations as "tough love," and one has to take it for what it's worth. But I certainly believe that Democrats ignore him at their peril.
And one final topic before signing off. Wilson doesn't say much about the Democrat field of candidates. He does describe Pete Buttigieg as " a man who is demonstrably smarter than most of the field," an assessment that I agree with. Of Elizebeth Warren, he writes:
"For being a clunky and terrible candidate in a number of areas . . . Warren has gotten closer to a winning message, broaching the ideas that government doing socialist-adjacent things doesn't have to be socialist itself. It's smart politics. My conservative eyebrows are raised. As an ad guy and message strategist, I think she's closing in on something that resonated with Trump base the first time around--that the little guy without an army of lobbyists in Washington, D.C. gets f@#%ed and everyone else gets rich. I hate to admit it, but she's not even wrong.
This is a message window for the Democrats if they can just skip playing "The Internationale" at the convention."
But Wilson expends the most ink about any candidate (other than Trump) on Bernie Sanders. Because I'm planning on writing a blog to come about the Sanders phenomenon (he's not just a candidate, he's a phenomenon), I'll keep it short. Here's a part of what Wilson writes about Sanders:
"In a year when Democrats had a stark, bright-line ideological contrast before them--sane, stable-to-a fault HRC vs Donald F@#$%^&* Trump--one group stood out in switching their party preferences radically: the Bernie bros. Somewhere between 10 and 15 percent of Sanders voters switched their preferences on Election Day to Trump. These aren't principled progs; they’re arsonists.
Bernie is Trump re-election insurance.
If he's the nominee, I say to my Democrat friends, get ready to lose forty-five states."
Now the first thing to say about this quote is that the only gravity that binds Wilson and Sanders is the Dark Star, Donald Trump. In normal times they are light-years apart in their thinking about political economy and travel in entirely separate orbits. Thus, one can argue for all his tell-it-like-it-is-tough-love, Wilson's judgment is warped by his ideological animus toward Sanders. But because Wilson isn't the first, nor certainly the last, to raise these points, his words to give me pause. After all, what if he's correct? Well, that's a minefield to traverse in a later blog.
Wilson realizes that he needs to prove his bona fides before anyone will heed his plea, and he has done so by publishing a previous book by the title
Everything Trump Touches Dies: A Republican Strategist Gets Real About the Worst President Ever (2019 update) and by spending about the first 75 pages of the current book bad-mouthing (even foul-mouthing) Trump. His public recantation of Trump establishes his Never-Trumper credentials. He's proven--at least for the 2020 election--that he wants to see the Democrats vanquish Trump and his ilk. One may suspect that he won't retain this attitude if the Republican Party returns to a vision of center-right normalcy and fidelity to constitutional and democratic norms. But for now, Wilson and those steadfast few who've remained Never-Trumpers have earned their place in the fight against this nefarious foe of constitutional government, the rule of law, and democratic norms.
Indeed, I became impatient with his recitation of Trump's almost innumerable sins: tell me something I don't know. It's like a KGB agent spending his de-briefing explaining how bad life is inside the Soviet Union. We already know that, let's get to giving us your playbook. When Wilson gets down to giving us his tradecraft and analysis, the message he provides isn't so secret. In some sense, it's already in the open but Democrats don't want to believe it. Here's an executive summary:
1. The president is elected by the Electoral College and only the Electoral College. To say that Hillary Clinton or Al Gore won the popular vote is like commenting upon how big, bright, and shiny your runner-up trophy is. It means nothing. All power goes to the winner of the Electoral College.
2. A corollary of the first point: the election will be won or lost in 15 states that could go either red or blue. The Democrat nominee must kiss California and New York and all the loyal blue states good-bye at the convention and tell them "I'll be back right after the election." After the nomination up to Election Day, the nominee will need to focus--even obsess--on 15 states.
3. For the record, I list the states Wilson identifies as controlling the outcome of the 2020 election. I list them in their order of Electoral College magnitude. I include the 2016 winner and electoral votes:
Florida (T-29)
Pennsylvania (T-20)
Ohio (T-18)
Georgia (T-16)
Michigan (T-16)
North Carolina (T-15)
Virginia (C-13)
Arizona (T-11)
Minnesota (C-10)
Wisconsin (T-10)
Colorado (C-9)
Iowa (T-6)
Nevada (C-6)
Maine (C-4)
NewHamphsire (C-4)
Of these 15 states, Trump carried nine of them in 2016 for a total of 141 electoral votes. Clinton received only 46 electoral votes from the in-play states. Wow. For the Democrats to beat Trump in 2020, they will need to drastically change this list and hang-on to their other states. But as Wilson notes, most Democrats will crawl over broken glass to vote against Trump, so there's little reason to believe that solid blue states will defect.
3. Democrats must focus on winning the Electoral College. (This mantra repeats throughout the book.)
4. This upcoming election will not be like a Federer-Nadal tennis final with the contestants holding a deep respect for one another and the game of tennis while playing under carefully delineated rules governed by an umpire, line-judges, and infallible re-plays. Oh no. It will be a knife-fight with Butch Cassidy rules--it's the only way Trump fights, it's the only method by which he can win. If the Democrat nominee doesn't come ready for a knife fight, he or she will be gutted before realizing what happened.
5. Like all presidential elections involving an incumbent, the election will be a referendum on the incumbent. The election will have one issue: Donald Trump. The best thing that the Democrat can do is run against Donald Trump: his corruption, his ineptitude, his ignorance, his cruelty, his lying. Details about issues may play for some in the primaries, not in the general election. No voter reads the party platform and decides how to vote based upon it. Most voters are only marginally informed and are motivated by feelings like trust and fear. Trump feeds on fear, Fox News feeds on fear. The Democrats must neutralize the fear factor by promoting a candidate who disarms fear and instills trust. Wilson sums-up his point:
"This race has absolutely nothing to do with policy. This race is about Trump and a competing candidate’s personality and presentation, not about soon-forgotten policy papers and the administrivia of running a government. . . . Policy is a luxury good in this election because this race is against a man, not a party, a platform, or an ideology. Democrats are fighting a cult and a cult leader, until they realize that the referendum against Trump is about Trump, he has the winning hand."
6. Democrats gained control of the House by winning over suburbanites, women, and disaffected Republicans. The Democrat nominee can't afford to alienate these groups. Also, there are Obama-Trump voters out there who can be won back. Farmers, businesses, and wage-earners have all taken economic hits with Trump's trade shenanigans, the stock market and overall favorable economy news notwithstanding. These folks, too, can be won back. But the Democrats need to figure out one big problem.
7. The Culture Wars. Democrats will have to set aside long-running habits, accentuated by some of late, toward ideological purity. The great temptation is to mirror the Republicans who have exiled (as all revolutionaries do) those who might challenge the most extreme ideological purity, who might taint the revolution by questioning the leadership or confusing the masses. Instead, the Democrats will need to find a way to defuse topics like abortion, immigration, guns, and other like emotional issues. What might this entail? Wilson makes some suggestions that don't seem unreasonable. Democrats must find a way to make anti-abortion, immigration, and "2nd Amendment" voters realize that Democrats won't take radical steps on these issues but will act in ways that are reasoned and sensible. (By the way, such positions of a moderate, reasoned nature will sell well with most folks who self-identify as Democrats.) Wilson suggests that Democrats will need to change some minds and that what sells in Berkeley, Boston, and Bronx-Queens won't sell so well in the heartland areas of the swing states. Dems are going to win in Berkeley, Boston, and Bronx-Queens (AOC's district) in any event. Wilson makes his point:
"What do you think sells in western Pennsylvania? Mike Rowe, or some stern-faced, super-woke, commissar telling a white working-class guy he’s got to give up eating meat, driving a truck, and hunting? You may want him to, but how well do you think that sells? The guy who used to make $37 an hour in a union auto-parts manufacturer doesn’t give a flip flying f#@k about climate change, genderless bathroom mandates, or paper straws. He does care about getting and keeping a real job that can support his family and--stop me if you’ve heard this one before – his guns and religion." 276
I could go on at length about various other perspectives and recommendations, but this sampling should provide a sense of Wilson's offering. He writes in blunt words that are at times rough and scatological. One non-scatological example: "Trump loves digital advertising. He loves it like a fat kid loves cake." Certainly a vivid image, but perhaps not the best register of discourse in a book about a very serious topic. He describes his recommendations as "tough love," and one has to take it for what it's worth. But I certainly believe that Democrats ignore him at their peril.
And one final topic before signing off. Wilson doesn't say much about the Democrat field of candidates. He does describe Pete Buttigieg as " a man who is demonstrably smarter than most of the field," an assessment that I agree with. Of Elizebeth Warren, he writes:
"For being a clunky and terrible candidate in a number of areas . . . Warren has gotten closer to a winning message, broaching the ideas that government doing socialist-adjacent things doesn't have to be socialist itself. It's smart politics. My conservative eyebrows are raised. As an ad guy and message strategist, I think she's closing in on something that resonated with Trump base the first time around--that the little guy without an army of lobbyists in Washington, D.C. gets f@#%ed and everyone else gets rich. I hate to admit it, but she's not even wrong.
This is a message window for the Democrats if they can just skip playing "The Internationale" at the convention."
But Wilson expends the most ink about any candidate (other than Trump) on Bernie Sanders. Because I'm planning on writing a blog to come about the Sanders phenomenon (he's not just a candidate, he's a phenomenon), I'll keep it short. Here's a part of what Wilson writes about Sanders:
"In a year when Democrats had a stark, bright-line ideological contrast before them--sane, stable-to-a fault HRC vs Donald F@#$%^&* Trump--one group stood out in switching their party preferences radically: the Bernie bros. Somewhere between 10 and 15 percent of Sanders voters switched their preferences on Election Day to Trump. These aren't principled progs; they’re arsonists.
Bernie is Trump re-election insurance.
If he's the nominee, I say to my Democrat friends, get ready to lose forty-five states."
Now the first thing to say about this quote is that the only gravity that binds Wilson and Sanders is the Dark Star, Donald Trump. In normal times they are light-years apart in their thinking about political economy and travel in entirely separate orbits. Thus, one can argue for all his tell-it-like-it-is-tough-love, Wilson's judgment is warped by his ideological animus toward Sanders. But because Wilson isn't the first, nor certainly the last, to raise these points, his words to give me pause. After all, what if he's correct? Well, that's a minefield to traverse in a later blog.
Read
February 3, 2020Apostate Republican strategist trying to help the Dems get out of their own way so they can defeat the Evil Orange Ogre. I fear the Dems are too enamored with their highfalutin' idealism to play dirty in the way that is required to beat the pure unmitigated evil that is the Republican party. I sincerely hope I am wrong.
January 22, 2020
“Listen Liberals, I’m about to go all native on your asses and lay down the skinny-s**t; you need to get your lackluster act together to beat this f-tard Orange Demon in the WH, and here’s how...” - these aren’t Rick Wilson’s words, but I’m paraphrasing. I hope you get a sense in one sentence what his latest book, “Running Against the Devil,” is all about and who it’s target audience is. Trumpland need not waste their one read of the decade here (I’m trying in this review to channel Wilson’s biting sarcasm). This book is for all my Libtard friends, especially the hyper-politically active Progressive Comrades, be they Bernie Bros, Mayor Petes Pals, Liz acolytes or others in the New Democratic camp. Wilson’s got something important to tell you and you all need to listen.
As a life-long Conservative and 30 year veteran partisan strategist, political ad man, and incumbent-maker for the RNC, Wilson knows a couple things about how the Republican Party functions. His experience, like it or not, also gives him clear insight into how Democratic campaigns work (something Dems deep in the system oft lack); or to be more precise fail. His lessons in “Running Against the Devil” are lessons in tough love, but they come at a perilous time when the rod can’t be spare, lest we sh*t the bed!! Wilson’s hatred - yes he actually HATES Trump - oozes from the pages. But he’s clear eyed about the threat of another four years of Trumpkleptocracy, and has no illusions about how and what the Trump campaign and their candidate will do to get re-elected. So committed to defeating Trump in our democratic elections (which is HOW those who don’t like this President defeat him: via the ballot box!) Wilson not only wants a Democratic to win, but is willing to try to help them. Make no mistake, Wilson is still a committed old-school Conservative, but he recognizes the Grand Old Party, he party of Lincoln, of Reagan, is a chapter in our history books now; the Trumpublican Party and the cult of personality now inhabits the rotting carcass that was the GOP. As Wilson very aptly and concisely states: our current President is a ‘transactional President;’ his is the “F**K YOU! Pay me” Presidency. This insight should not surprise anyone since Trump’s entire adult life has been transactional; he brought to the Office the only skill set he possesses.
Wilson’s lessons for Democrats are rather straightforward, if improbable to imagine the Dems adopting:
1) understand the game you are playing; this is an Electoral College game, the popular vote don’t mean s**t!
2) as such, focus everything on the 10-15 ‘swing state’s’ that matter; don’t spend time or money in deep blue states or solidly red states (35 states worth of electoral votes are already locked up);
3) stop being pussies (I’m paraphrasing, kind of) - recognize Trump has no boundaries, decorum or morals. You can’t fight him on the ‘high road.’ Take the page out of his book: if he hits hard, hit back 10 times harder and NEVER let up. No, scratch that, hit FIRST and never let up;
4) also, forget trying to shame Trump, or expect him to have remorse for anything, or that his cultish followers will feel those things, let alone abandon him - he ain’t doing it, he’s Double-Down Teflon Don;
5) while you’re pummeling him and never letting up, employ all the modern data and analytical tools at your disposal to deploy resources ($, ads, people, voter registration, polling, etc) necessary to pull the Reagan and ‘Trump’ Democrats, soft Republicans (eg, suburban white women), and Trump independents into your column. Start yesterday and don’t let up until all the polls are closed;
6) Speak ‘American,’ not blue coastal or policy wank or ‘edge’ Progressive (a la comrade Bernie and AOC). Never forget that the fly-over states and South aren’t dens of closeted Progressives chomping to be set free; folks in those places are middle of the road and conservative, even if registered Dems. Don’t let the ‘edge’ ideology drive the loss to the Orange Turd; and
7) ALWAYS remember, 2020 is a referendum on Donald Trump. It’s not about ideology, or policy, or anything Democrat’s want to hold true for elections. It is simply about the disaster of the Trump Presidency.
Wilson repeats many times that President Trump has provided all of the lies, corruption, kleptocracy, nepotism, criminality, etc on which to base a voter referendum. It is all up to the Democrats to get out of their own way and never let the voters forget who and what the President is. Whether the Democrats follow Wilson’s advice only time will tell. 5 stars for narrative, guts (to buck the tribe), effort and love of our democracy!
As a life-long Conservative and 30 year veteran partisan strategist, political ad man, and incumbent-maker for the RNC, Wilson knows a couple things about how the Republican Party functions. His experience, like it or not, also gives him clear insight into how Democratic campaigns work (something Dems deep in the system oft lack); or to be more precise fail. His lessons in “Running Against the Devil” are lessons in tough love, but they come at a perilous time when the rod can’t be spare, lest we sh*t the bed!! Wilson’s hatred - yes he actually HATES Trump - oozes from the pages. But he’s clear eyed about the threat of another four years of Trumpkleptocracy, and has no illusions about how and what the Trump campaign and their candidate will do to get re-elected. So committed to defeating Trump in our democratic elections (which is HOW those who don’t like this President defeat him: via the ballot box!) Wilson not only wants a Democratic to win, but is willing to try to help them. Make no mistake, Wilson is still a committed old-school Conservative, but he recognizes the Grand Old Party, he party of Lincoln, of Reagan, is a chapter in our history books now; the Trumpublican Party and the cult of personality now inhabits the rotting carcass that was the GOP. As Wilson very aptly and concisely states: our current President is a ‘transactional President;’ his is the “F**K YOU! Pay me” Presidency. This insight should not surprise anyone since Trump’s entire adult life has been transactional; he brought to the Office the only skill set he possesses.
Wilson’s lessons for Democrats are rather straightforward, if improbable to imagine the Dems adopting:
1) understand the game you are playing; this is an Electoral College game, the popular vote don’t mean s**t!
2) as such, focus everything on the 10-15 ‘swing state’s’ that matter; don’t spend time or money in deep blue states or solidly red states (35 states worth of electoral votes are already locked up);
3) stop being pussies (I’m paraphrasing, kind of) - recognize Trump has no boundaries, decorum or morals. You can’t fight him on the ‘high road.’ Take the page out of his book: if he hits hard, hit back 10 times harder and NEVER let up. No, scratch that, hit FIRST and never let up;
4) also, forget trying to shame Trump, or expect him to have remorse for anything, or that his cultish followers will feel those things, let alone abandon him - he ain’t doing it, he’s Double-Down Teflon Don;
5) while you’re pummeling him and never letting up, employ all the modern data and analytical tools at your disposal to deploy resources ($, ads, people, voter registration, polling, etc) necessary to pull the Reagan and ‘Trump’ Democrats, soft Republicans (eg, suburban white women), and Trump independents into your column. Start yesterday and don’t let up until all the polls are closed;
6) Speak ‘American,’ not blue coastal or policy wank or ‘edge’ Progressive (a la comrade Bernie and AOC). Never forget that the fly-over states and South aren’t dens of closeted Progressives chomping to be set free; folks in those places are middle of the road and conservative, even if registered Dems. Don’t let the ‘edge’ ideology drive the loss to the Orange Turd; and
7) ALWAYS remember, 2020 is a referendum on Donald Trump. It’s not about ideology, or policy, or anything Democrat’s want to hold true for elections. It is simply about the disaster of the Trump Presidency.
Wilson repeats many times that President Trump has provided all of the lies, corruption, kleptocracy, nepotism, criminality, etc on which to base a voter referendum. It is all up to the Democrats to get out of their own way and never let the voters forget who and what the President is. Whether the Democrats follow Wilson’s advice only time will tell. 5 stars for narrative, guts (to buck the tribe), effort and love of our democracy!
February 8, 2020
The Playbook
It is just as advertised - a brutally honest political playbook that also raises the alarm on how much is at stake.
It is just as advertised - a brutally honest political playbook that also raises the alarm on how much is at stake.
February 11, 2020
This book is harsh and funny and spot on!
Trump is human scum, and the Democratic nominee has got to make their campaign a referendum on Trump. This crap bag has got to be sent packing.
Trump is human scum, and the Democratic nominee has got to make their campaign a referendum on Trump. This crap bag has got to be sent packing.
February 12, 2020
Crass, coarse, blunt, uncomfortable... mostly accurate! This book was a sharp contrast to another recently finished read (Listen Liberal!) and I appreciated the chance to see a different perspective.
Ultimately the message I take away from this book isn’t that a progressive can’t win against DJT, but rather that the messaging and focus of the campaign needs to be why Trump is unfit. Just saying “Hey, Trump lies!” Isn’t enough. Nor is it ok to just say “here’s why all of my policies are better.” Instead, the message needs to be “he lies, his policies aren’t serving you (be specific), and I’m a safe alternative!”
Some people are going to hate every second of this book and practically retch and gag after every sentence. However, it’s still important to hear out this perspective and consider the merits (take the sting out of his rhetoric and the theories are sound).
The only thing that stopped me from giving this book a better rating is that I could have done without all of the imagined convos, tweets, headlines, etc. In between almost every chapter he indulges in some theatre of the absurd and plays out a fictional scenario (e.g. diary entries from Melania in broken English where she lists after Justin Trudeau, tweets DJT sends off while sitting on the can...) they’re good for a laugh, but they don’t really add anything to the book and end up detracting from the message.
Ultimately the message I take away from this book isn’t that a progressive can’t win against DJT, but rather that the messaging and focus of the campaign needs to be why Trump is unfit. Just saying “Hey, Trump lies!” Isn’t enough. Nor is it ok to just say “here’s why all of my policies are better.” Instead, the message needs to be “he lies, his policies aren’t serving you (be specific), and I’m a safe alternative!”
Some people are going to hate every second of this book and practically retch and gag after every sentence. However, it’s still important to hear out this perspective and consider the merits (take the sting out of his rhetoric and the theories are sound).
The only thing that stopped me from giving this book a better rating is that I could have done without all of the imagined convos, tweets, headlines, etc. In between almost every chapter he indulges in some theatre of the absurd and plays out a fictional scenario (e.g. diary entries from Melania in broken English where she lists after Justin Trudeau, tweets DJT sends off while sitting on the can...) they’re good for a laugh, but they don’t really add anything to the book and end up detracting from the message.
January 26, 2020
A powerful screed with a Ton of Good Advice.
After he spends a lot of the first half of the book on a welcome, redundant and probably unnecessary but well-deserved Rant against the EVIL of Donald J. Trump, Wilson provides a Truckload of tips that hopefully will be heeded by the people who will run the most important Presidential Campaign in American History.
He’s snarky as Hell, but full of wisdom that can only be gotten by absorbing the scars of numerous, ugly, political campaigns and learning their lessons well. His passion leaps from every page and it must be shared. A fast-paced read that should be read by every American who cares about the future of the Country we love and worries about November, 2020.
After he spends a lot of the first half of the book on a welcome, redundant and probably unnecessary but well-deserved Rant against the EVIL of Donald J. Trump, Wilson provides a Truckload of tips that hopefully will be heeded by the people who will run the most important Presidential Campaign in American History.
He’s snarky as Hell, but full of wisdom that can only be gotten by absorbing the scars of numerous, ugly, political campaigns and learning their lessons well. His passion leaps from every page and it must be shared. A fast-paced read that should be read by every American who cares about the future of the Country we love and worries about November, 2020.
February 12, 2020
Nothing new here.
March 25, 2020
Not the cathartic read of ‘Everything Trump Touches Dies’ but a deeper dive into the seedy world of politics. Really depressing right now.
January 4, 2021
I generally enjoy Rick Wilson's take on the world, and I'm consistently entertained by his profane snipes at Trump on Twitter, so I was looking forward to this one more than most political books. Unfortunately for Wilson, and I'm sure many others whose "timely" books got completely undermined by the pandemic, the justifiable dominance of the coronavirus over every 2020 news cycle took some of the punch out of the points the book was written to make. In my case, I also spent a long time waiting for library hold on this, and I didn't manage to finish it before the election, which dulled it some more, so it was a bit harder to finish than anticipated.
Wilson did manage to include a chapter referencing the pandemic, which gives a bit of additional perspective without changing the core of the book. Many of the points/lessons/instructions here were dwarfed, or made entirely moot, by the coronavirus pandemic and Trump's god-awful response to it, but the irony is that without the pandemic I might have dismissed a lot of what Wilson has to say about the electorate — especially about the moderate middle, and the scope for bending a meaningful number of them away from Trump. Wilson also identified new disasters to fear from a second Trump administration that I hadn't considered before — one, the prospect of judicial mayhem for years to come, and the other, the specter of the Trump family rooting themselves in to power as some kind of imperial family well into the future — but I'm not sure that without the pandemic, enough people would have realized or acted on the risk. Wilson's campaign mantra for the Democrats throughout the book is play to the moderates, forget about socialism, and make the campaign all about dumping Trump. As it happened, I'm not sure the Democrats really did the first, and the second was practically a default simply because the most consistent chant amongst the pro-trump crowds was to equate Democratic rule with socialism. As for the last, I don't really think that the Democrats did enough of making everything about Trump, but I do think they would have done much less without the pandemic. Without the Democrats really having to try much, 2020 was all about Trump and his handling of the virus in particular, which in the end seems to be what pushed enough numbers of people out to the polls to give the margin to Biden.
It's hard to judge a book like this given the unusual environment in which it came out, but it was an OK read — nothing spectacular, but the circumstances of 2020 changed the reading of it so much it's hard to know how I would have reacted to it under other circumstances. I will say that the other election-season book I read this year was How Trump Stole 2020 by Greg Palast, which lost none of its import, and in fact gained some, out of the events of 2020. Palast also does a better job of addressing the racism of the Trump machine, which gets tangential treatment in Wilson's book, not the deep dive it deserves.
Wilson did manage to include a chapter referencing the pandemic, which gives a bit of additional perspective without changing the core of the book. Many of the points/lessons/instructions here were dwarfed, or made entirely moot, by the coronavirus pandemic and Trump's god-awful response to it, but the irony is that without the pandemic I might have dismissed a lot of what Wilson has to say about the electorate — especially about the moderate middle, and the scope for bending a meaningful number of them away from Trump. Wilson also identified new disasters to fear from a second Trump administration that I hadn't considered before — one, the prospect of judicial mayhem for years to come, and the other, the specter of the Trump family rooting themselves in to power as some kind of imperial family well into the future — but I'm not sure that without the pandemic, enough people would have realized or acted on the risk. Wilson's campaign mantra for the Democrats throughout the book is play to the moderates, forget about socialism, and make the campaign all about dumping Trump. As it happened, I'm not sure the Democrats really did the first, and the second was practically a default simply because the most consistent chant amongst the pro-trump crowds was to equate Democratic rule with socialism. As for the last, I don't really think that the Democrats did enough of making everything about Trump, but I do think they would have done much less without the pandemic. Without the Democrats really having to try much, 2020 was all about Trump and his handling of the virus in particular, which in the end seems to be what pushed enough numbers of people out to the polls to give the margin to Biden.
It's hard to judge a book like this given the unusual environment in which it came out, but it was an OK read — nothing spectacular, but the circumstances of 2020 changed the reading of it so much it's hard to know how I would have reacted to it under other circumstances. I will say that the other election-season book I read this year was How Trump Stole 2020 by Greg Palast, which lost none of its import, and in fact gained some, out of the events of 2020. Palast also does a better job of addressing the racism of the Trump machine, which gets tangential treatment in Wilson's book, not the deep dive it deserves.
September 20, 2020
I find Rick Wilson’s sarcasm really funny and I like the way he writes. I preferred Everything Trump Touched Dies, but this was pretty good too!
April 12, 2020
From first to last, I was struck by the fact that this was written by a Republican strategist who knew every trick Republicans had played in the past, because he was involved - if not responsible - for some of them. I wish the Democratic party would hire him as a high-level adviser because he understands the full measure of the opposition's commitment, treachery, and villainy. He sees very clearly that the Republicans will win at all cost, sacrificing the most basic values we once held dear, such as the rule of law. If you are still trying to think there are "good people on both sides," wake up and read this book. We are facing the risk that Trump could win again and take even more steps to solidify the dictatorship he so dearly wants. He has an Attorney General who has forgotten the law that he once believed in. In the Senate he has a Majority Leader who is actually smarter and just as dangerous as he is. In the courts, we have far right judges occupying more and more benches, including the horrific Brett Kavanaugh on the Supreme Court.
If we are allowed to vote in November - and you'd better believe Trump will do everything he can to stop it -we need to remember that we are also voting for Supreme Court justices that are not pandering to Trump but serving the law. Like Merrick Garland, who was denied even a hearing because Mitch McConnell said so. A violation of his oath and of his responsibilities. But his only responsibility is to his own pocket.
Please read.
If we are allowed to vote in November - and you'd better believe Trump will do everything he can to stop it -we need to remember that we are also voting for Supreme Court justices that are not pandering to Trump but serving the law. Like Merrick Garland, who was denied even a hearing because Mitch McConnell said so. A violation of his oath and of his responsibilities. But his only responsibility is to his own pocket.
Please read.
February 3, 2020
I like to keep up to speed on both sides of the political spectrum. Wilson was recently known for mocking DJT for not knowing where Ukraine is on the map if you showed him a picture of a "U" and a "Crane". This book is the sequel to his first book "Everything DJT touches he kills" or something like that.
His book provides an interesting insight into defeat DJT in 2020. As a former GOP'er, he speaks about his time on the road and what he misses about the party. He also punches right into the heart of what he feels the Democrats need to do to defeat DJT. He doesn't stoop so low as to quote unverified tweets as author Daou does, but he goes further and comes up with makeshift diaries of Trump supporters that are crass, provide no value, and if anything, puts him in Trump category for being a jerk. You won't see respectable conservative authors like Krauthammer and Sowell take this tactic, so don't be disappointed if you are looking for a respectable deep dive into liberal politics in America. Oh, and the title is just for glitz, nowhere in the book does the author make his case for DJT being the Devil or Anti-Christ.
His book provides an interesting insight into defeat DJT in 2020. As a former GOP'er, he speaks about his time on the road and what he misses about the party. He also punches right into the heart of what he feels the Democrats need to do to defeat DJT. He doesn't stoop so low as to quote unverified tweets as author Daou does, but he goes further and comes up with makeshift diaries of Trump supporters that are crass, provide no value, and if anything, puts him in Trump category for being a jerk. You won't see respectable conservative authors like Krauthammer and Sowell take this tactic, so don't be disappointed if you are looking for a respectable deep dive into liberal politics in America. Oh, and the title is just for glitz, nowhere in the book does the author make his case for DJT being the Devil or Anti-Christ.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
May 3, 2020
I don't give many 5-star ratings although I choose my reading carefully and reject those I know I would not like or don't trust. This book is different. Wilson was a top GOP strategist for Reagan and Bush. He bailed out when Trump showed up. He is a hard-line conservative and is disgusted with Trump has done to "his" GOP party.
Essentially what this book is, is an instruction manual on how Wilson and the GOP won against their Democratic opponents (except Obama of course,) how Trump managed to win the Electoral College needed to grab the White House, and most importantly, what the Democrat party must do to beat Trump in 2020.
That's in in a nutshell. Wilson has some great one-liners sprinkled throughout the book and uses some adult language that some may find a bit offensive. But he apparently has the credentials and knows his stuff. Recommended, especially for anyone on the Democrat side working in politics.
Essentially what this book is, is an instruction manual on how Wilson and the GOP won against their Democratic opponents (except Obama of course,) how Trump managed to win the Electoral College needed to grab the White House, and most importantly, what the Democrat party must do to beat Trump in 2020.
That's in in a nutshell. Wilson has some great one-liners sprinkled throughout the book and uses some adult language that some may find a bit offensive. But he apparently has the credentials and knows his stuff. Recommended, especially for anyone on the Democrat side working in politics.
August 13, 2020
For those who think books about politics is boring then this is the antidote. I don't so & I always going to be drawn to a book written by the ever entertaining Rick Wilson. This though is a serious a book about a serious subject which is how to defeat Donald Trump & his tribe in 2020.
We do live in strange times. We not only have a pandemic to endure but we have books published by former Republican Political Consultants pleading with their normal Democratic opponents to beat their Republican President at the earliest opportunity. Rick has gone over to the dark side by becoming a "Never Trumper". He is one of founders of Lincoln Project whose ads are required viewing.
The book does contain swear words. As John Prescott the former British Labour Deputy Prime Minister maintains a bit of "industrial language" is good for the soul.
We do live in strange times. We not only have a pandemic to endure but we have books published by former Republican Political Consultants pleading with their normal Democratic opponents to beat their Republican President at the earliest opportunity. Rick has gone over to the dark side by becoming a "Never Trumper". He is one of founders of Lincoln Project whose ads are required viewing.
The book does contain swear words. As John Prescott the former British Labour Deputy Prime Minister maintains a bit of "industrial language" is good for the soul.
November 8, 2020
4 stars. Political strategist Rick Wilson writes about the challenges facing Democrats in 2020. A veteran political consultant, and fervent critic of the current administration, Wilson is ready to back anyone who can defeat the current president in 2020. The author recognizes this is an uphill battle but in this book he outlines his state-by-state strategy (as well as landing a few well-crafted zingers against the current administration).
Wilson’s acerbic style may not be for everyone, but if you enjoy reading his columns in the Daily Beast and The NY Times then you may want to check it out.
4 stars for thoughtful and engaging political analysis.
Wilson’s acerbic style may not be for everyone, but if you enjoy reading his columns in the Daily Beast and The NY Times then you may want to check it out.
4 stars for thoughtful and engaging political analysis.
August 14, 2020
Let's get this out of the way: Rick Wilson is an asshole. But he's a funny asshole and he's super savvy about the GOP Playbook and how/what the Democrats need to do in order to avoid a repeat of the 2016 election. Every Democrat, and I mean every one of us, should read this book before the Fall. You'll rethink that Tweet or that whine for your pet project and put the focus where it needs to be: getting Trump and his wannabe kleptocracy and cronies out of office and on trial for their graft and corruption. We're not a Banana Republic yet, but we will be if they get a mandate in the election to continue their ways.
April 8, 2020
On one hand it is very helpful to hear a GOP analysis of how both parties campaign. On the other hand, it makes me lose faith in society (or at least politics). Ultimately, Wilson is angry and it comes across and flagrant and unnecessary at times. But that’s also his point. Will be interested if he submits an “How to Campaign in a Pandemic Addendum"
May 24, 2020
Insulting, lazy, patronising rubbish.
May 18, 2020
A great follow-up to his first novel and very informative. My personal opinion (although I consider myself a moderate Democrat, I can relate to some of the principals of the Never Trump Republicans and admire them very much for their stance on upholding the rule of law and the Constitution and their fearless courage in standing up against Donald Trump) : I find myself shaking my head in huge disappointment at the Democratic Party who seem to be always one step behind Trump and his Trumpism Washington cronies; always checking themselves for political correctness, always a bit too meek to get down in the mud, always clutching pearls and hand-wringing, and always on the losing end of Trump, McConnell, Barr and their circle of criminal puppets in the Senate, Congress, State Houses and Municipal Mayors. This is why these demonic hellions are unbeatable. They stick together in lockstep and the Democrats refuse to fight down and dirty with them. Even the presidential campaign is a failure for Biden but for people like Rick Wilson and George Conway, etc. who contribute and fundraise for Biden. Without them, the Democrats are setting themselves up for failure. It's a sad damn day when Democrats have to depend on Republicans to win an election. All that being said, this book is a must read.
Rick Wilson has spent decades getting the Republicans elected. He knows how they think, he knows their playbook and for God sakes he WROTE their damn playbook.
If you would like to know the successful way to win the 2020 elections and if you would like to take a peak at the Republican playbook and if you would like to see a Republican show a Democrat the winning strategies on how to beat Trump, read this book.
Rick also has a new podcast which I have been listening to on Spotify and ITunes called The New Abnormal with Molly Jung Fast. They are a delight to listen to and have the most interesting guests and discussions. These two hate Trump as much as I do. There was a time when Barack Obama was President when I was so against some of his policies I thought there was no one worse than Obama. But nope, I was wrong. Trump trumps Obama by a landslide on that front. Yesterday my hubby and I were watching Barack Obama's virtual graduation commencement speech and we both looked at each other and said "I hate to admit this but I would rather have Obama back as President". Yeah.
You can't win an election or beat the Trumpists without the Never Trump Republicans, so please, Democrats, put your foolish pride behind you and do the right thing. Our country depends on it.
Rick Wilson has spent decades getting the Republicans elected. He knows how they think, he knows their playbook and for God sakes he WROTE their damn playbook.
If you would like to know the successful way to win the 2020 elections and if you would like to take a peak at the Republican playbook and if you would like to see a Republican show a Democrat the winning strategies on how to beat Trump, read this book.
Rick also has a new podcast which I have been listening to on Spotify and ITunes called The New Abnormal with Molly Jung Fast. They are a delight to listen to and have the most interesting guests and discussions. These two hate Trump as much as I do. There was a time when Barack Obama was President when I was so against some of his policies I thought there was no one worse than Obama. But nope, I was wrong. Trump trumps Obama by a landslide on that front. Yesterday my hubby and I were watching Barack Obama's virtual graduation commencement speech and we both looked at each other and said "I hate to admit this but I would rather have Obama back as President". Yeah.
You can't win an election or beat the Trumpists without the Never Trump Republicans, so please, Democrats, put your foolish pride behind you and do the right thing. Our country depends on it.
December 11, 2021
Before the Pandemic of Covid19, I ordered this book. It arrived at the very start of the 2020 election year. I began to read it then, but once we were in lockdown, I had less time to read. And then the election year carried forward, and demonstrations occupied our cities, and the parties moved toward nominations… I was not able to read from this book again until the Autumn of 2021, one year after the elections. It is amazing how author Rick Wilson (long-time political strategist for the National Republican Party) was able to name all the tactics that Donald Trump would employ to stay in power, and how the Republican Party was transformed from the GOP to Trump's Party. Wilson was right in all these predictions. He even foresaw that Trump would not concede. What he did not predict, however, was the January 6th attack on the Congress of the USA by Trump's devotees. And yet, even that fit into Wilson's understanding of the Trump and his new version of Republican leadership. "Never, ever underestimate how much they'll do to survive," he wrote at the end of his analysis (pg. 300).
This book was written for election year 2020. Does it make sense to read it now? Yes, I think so. There are so many people in the USA who have never accepted the results of those election. Reading this book by a former Republican strategist has helped me to better understand why.
This book was written for election year 2020. Does it make sense to read it now? Yes, I think so. There are so many people in the USA who have never accepted the results of those election. Reading this book by a former Republican strategist has helped me to better understand why.
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