Summary of Tired of Winning by Jonathan Karl: Donald Trump and the End of the Grand Old Party

By Willie M. Joseph

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This book does not in any capacity mean to replace the original book but to serve as a vast summary of the original book.

Summary of Tired of Winning by Jonathan Karl: Donald Trump and the End of the Grand Old Party

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Tired of Winning: Donald Trump and the End of the Grand Old Party is a unique look into the politics of our times, examining how Trump transformed the Republican Party in his own image. Despite his meddling and mounting legal troubles, Trump has re-emerged as the frontrunner for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination. Jonathan Karl, a former New York Post reporter, provides insights into Trump's quest for retribution and the GOP's future if they choose him as their standard bearer.

 

 

• Language: English
• Publisher: Willie M. Joseph
• Release date: Nov 14, 2023
• ISBN: 9798223382089

Willie M. Joseph

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INTRODUCTION

At the Mar-a-Lago Club in Palm Beach, Florida, a few dozen Trump diehards gathered to announce his third presidential campaign, promoting it as the most important speech given in the history of the United States of America. The event was a grand occasion, with a grandiose setting and grandiose crystal chandeliers. Trump had previously urged Senator Lindsey Graham to delay launching another presidential campaign, with Graham meeting Chris Ruddy to help. Fox News host Sean Hannity called for an all-out effort to deter Trump from launching his third campaign. Many of Trump's longtime supporters and advisors, as well as his own family, remained away from the event. Trump's wife, Melania, agreed to be there after intense negotiations, but remained mostly out of sight of the cameras.

The author visited Mar-a-Lago, Trump's former White House, to discuss his presidential announcement. In an interview, Trump lashed out at many of the Republicans who had served him, accusing Attorney General Bill Barr of betraying him and accusing former United Nations ambassador Nikki Haley of being disloyal. He mocked Senator Graham for crawling back to him after trying to distance himself following the attack on the Capitol. Trump also slammed Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell and House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy.

The author found it surprising that Trump was not only refusing to condemn calls for his own vice president's execution but was justifying them. The atmosphere at Mar-a-Lago was different from the 2020 banners draped over the inaugural platform. The first familiar face was Mike Lindell, a mustachioed businessman who peddles pillows and conspiracy theories about voting machines. Other Trump-list celebrities were in attendance, such as Roger Stone, Sebastian Gorka, and a man dressed in a brick suit designed to look like a brick wall.

Nearly every highprofile figure from Trump's White House and previous campaigns decided they had better places to be. Kellyanne Conway, Steve Bannon, Hope Hicks, and Dan Scavino were missing in action. Trump's Treasury secretary, Steven Mnuchin, and secretary of state Mike Pompeo didn't show up for his big day. Not a single confirmed cabinet secretary from the Trump administration made the trek to Mar-a-Lago.

The people who knew Trump best actively decided to steer clear of his launch. Only two members of Congress were spotted: Representative Troy Nehls of Texas and Representative Madison Cawthorn, who would be leaving public office soon. Representative Matt Gaetz of Florida said he wanted to go but had to stay in Washington for votes.

Trump's third presidential campaign announcement at Mar-a-Lago in November 2022 was reminiscent of his first, with the former president delivering a speech that was met with a lack of enthusiasm. The speech was criticized for lacking disruptive, controversial, and counterrevolutionary ideas, such as imposing term limits on Congress members to drain the swamp. Trump's team barred the exits to ensure people stuck around for the entire address.

In 2015, Trump had virtually no support from prominent Republican officials or party donors, and in 2022, his team barred the exits to ensure people stuck around for the entire address. However, the Donald Trump who spoke at Mar-a-Lago in November 2022 was not the same person who had come down the escalator seven years earlier.

Trump chose to announce his third presidential campaign exactly one week after the GOP suffered crushingly disappointing results in the midterm elections, which arguably did more damage to the former president's standing in the party than his role in the January 6 attack on the Capitol. Many of the candidates the party put up were hand-selected by the former president in the primaries, and the more electable nominees were forced to defend Trump's lies about the 2020 election or face withering attacks from the leader of their party.

The biggest loser of the midterm cycle is Donald Trump, who has earned this title well before the first votes were counted in 2022. Six years earlier, Trump had won an election almost nobody thought he could win, arguably the biggest electoral upset the United States had ever seen. He survived controversies and vanquished enemies, both Democratic and Republican. Trump entered office in January 2017 with an opportunity to redefine the Republican Party and build a brand as one of the most successful businessmen in America.

Winning was key to crafting and maintaining this image, and a hallmark of his first presidential bid in 2015. Trump's behavior after the 2020 election better than anything that's been written in the years since. He was so terrified of his winning being exposed as a facade that he was willing to tear down American democracy. If his devotees accepted the truth, his time as a force within Republican politics would come to an end.

Trump's story is one of failure. His most visible defeat may have come in November 2020, but he was losing long before he entered politics and continued losing after he left the White House. His losses have infected just about everything and everyone he's touched, including the people who remained loyal to him, betrayed him, enabled him, and confronted him.

Trump has been an undisputed winner in the party, vanquishing once-prominent Republicans who have tried to take him down and remaking the party in his own image. His luck may run out in 2024, as some powerful people in the party are tired of winning and determined to stop him.

COME RETRIBUTION

The Right to Bear Arms: The Rise of America's New Militias, written 25 years after the 1995 bombing of the Oklahoma City federal building, explores the anti-government movement that inspired Timothy McVeigh to make war on federal law enforcement agencies. The book features a photograph of the Branch Davidians' Waco, Texas, compound called Mount Carmel, which was engulfed in flames after a disastrous fifty-one-day siege in early 1993.