Donald Trump’s real threat

Andrew McCabe, the former Deputy Director of the FBI whom Donald Trump fired just days before his retirement, is hitting the media circuit to promote his new aptly-named book, The Threat. While many of the released excerpts may fail to surprise, they do paint Trump in an even worse light, if that’s even possible, including his apparent giddiness at getting rid of Comey – a move he thought would end the Russia investigation.

The Atlantic has posted a short portion of The Threat. While reading that excerpt, I could feel my heart pounding. Earlier thoughts or suppositions about the level of Trump’s narcissism and dirty dealings pale in comparison to the truth that continues to come out.

When McCabe first assumed the role of Acting Director after Trump’s firing of Comey, Trump called McCabe to say, “it’s [Comey’s firing] a great thing, people are really happy about the fact that the director’s gone.” Trump claimed to have received “hundreds” of messages from FBI employees, congratulating him for firing Comey because they “hated him.

McCabe tells a completely different story: “You could go to any floor and you would see small groups gathering in hallways, some people even crying.” Par for the course with Trump, he sees what he wants to see and completely ignores the truth. During that conversation, Trump also had the audacity to ask about McCabe’s wife, about whom Trump shamelessly made false, malicious allegations during her campaign for senate. Trump wanted to know how McCabe’s wife felt about being a “loser.”

The man has no class, but importantly, he has no empathy or concern for others and says things that he thinks will make people admire him. In other words, he’s a classic narcissist: arrogant, self-centered, manipulative, demanding, and concentration on grandiose fantasies of their own success, beauty, or brilliance, according to the definition from Psychology Today. Yep. But, I digress.

We can thank Andrew McCabe for Special Counsel Robert Mueller. Because McCabe already knew his days were numbered, he wanted to ensure that the Trump-Russia investigation survived his termination. He went to Rod Rosenstein, who had also been burned by Trump by putting Rosenstein’s name on a memo following Comey’s termination. Together, Rosenstein and McCabe determined that a special counsel was necessary – someone who would ultimately be untouchable by Trump – leading to the appointment of Mueller.

McCabe’s book is another in a series of writings from people Trump has tried to destroy. If you haven’t yet read A Higher Loyalty from James Comey, I highly recommend it, as it gives a clear play-by-play of Trump’s attempted manipulations of Comey, ultimately leading to hints of the obstruction Trump was openly willing to undertake. I suspect McCabe’s book will be just as telling. Tune into “60 Minutes” this Sunday for a full interview with McCabe.