Even Moustaches Need Lifeboats.

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From Business Insider's Brennan Weiss back in ancient times (i.e. early 2018) a few weeks before John Bolton became the 3rd Trumpian National Security Advisor:

During the presidential transition (in late 2016), Donald Trump reportedly passed on selecting former US ambassador to the UN John Bolton as his top national security adviser because of Bolton's eccentric mustache.

When Roger Ailes, the ex-chairman of Fox News and longtime Trump ally, suggested Trump appoint Bolton to the coveted Cabinet position, then incoming White House Chief Strategist Steve Bannon fired back, according to excerpts from Michael Wolff's upcoming book about the Trump presidency.

"Bolton's mustache is a problem. Trump doesn't think he looks the part," Bannon reportedly said. "You know Bolton is an acquired taste."

Ailes praised Bolton, who is a frequent contributor on Fox News.

"He's a bomb thrower. And a strange little f---er," Ailes reportedly said. "But you need him. Who else is good on Israel? [Michael] Flynn is a little nutty on Iran. [Rex] Tillerson just knows oil."...

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Look.

Despite the short term headlines he is currently generating, American Democrats (and/or reasonable people) should best remember that Mr. John Bolton is not their friend or ally as actual reviews of his book are pointing out pointedly.

The Guardian's Alison Flood has the details:

...Early reviews of the book (by Bolton) have not been favourable. The New York Times said the memoir was “bloated with self-importance, even though what it mostly recounts is Bolton not being able to accomplish very much”. Filled with “minute and often extraneous details”, the review continued, it “toggles between two discordant registers: exceedingly tedious and slightly unhinged”.

The Washington Post said that “for a memoir that is startlingly candid about many things, Bolton’s utter lack of self-criticism is one of the book’s significant shortcomings”, while NPR found that Bolton “clearly does not expect to attract the casual reader, or anyone else unable to digest sentences such as this one on the third page: ‘Constant personnel turnover obviously didn’t help, nor did the White House’s Hobbesian bellum omnium contra omnes (war of all against all)’.”

Reviews were united in criticising Bolton’s refusal to testify at the Trump impeachment hearings last year. The New York Times called his chapter on Ukraine “weird, circuitous and generally confounding”. Bolton argues that “because of the House’s impeachment malpractice”, testifying would have made “no significant difference”.

“It’s a self-righteous and self-serving sort of fatalism that sounds remarkably similar to the explanation he gave years ago for pre-emptively signing up for the National Guard in 1970 and thereby avoiding service in Vietnam,” writes the NYT.

For NPR, “what might have been blockbuster testimony in January or February seems more historical than contemporary today”. The Washington Post also considers him too late: “Bolton took his time in telling us the truth, and he should have done more when it was his duty during the impeachment inquiry. But it’s all here. In boxing, you’d call it a knockout punch.”...


And, just to be clear, any reasonable USian who thinks that 'Never Trumpers' like, say, Rick Wilson (i.e. the very fine fellows who engineered the rise of the modern Republican party), who have most recently glommed on to Mr. Bolton's bombast,  have anything in common with Mr. Lincoln should think again, very hard.

Because this 'Lincoln Project' thing, like the Tea Party before it, is nothing more than a lifeboat building exercise designed to help get these people to safe harbour after the flood, which they are sure to lay claim to causing in the aftermath.

Because James Carville will say so, or some such thing.

OK?


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