Regime Change, subtitled Inside the Imperial Presidency of Donald Trump, by two White House correspondents for The New York Times — Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan — concludes with an encounter with its subject.
When the two authors asked whether there had ever been an American president as powerful has he, Trump responded by reading out a tribute written by a golf caddy he met, an amateur historian, about his status in comparison with the great men of history. He reeled them off. Alexander the Great, the Caesars, William the Conqueror, Genghis Khan, Attila the Hun. “Napoleon”, Trump added with relish. “Hitler, Mao, Stalin.” These leaders “maintained power through fear”. The caddy’s conclusion: “If President Trump is the American Eagle, then William the Conqueror was merely a sparrow.”
