I took while to finish this book. It was not hard to read and very gripping in the way I keep making scream faces from Edvard Munch. It was funny Americans believe in secrets in government. In British government, it’s called confidential security briefings. (I love Yes, Minister.) In Singapore, we are much more hapless and funnier. After a while, that level of surprise was unsustainable. It was tiring.

Perhaps it is American for a president to work happily with the staff around him without disagreements. Perhaps they all think the same way because the President surrounds himself with the kind of people who shares his thinking. That they have to steal papers, quit a lot, move things around, try to silence fallouts is normal if you don’t think of it as the government. If you imagine this happening in a private organisation, that’s par on course. Some might express horror how can any organisation work at all but the uncertainty is how private organisations need to work. If there is certainly and consensus, it is probably a family business and believed as stuffy and slow.

Back to the book, I enjoyed and admired his investigative journalism. The conversations he captured in the book is astounding. Unhappy people are willing to share their unhappiness. He tapped that gold vein and mined it well. I was fascinated to take out another of his book.