This is not, goes the Trump Era motto, normal.
Yet with each successive Twitter outburst from @POTUS, it feels increasingly so.
Its reasonable to suspect that Comey hopes to regain some fans by telling his side of the story.
Credit: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
Loyaltytraces Comeys attraction to moral leadership.
This is not the dry law enforcement memoir that such a linear structure would typically beget.
Instead, its cunningly calculated.
Flatiron Books
Both explicitly and subtly, Comey draws himself as Trumps polar opposite.
His profound regret over fabricating a college basketball career is comically minor in comparison to our unethical presidents lies.
His corny jokes, peppered throughout, amplify the alarming detail that hes never seen Trump laughever.
Indeed, Comey is on a bit of a redemption tour here, a reclaiming of his legacy.
(Full disclosure: This critic certainly did.)
This is Comeys predicament, in a nutshell.
But Comey leans into that tension more than expected.
Loyaltyis stuffed with colorful soundbites.
Its repetitious, maudlin writing, but there is a political purpose to it.
Comey says that the criticism which most gets to him is that hes in love with his own virtue.
(I am proud of the fact that I give a shot to do the right thing.)
This is not especially evident inLoyalty.
Conversely, its his unwillingness to admit hes playing the game that so frustrates.
