Freeloader Lindsey

As a rabid current-events and politics fan, I try to read all the new books shedding light on the inner workings of the Trump administration. My latest is Stephanie Grisham’s I’ll Take Your Questions Now (What I Saw at the Trump White House). Uh . . . don’t bother. I found it self-serving and pretty limp, revelation wise. Too often it’s an exercise in whataboutism. “Yeah, it was a dumpster fire, but so was the media.” If it’s dirt you want, Michael Cohen’s book is a lot juicier.

What snippets that have already been released in the press and on social media pretty much tell it all. Yeah, she doesn’t like “the interns,” Jared and Ivanka, but who does? And we know Mark Meadows is a douchebag, but this doesn’t add much to his litany of dumbfuckery. More is sure to come. One excerpt, though, hasn’t been put out there (too risqué for the mainstream?), which makes it perfect fodder for here:

Someone who was almost as frequent a guest at Trump properties as I was was Senator Lindsey Graham. Okay, I’m exagger­ating, but not by much. The difference, of course, is that I was there to work. Of all of the various characters and hangers-on in Trump World, Lindsey was one of the weirder ones, and that’s saying something. He seemed almost schizophrenic. Some days he would be one of Trump’s most vigorous defenders; other days he was a harsh critic. People around the president would tell him that he couldn’t trust Graham, but Trump seemed to like him for whatever reason and I often wondered if he sought Lindsey’s approval. And Lindsey Graham? Well, it struck me that he was using Trump to mop up the freebies like there was no tomorrow (seems that he still is). He would show up at Mar-a-Lago or Bedminster to play free rounds of golf, stuff his face with free food, and hang out with Trump and his celebrity pals. On one occasion, I came across him at Bedminster after he’d kicked out a White House staff member so he could take her room. Senator Freeloader was sitting at a table by the pool, a big grin on his face, lapping up the goodies he was getting like some potentate. He said to me, with a creepy little smile, “Isn’t this great? Man, this is the life.” I remem­ber thinking “Yes, it is, but not your life—it’s the president’s life.” There was something so gross and tacky about his behavior during that trip that the image never left me.