This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2016, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
Watching Mitt Romney audition for "The Apprentice" — oops, the job of secretary of state — is the best chance yet to see which persona President-elect Donald Trump will bring to the White House, says New York Times op-ed columnist Maureen Dowd.
The election was an unprecedented fusion of politics, social media and reality TV, and Trump's transition is unfolding via that same mix, says the Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist. "Who would have thought a 70-year-old guy would usher in the Twitter era of the presidency?" she says.
"Welcome to Trump World" might be the title of Dowd's talk on Saturday, Dec. 3, with Times congressional reporter Carl Hulse at the Park City Institute, kicking off the performing arts agency's 20th anniversary season.
Will Romney play the role of savior or sellout? Dowd says we just don't know yet if top Trump aide Kellyanne Conway is calling for an apology from Romney at the president-elect's request or acting on her own.
Should Americans be calling on electors to reject state votes? Dowd says without any evidence of voter fraud on either side, the country should move on and deal with a new reality.
"The Mitt Romney show is sort of like 'The Apprentice,' and none of us have ever seen that before," she says, quoting "Princess Bride" screenwriter William Goldman who famously said about Hollywood: "Nobody knows anything."
"And that's true of Washington right now," Dowd continues. Pundits and political insiders don't know which direction Trump is aimed, and they can't predict the many ways he's turned politics upside down, or if his cult of personality will have lasting effects.
"I think the most surprised person in the country is Donald Trump," Dowd says. "I think he doesn't know. I think right now he is forming the persona he will be in the White House."
Rather than political ideology, she says her weekly column focuses on the effects of power on power brokers, the same themes that run through Shakespeare or "Game of Thrones" or "House of Cards," she says. No matter how people get their news, through carrier pigeons or Google, "I don't think human nature changes."
Dowd laughs easily as she drops apt quotes from other column-literi, and as she refers to her complicated relationship with her conservative Irish Catholic family, whom she refers to in print as her "little basket of deplorables."
Despite the showcase of Dowd's Times' column, nobody in her family ever asks for her political opinion, she says with a laugh, "even though I'm paid for that." Instead, they gloated with Champagne toasts to Trump at Thanksgiving dinner, while her brother wrote his own "Election Therapy Guide for Liberals," all of which she described in her Nov. 27 column.
In September, Dowd published her third book, "The Year of Voting Dangerously" (Twelve, $30), a compilation of political columns, in which she details her longtime phone friendship with Trump. She was on the plane in 1999 when Trump and his then-girlfriend Melania Knauss made a Miami speech that was intended as a dress rehearsal for a future presidential race.
More recently, in Trump's prominent meeting with the Times' top brass last week, the president-elect called out Dowd — disinviting her to phone him — because she treats him "too rough."
What she didn't include in her column was Times Publisher Arthur Sulzberger Jr.'s response: "As we all say about Maureen, it's not your fault, it's your turn."
That says everything about Dowd's sharp-edged, nonpartisan column written by the former White House correspondent. She considers herself a watchdog — now a watchdog on what Trump biographer Tim L. O'Brien termed the Rottweiler voters unleashed on Washington to rip the faces off Congress. A watchdog on the Rottweiler, and as she puts the metaphor together, Dowd laughs through the phone, ever grateful for new material.
facebook.com/ellen.weist —
Maureen Dowd and Carl Hulse in Park City
P The New York Times political writers will speak about the aftermath of the election to kickoff Park City Institute's 20th anniversary season.
When • Saturday, Dec. 3, 7:30 p.m.
Where • George S. and Dolores Doré Eccles Center for the Performing Arts, 1750 Kearns Blvd., Park City
Tickets • $29, $49, and $79 (discounts for children, seniors, Summit County students) at 435-655-3114 or parkcity.institute.