Trumpocracy: The Corruption of the American Republic

with David Frum

Hosted by Maclean's Magazine's Paul Wells

In Person Politics
Date
Admission
Free
Date
Thursday
Jan , 2018
25
7:00pm
Eastern
Southminster United Church
15 Aylmer Ave. • Ottawa
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Trumpocracy: The Corruption of the American Republic

Until the US presidential election of 2016, the global decline of democracy seemed a concern for other peoples in other lands. . . . That complacent optimism has been upended by the political rise of Donald Trump. The crisis is upon Americans, here and now.

David Frum
Bestselling author, former White House speechwriter, and Atlantic columnist and media commentator David Frum explains how President Trump has undermined America's most important institutions in ways even the most critical media has missed, in this thoughtful and hard-hitting book that is a warning for democracy and America’s future.
 
Quietly, steadily, Trump and his administration are damaging the tenets and accepted practices of American democracy, perhaps irrevocably. As he and his family enrich themselves, the presidency itself falls into the hands of the generals and financiers who surround him.
 
In Trumpocracy, he documents how Trump and his administration are steadily damaging the tenets and accepted practices of American democracy. During his own White House tenure as George W. Bush’s speechwriter, Frum witnessed the ways the presidency is limited not by law but by tradition, propriety, and public outcry, all now weakened. Whether the Trump presidency lasts two, four, or eight more years, he has changed the nature of the office for the worse, and likely for decades.
 
Join us for a conversation on how Trump could push America toward illiberalism, what the consequences could be for our world, and what Americans can do to prevent it.

The Authors

David Frum

David Frum

David Frum is a senior editor at the Atlantic. From 2014 through 2017, he served as chairman of the board of trustees of the leading UK center-right think tank, Policy Exchange. In 2001-2002, he served as speechwriter and special assistant to President George W. Bush; in 2007-2008, as senior adviser to the Rudy Giuliani presidential campaigns.   Frum is the author of nine books, most recently TRUMPOCRACY: The Corruption of the American Republic(HarperCollins, 2018). His first book, Dead Right, won praise from William F. Buckley as “the most refreshing intellectual experience in a generation” and from Frank Rich in the New York Times as “the smartest book written from the inside about the American conservative movement.” In National Review, John Podhoretz hailed Frum’s history of the 1970s, How We Got Here, as “an audacious act of revisionism, written in a voice and style so original it deserves to be called revolutionary.” Arianna Huffington said of Frum’s 2012 novel, Patriots, “David Frum is someone who fearlessly speaks his mind, regardless of where the chips may fall, so it’s no surprise he’s able to convey so much truth in his fiction.” Frum’s memoir of his service in the George W. Bush administration, The Right Man, was a #1 New York Times bestseller.   He and his wife Danielle Crittenden Frum live in Washington DC and Wellington, Ontario. They have three children.

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