I used to write one page biographies for a newspaper. Usually it was a Sunday edition, “Write about an ordinary person doing something extraordinary,” my editor would say. It was nice to have some autonomy; to be able to pick my subject and sit down with them for an hour or two. I didn’t like doing phone interviews and Zoom was just a thing my cat did on occasion. I found that if you listen long enough, and look into someone’s eyes, you can always find a kernel of truth in their story. The story they tell themselves.
Lately journalists have delved into the depths of MAGA world. While I was traveling last week with the family, I searched high and low for the new Vanity Fair in foreign and domestic airports. I was dying to read the profile of Mr T’s Chief of Staff, Susie Wiles. Going back decades, a total news blackout has been our custom on vacation – so no TV, no NYTimes (except for the Games section). But if I could just get my hands on the magazine… and sorry to say, the new Vanity Fair had not hit the news stands yet.
Wiles intrigued me. She looked like one of my Irish aunts – petite, grey-haired bob, sweet, funny, baking pies and cookies for holidays. But she was the person behind the President of these United States, and also sitting on his right side and steering the ship. The second most powerful political figure in the world – in fact, she is the first woman to hold this White House position! And all I could get on social media was that Wiles said Mr T has an “alcoholic’s personality.” What does that even mean?
According to the Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation, there are a number of traits that many alcoholics seem to suffer from: “…low frustration tolerance; impulsivity; low rejection threshold; low sense of one’s own worth; and they are loners and afraid of intimacy.” Maybe some of that is true, but a low sense of Mr T’s worth? If anything, the POTUS is a would be king, a narcissist in every sense of that word. My question is what does this description of her boss say about Wiles?
Wiles mentions that she grew up with an alcoholic father. But maybe she feels like the wife of an alcoholic – always pleading for him to reconsider impulsive decisions, stepping on eggshells whenever she is around him. It was ironic to learn that she also worked for Ronald Reagan, as a scheduler and in his Labor Department. Mostly she worked on Republican campaigns over the years with no experience in the federal government. I picture her as a bullfighter, a highly choreographed master manipulator of the bull in the White House.
And now Marjorie Taylor Greene, the MAGA boss lady turned ‘traitor,’ has earned herself a profile in the NYTimes Magazine. This turncoat Representative from Georgia always turned me off. I dismissed her as a kook. But reporter Robert Draper interviewed her before and after her conversion and I’m willing to believe he captured her journey perfectly. It all started when she spoke with some of the Epstein victims and threatened to release the names of the powerful men involved. Mr T’s response, on speakerphone in her Congressional office, was so loud and abusive everyone heard him claiming not to want some of his friends hurt. (wink, wink).
In Greene’s mind this represented “… everything wrong with Washington,” adding that it was a story of “rich, powerful elites doing horrible things and getting away with it. And the women are the victims.” https://www.nytimes.com/2025/12/29/magazine/marjorie-taylor-greene-interview-takeaways.html?unlocked_article_code=1.AlA.AFU7.jW9VSVlIj-p4&smid=url-share
Gone are the days when Martha Mitchell could be gaslit for telling the truth about Watergate. I believe Greene has had a change of heart and I’m sorry she is resigning her seat in the new year. But I’m glad independent journalists are doing their jobs. I’d love to get Greene and Wiles in a room together, two different generations of women in the Republican stratosphere. Wiles attended the Academy of the Holy Angels in NJ so I’m presuming she’s Catholic or catholic-light-Episcopalian, and Greene makes a big point about being a Christian. Surely they could agree about something?
We’re back in Nashville and I’m missing my morning cuddles with the Grandbabies. They are water nymphs, I loved watching them discover new birds and flowers at our cozy cottage. They are on the move and have just learned how to share their toys. Which is more than I can say about the alcoholic/adolescent/addled boys in the White House.
MountainMornings 