From Washington to Trump - how did it get to this?

If you are wondering how America got from George Washington to Donald Trump, let me recommend a book published just last year.

Gimson’s Presidents features short essays on every US president including many you’ve probably never heard of.

It followed a previous book, Gimson’s Prime Ministers, that appeared mid way through Theresa May’s disastrous period in office.

Given the final chapter in each book is already, and unavoidably, out-of-date, that alone highlights the ephemeral (here today, gone tomorrow) nature of most politicians, including many presidents and prime ministers.

Anyway, author and journalist Andrew Gimson has a lightness of touch that makes both books hugely enjoyable as well as informative. Warmly recommended.

PS. Here's Gimson on Andrew Jackson (president, 1829-37). Describing the 7th President as 'the kind of man it was inadvisable to pick a quarrel in a tavern', he writes:

Jackson was the first frontiersman to reach the top in American politics ...

Historians confuse matters by making him an apostle of democracy, and Jackson certainly expressed and turned to political advantage the resentments of backwoodsmen who felt they were looked down on by the folks in Washington DC. But he himself was a natural autocrat.

Jackson had promised to reform Washington, but in practice this meant that more office holders, most of them perfectly competent, were sacked in the first year of his presidency than in the whole forty years since [George] Washington, and replaced with his own supporters.

As for Jackson's inauguration, for which the new President 'wore mourning' to mark the death of his wife:

The mob which at his invitation came to Washington to celebrate his victory was less restrained. It invaded the White House, smashed the furnishings and could only be induced to leave by the provision of free punch on the lawn.

Aside from the free punch, does that remind you of anything?