The most important commentary on the 2016 race -- by historian Doris Kearns Goodwon.

Doris Kearns Goodwin, photo by Morry Gash/AP 

Pulitzer Prize winning presidential historian Doris Kearns Goodwin (author of biographies of Lincoln, the Roosevelts, and LBJ) gave an interview to the Huffington Post's Howard Fineman.   This is, to me, the most insightful thing I have read about this extraordinary 2016 Republican presidential primary race.    Her bottom line is that the media is falling down on its job to vet Donald Trump.

Quoting Fineman's article about what Goodwin said in the interview:

"Trump deploys fame for fame’s sake; taps into populist expressions of fear, hatred and resentment and shows a knack for picking fights and a braggart’s focus on the horse race. All of which allow him to play into -- and exploit -- every media weakness and bad habit in a chase for audience and numbers.

"As a result, said Goodwin, the 69-year-old Trump has preempted serious scrutiny of his past, character, record in business and suitability -- if any -- for the office of president. . . .  'We in the media are the key purveyors of the qualities of the candidates and of telling people who they are and what they stand for . . .  The responsibilities are pretty great.'"

And the press is not carrying out those responsibilities, in Goodwin's view.   Additional factors are the obsession with polls and conflict, the shorter attention spans of most news consumers and the ruthless aggregation, measurement and marketing of user interactions across scattered social media.   Fineman continues:  

"But no one uses these trends as cynically or successfully as Trump to avoid the scrutiny that only the media can provide and that the media, mesmerized, is not providing.

“'Every day he is a new story . . . .  By dwelling on the glittering present and the entertainingly uncertain future, Trump erases all sense of history, context and accountability for his own life and actions.  'He doesn’t let you have time to go back to his past,' said Goodwin.

“'Do we know, at this point, about his modus operandi in business? Do we know how he treated his staff? Do we know what kind of leader he was when he was building his business?  . . .  No person in public life is more in need of deep investigative scrutiny than Trump. . . .  

"Trump has another tactic for defeating press scrutiny . . . .  Trump isn’t selling a movement or a specific agenda, or even the details of his own track record. . . .  He is selling his stage persona -- and the related notion that his supporters can somehow mimic him by voting for him. It’s a materialistic version of a religious appeal: the 'prosperity gospel' of Norman Vincent Peale and Rev. Ike. 

"Or it’s like becoming another Beyoncé by buying her lipstick.

"Media amplifies the presumed power of Trump by conflating celebrity with clout and voters’ faith in an agenda with fan worship.  'Bernie Sanders is a movement; Trump is not a movement. . . .  It’s just him.'

"He’s saying ‘I am here and just somehow, I am going to make things good.  We know enough about leadership to know that that is not true.'"

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Put this alongside the article I quoted last week (January 20th) on authoritarianism as the one trait that distinguishes Trump supporters -- and what he offers -- and I think we have a pretty good understanding of the Trump phenomenal appeal in this particular election year.

The interview with Goodwin was before Donald Trump's latest caper over whether or not he will participate in the Fox News debate on Thursday night.   Is this just another of his caper's with the media that Goodwin is talking about?

Or is this is far bigger than a spat over Megyn Kelly as moderator?   Some suggest that this has more to do with a fight going on behind scenes between Roger Ailes -- who built Fox News into what it is -- and the now owner Rupert Murdoch.  Trump has said he won't talk with Ailes but only with Murdoch himself.   Then Bill O'Reilly got into it, trying to muscle in on Ailes power and win favor with Murdoch by begging Trump on live tv to do the debate. 

It's not clear what Trump's role in this -- except perhaps a fight to gain even more control of the media than he altready has.   It does not seem like a good idea for a presidential candidate to be meddling in the internal politics of the leading conservative television news empire -- or, as some say, the mouthpiece for the Republican Party. 

To say the least, it is not presidential.  Having an authoritarian president who also has control of the media would be very dangerous.

Ralph