Finally, the president added, 'The American people are idealists, but they also want their leaders to be realistic... - Bob Woodward

Almost everything about Afghanistan was troubling Mullen. As Obama was giving intense focus on the war, Mullen was feeling more personal responsibility. Afghanistan had been marked by 'incredible neglect,' he told some of his officers. 'It's almost like you're on a hunger strike and you're on the 50th day, and all of a sudden you're going to try to feed this person. Well, they're not going to eat very quickly. I mean, every organ in the body is collapsing. The under-resourcing of Afghanistan was much deeper and wider than even I thought. It wasn't just about troops. It was intellectually, it was strategically, it was physically, culturally.

He was fighting hard to draw a line where politics could stop, where family loyalty could stop and his own personal morality and his own life could begin. It was hard to find that place

A president must be willing to share the worst with the people, the bad news with the good. All presidents have a large obligation to inform, warn, protect, to define goals and the true national interest. It should be a truth-telling response to the world, especially in crisis. Trump has, instead, enshrined personal impulse as a governing principle of his presidency.
“When his performance as president is taken in its entirety, I can only reach one conclusion: Trump is the wrong man for the job.”

- Bob Woodward, Rage, pp. 391-2 (emphasis added).