People familiar with author Michael Wolff know about his penchant for inflating events and making them out to be more dramatic. It’s fair to say that some of what Wolff writes in Fire and Fury should be taken with a grain of salt.

That said, the notion that everything Wolff wrote is false and that he had, according to Trump, “zero access” to him and White House staff is ridiculous.

Press Secretary Sarah Sanders decried the book as nothing but “tabloid gossip.” It’s the irony of all ironies. For decades, Donald Trump operated in and thrived in the world of tabloid gossip, doing whatever he could to gain the attention of The New York Post and Daily News, even going so far as playing the role of ‘John Miller,’ a publicist for Trump. Nothing made Trump happier than to find himself the center of attention on Page Six, so the idea that he’s suddenly outraged over being the subject of “tabloid gossip” is rather hilarious.

Trump’s denials ring more hollow than his sudden political shift from a Manhattan liberal to a populist conservative.

Whatever one thinks of Wolff and his work, the idea that he wrote the book based on nothing but hearsay conversations doesn’t hold water. Wolff claims to have “dozens of hours” of recorded conversations with senior staff. He said he spoke directly with the president who may not have believed the discussions were in fact, an interview and not an off the record conversation.

Trump’s rage has more to do with the fact that he expected Wolff to write a suck-up book that would discuss his brilliance and wonderfulness above all else. Trump lives for praise, and it doesn’t matter who provides it. The problem for Trump (and those around him) is the press will discuss the book as though everything in it is true. They won’t question the contents of the book, and that will only enrage Trump further leading to more outbursts.

But that’s his fault. If he wanted to grant access to somebody that would provide a fair account of what happens in the White House, he should have chosen more wisely. He essentially chose a gossip columnist to do the work.

His pretend outrage isn’t fooling anybody other than his most ardent supporters.