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How American Democracy Was Trivialized By People Who Think You're Stupid
Doubleday
April 2006
272 pages ISBN: 0385510276 Hardcover
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Non-Fiction Political
People on the right are furious. People on the left are
livid. And the center isn't holding. There is only one
thing on which almost everyone agrees: there is something
very wrong in Washington. The country is being run by
pollsters. Few politicians are able to win the voters'
trust. Blame abounds and personal responsibility is nowhere
to be found. There is a cynicism in Washington that appalls
those in every state, red or blue. The question is: Why? The
more urgent question is: What can be done about
it?
Few people are more qualified to deal with both
questions than Joe Klein.
There are many loud and
opinionated voices on the political scene, but no one sees
or writes with the clarity that this respected observer
brings to the table. He has spent a lifetime enmeshed in
politics, studying its nuances, its quirks, and its decline.
He is as angry and fed up as the rest of us, so he has
decided to do something about it -- in these pages, he vents,
reconstructs, deconstructs, and reveals how and why our
leaders are less interested in leading than they are in the
"permanent campaign" that political life has
become.
The book opens with a stirring anecdote from
the night of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s assassination.
Klein re-creates the scene of Robert Kennedy's appearance in
a black neighborhood in Indianapolis, where he gave a
gut-wrenching, poetic speech that showed respect for the
audience, imparted dignity to all who listened, and quelled
a potential riot. Appearing against the wishes of his
security team, it was one of the last truly courageous and
spontaneous acts by an American politician -- and it is no
accident that Klein connects courage to spontaneity. From
there, Klein begins his analysis - campaign by campaign - of how
things went wrong. From the McGovern campaign polling
techniques to Roger Ailes's combative strategy for Nixon;
from Reagan's reinvention of the Republican Party to Lee
Atwater's equally brilliant reinvention of behind-the-scenes
strategizing; from Jimmy Carter to George H. W. Bush to Bill
Clinton to George W. -- as well as inside looks at the losing
sides -- we see how the Democrats become diffuse and
frightened, how the system becomes unbalanced, and how
politics becomes less and less about ideology and more and
more about how to gain and keep power. By the end of one of
the most dismal political runs in history - Kerry's 2004
campaign for president - we understand how such traits as
courage, spontaneity, and leadership have disappeared from
our political landscape.
In a fascinating final
chapter, the author refuses to give easy answers since the
push for easy answers has long been part of the problem.
But he does give thoughtful solutions that just may get us
out of this mess -- especially if any of the 2008 candidates
happen to be paying attention.
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