Game Change: Obama and the Clintons, McCain and Palin, and the Race of a Lifetime
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 | Product Details: Hardcover 464 pages Release Date: 01 January 2010 Publisher: Harper ISBN: 0061733636 Rating:   Sales Rank: 802 | | Look for similar books by subject: | | Customers who bought this item also bought:
| | Customer Reviews: Really very good (02 September 2010)There is very little to say about Game Change that isn't immediately obvious to anyone who picks up the book. Game Change chronicles the 2008 (and leadup) primary and presidential elections. Reasonably impartial and with a good balance between professionalism and relaxed prose the authors of Game change take us through the close contest between Clinton and Obama, the bizarre humiliation of Edwards and the shock choice of Sarah Palin as VP running mate for McCain. The book is informative and fascinating but drags slightly too long on the primary races, while interesting we all know we really want to hear about Sarah Palin and her blunders rather than a protracted battle between Clinton and Obama. (in saying that the Obama Clinton Race is probably much for interesting on a academic level, whereas its just plain fun to read about Palin's exploits.) Game Change is probably the best summary of the election you can find - That is on the presumption that most of the information contained within is correct, I haven't heard too much slamming of the work, and fact checking myself is just asking to ruin the fun of reading about political controversy. Boy are we in trouble (19 August 2010)Here are three inescapable truths that one can learn from reading this book, Sarah Palin is a nut job who has no more right to expect to be electged president than dog catcher, Obama really had no idea what he was doing running as president other than it was "his time" (whatever that means), and the media is infantile, sex obsessed, and has all the perspective on the world on the world of the average sex crazed teenager In short, it confirmed my own particular world view precisely and had the election to be run all over again I would favor a ticket of McCain and just about anyone on the list other than Sarah Palin, perhaps with Biden, but it looks like the grown ups have left the political building. God help us. While I had read some of the reviews of this book I was really unprepared for what a nut job Sarah Palin is throughout her portion of the book. From the moment that she is caught muttering that her selection is "God's will" to the periods in which she goes berserk over the new clothes, to her seeming inability to pronounce people's names correctly (much less master public policy) she is the scariest of all the people one meets in the book. Her selection as McCain's running mate is a clear sign that whatever else God is, he is certainly not a Republican. While certainly ignorant, she is not stupid and seems intent on making her way regardless of her own unfitness for the job. The fact that she is still considered a viable political force is measure of the sheer ignorance of the electorate to understand what are and most certainly are not the proper qualifications for president, such as the ability to speak English. She clearly played a significant role in costing the Republicans the 2008 election, for though she may have charmed the red neck voter, she scared the bejesus out of middle America. Obama's election can be seen as the ultimate repudiation of Bush. After all Obama is everything Bush was and is not, articulate, well educated and self made. What Obama lacks and this is even brought home even by members of his staff is substance. Why is this man running for president? What is the goal? At one point when Joe Biden is shown what the tax policy is, his one reaction is "you have got to be kidding me?" I suppose a lack of substance can be an advantage in an election, since there is less out there for opponents to latch onto. However if we are stuck with a democratic system of government we should not see candidates run campaigns that are essentially about nothing. It worked for Seinfield, but is this really what we want when selecting political candidates? Obama's single advantage remains that he is not Bush and after that anything is an improvement. The candidate who comes off most unsympathetically in this book is John Edwards and his hellion of a wife, Elizabeth. Not the sort of people one wants in the oval office or even over for dinner. An Edwards administration would have been about John trying to seek emotional succor from any lame brain new age outlet around while Elizabeth, crazy as a bed bug, and worse than any first lady since Mary Todd, laid down the law. While it is nice for politicians to model themselves after the founding fathers, the one who John Edwards appears to channel is no one less than Aaron Burr, the sex crazed populist and founder of Tammany Hall. The parallels continue to be striking Edwards was the second person on his party's ticket in 2004 as Burr was in 1800. Burr like Edwards was widely dismissed by the grown ups of his and the other party. My ancestor John Adams referred to Burr as Catiline, the famous 1st century BC populist and naturally opponent of the republic and stability. All former Secretaries of the Treasury should flee should Edwards enter a room least the parallels with Burr continue. Edwards comes off as someone who is perhaps his own greatest fan and obsessed with style over substance. His own brand of populism is, as usual with that form of political expression, more about self love than public good. Hilary Clinton is another figure in this narrative. One is sorry for her since she felt that 2008 was her big pay off year. The Democrats had Bush's record to run against, but they could not have expected the election do be given to them as it was by the fact of Sarah Palin and Bush's last screw up, the economic catastrophe of September 2008. As someone who clearly had put up with a great deal throughout her life, Hilary appears to have thought that karma had to run in her favor. Of course we now know that it didn't and perhaps her days of running for elective office are over. Oddly enough, for someone obsessed with policy, she could not come up with a meaningful reason for people to vote for her for president either, other than a sense of entitlement. Where this entitlement came from is unclear, perhaps being married to Bill Clinton, which appears to be a somewhat unenviable job. The most heroic figure is John McCain. He manages to come back from certain defeat to win his party's nomination and he offered a real opportunity to de-Bush and de- Rove (and truth be told de-Strom Thurmond) his party and make it an organization run by responsible 21st century grown ups. Tragically this was not to be. The party chose to go on a bender with Sarah Palin (where it still is today) and Bush, after screwing up most things within the job description of the president of the United States, played his final card and screwed up the world's economy making McCain's election impossible. Party regulars are correct to insist that Bush not promote his memoirs until after election day 2010. Like "Vanity Fair" (which would have made a better title for this book) no one emerges as triumphant and positive, the worst character is of course the media. Throughout the book the primary obsession with the media is who is sleeping with whom. To be honest an effective president who prefers carnal knowledge of a McCormick reaper would be preferable to some idiot who really has no business in public office to begin with, all to often the case. The media in "Game Change" is constantly trying to get the goods on anyone having an affair. Policy issues, lack of substance, lack of experience, the sources of campaign contributions are all just so much inconsequence. Sex is not. To be honest, given the grueling level of fund raising and speech making that one has to do in order to run for any public office, the ability to carry on an affair suggests multi-tasking skills which might be useful in potential leader of what used to be called the free world. Far from disqualifying a person as president, this lack of marital fidelity might be a good thing for the job. At least that is what we ought to tell the media when it learns the facts of life and advances from the mentality of a sexually retarded 14 year old. Speaking of facts of life, some criticism is order of the analysis of the book. While the book did involve a number of interviews, the authors should have put their thinking caps on. Clearly the leading lights of the Democratic Party had a meeting or meetings or conference calls in late 2006-early 2007 and decided that they could not stand the Clintons and used this nice guy from Illinois to block them. Things do not just happen in politics by chance the way they seem to think it does. Ditto for the sexual peccadilloes of the various candidates (and in one case, a spouse). These things are generally laid down as bait in order to convince the generally clueless press to undermine an opponent. This kind of stuff doesn't just happen either as careful observers of the revelations concerning Monica, Callista and the other Mrs. Livingston might recall. Despite this lack of understanding of the forces really at work that lead to the rise of Obama, the defeat of McCain and the ongoing lunacy that is Sarah Palin, this is an interesting and well-researched book. I would give it high marks for the scope of the people the authors interviewed (which they take some pride in), In terms of analysis, I would only give this book a mediocre rating since the authors display some reluctance to figure out what all these hours and hours of interviews actually mean. What does this all tell us about the political process? Well nothing good in my opinion. Hardly qualifies (19 August 2010)This insipid telling of the story apparently impresses some people as incisive and newsworthy. I am one of the unconvinced. Aside from snippets of imagined conversation, the book is a rehash of superficial background material and chit-chat. No effort to extend the campaign process into a meaningful match to stated political philosophy or to list the numerous violations of ethical standards that each candidate engaged in, or to highlight the outrageous examples of contradictions and hypocrisy by the respective candidates. One glaring example for John McCain comes to mind: there is no mention whatsoever of the role played by his guru, Phil Gramm, the former US Senator from Texas, who'se role in facilitating the financial mess is extensive and part of the public record. Same with Hillary and Obama. Nothing worthwhile to be found in Game Change. Candid and Entertaining (16 August 2010)The book provides an insight into the major 2008 presidential campaigns. It is not an expose on any one of the candidates, nor does it purport to be. It provides a candid look on, sometimes funny, antics of the various players. I found the John Edwards sections quite enlightening and entertaining. The authors devoted many more sections on the Clintons and, later, Palin. This could be partly due to the fact that these two campaigns had more, for a lack of a better word, comical incidents than the others. The book painted the Obama campaign as a well-oiled juggernaut but the rest as amateur sailboats. That could be true and I have no reason to disagree but I just felt that the former probably more vulnerable and the latter more organized simply based on my own impression of the campaigns. Insightful (15 August 2010)Found this book very interesting and a behind the scenes look at politics and campaigningAS THE EAGLE CRIES: SHARON'S JOURNEY HOME | |
