Disclaimer: I don’t know what the political boundaries are for this website, i.e. what’s appropriate to talk about and what’s not. I’m a bleeding heart liberal who makes other bleeding heart liberals look like Birchers. I also bear the scars of many a social media fight over politics and have no desire to reopen wounds here. So I’ll be reviewing the quality of this book and what Woodward is saying in its context. Please do not take this as support of an administration I find […]
Not the president we want, but possibly the president we deserve
In all the madness of 2016, I forgot that so much of the talk in the first month was about how deeply Trump didn’t want to be in the White House. That the campaign was all a ruse to create a new media organization run by Roger Ailes and Steve Bannon, with Sean Hannity, Bill O’Reilly, and Satan (citation needed) at the helm. That view is reaffirmed, here, and gives me flashbacks to how terrible a prospect that would’ve been. Look, Donald Trump looked like […]
‘Fire and Fury’ Is a Steve Bannon Tell-All Written by Michael Wolff
Over the weekend, I read Michael Wolff’s Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House, and if you haven’t read it yet, I would suggest it’s not really worth the time investment if you’ve been keeping up with politics since Donald Trump was elected (that is most of you, I imagine). It essentially recounts Donald Trump’s first year in office, and there’s not a lot in the book we didn’t already know. It’s basically everything that the NYTimes, The Washington Post, Politico, and Axios reported […]
Now for something different: A sort of a follow-up
With this paper, Professor Kathrine Cramer revisits the rural groups she originally interviewed for her 2016 book The Politics of Resentment: Rural Consciousness in Wisconsin and the Rise of Scott Walker. These included various morning “coffee klatches” gathering at local gas stations in small Wisconsin towns with populations ranging from 600-2000. The groups were made up of men who were either retired, unemployed or employed. One central-west group was made up of a women’s lunch group made up of employed and retired women. The interviews were conducted […]
A poor man’s idea of a rich man, a stupid man’s idea of a smart man, a weak man’s idea of a strong man.
I don’t understand Donald Trump, he is anathema to everything I believe in, from the inherent worth of hard work, to the importance of intellectual pursuit and excellence, hell, even the idea that class is best represented by less not more. But more than simply not understanding him, I didn’t see him coming, I never imagined he would be the republican nominee, let alone the president, I was completely blindsided by this. Now, when I encounter something I don’t understand I always try to learn […]
In our hour of darkness, Oh Lord, grant me vision
In the summer of 2005, in the Korangal Valley of Afghanistan, a US Navy SEAL reconnaissance team was ambushed by local militia. Three of the four men were killed in the fight, and a quick reaction force helicopter sent in to rescue the team was destroyed by an RPG, killing all 8 SEALs on board. Only one man came out of the battle alive. This is his story. It’s a well-written book, both informative and entertaining. Luttrell sprinkles the book with humorous anecdotes about the […]