Burning Down the House, Julian E. Zelizer

 

Burning Down the House:  Newt Gingrich, the fall of a speaker, and the rise of the new Republican party by Julian E. Zelizer is a book that talks about how Newt Gingrich brought on Trump.  It is a concept I have asserted, so I thought it would be good to know it inside and out.

Started: 9/23/2020
Completed: 9/26/2020
Recommendation: Highly Recommended
Recommended By:  The Washington Post

Review:

I really did not pay much attention to politics below the president until Gingrich became Speaker of the House.  I was very interested in Anderson and participated in an in class debate as Ford in elementary school, but I had only the most superficial understanding of the issues.  Listening to this retrospective on how Gingrich came to power was shocking.  His follow-on behavior seems almost predictable.  The coalescence of events that led to Gingrich's rise to power (including one-sided radio talk shows) were also factors that were below my level of perception at the time.  This book is an excellent review of Gingrich's all-out character assassination approach to opponents.

The gamesmanship that has overcome our political system had its beginnings in the events described in this book.  It is a Republican thing and the character assassination that the Republican party started has also been used by the Democrats, but the scale is always so much different.  The GOP is without shame.  The hypocrisy with which Gingrich deployed his smear campaign (having himself been guilty of some of the things that he accused the Speaker of doing) and the partisan nature of his attacks only on Democrats.

Stakes Is High, Mychal Denzel Smith

 

Stakes Is High:  Life after the American dream by Mychal Denzel Smith was on a list of books to read about racism; I think it was in The Nation.

Started: 9/21/2020
Completed: 9/23/2020
Recommendation: Highly Recommended
Recommended By: An anti-racist list

Review:

"It is important here to define 'justice' as the US legal system has perverted our sense of what constitutes it.  It cannot be punishment or retribution for harm caused--justice is not revenge.  Rather, justice is a proactive commitment to providing each person with the material and social conditions in which they can both survive and thrive as a healthy and self-actualized human being."

Mychal Smith puts words and concepts into perspective.  He is quick to point to the heart of a matter and derive a world view consistent with this understanding.  I need this kind of writing as a lifeblood.  This kind of book moves my heart, captures my brain, and forces attention.  Wow.

"What does not have to end is our commitment to each other."

Quiet, Susan Cain

 

Quiet:  The power of introverts in a world that can't stop talking by Susan Cain is a book that I thought might apply to me.

Started: 9/18/2020
Completed: 9/21/2020
Recommendation: Highly Recommended
Recommended By: Nobody

Review:

The person reading the book, Kathe Mazur, does a wonderful job.  I have a hearing problem right in the area of women's voices, so I sometimes find women readers difficult to hear, but, for some reason, Mazur makes everything clear.  Her voice may be a little deeper, which truly helps me.  She may enunciate well.  She might just be impassioned on a quiet topic.  Listening to her read is calming and informative.  A really good experience.

This book is really informative.  As an introvert myself, I see where I have tried to behave as an extrovert and how wearing it is.  I plan to take the suggestions to heart and to find comfort in the quiet.  Quite honestly, listening to audio books has really helped me do that.

Super Sad True Love Story, Gary Shteyngart

 

Super Sad True Love Story by Gary Shteyngart got good reviews all over and I'm pretty sure I read about it in the New York Times.

Started: 9/15/2020
Completed: 9/18/2020
Recommendation: Not Recommended
Recommended By: A lot of places

Review:

The horrifying dystopia envisioned in this book is too close to home.  Ruth Bader Ginsburg died today.  Surely that tempers my perspective.  I did not find the book shocking, but I was  uncomfortable with things like a "suck dick" T-shirt being "hip."  It seemed intended to shock and the casual reference to body parts and sexual positions tied to a "fuckability ranking" seemed cheap.  The characters were flat and plot path was clear.  I just didn't like it.

The Tombs of Atuan, Ursula K. Le Guin

 

The Tombs of Atuan by Ursula K. Le Guin is the second book of the Earthsea Cycle.  I have read it before, but couldn't resist a revisit.

Started: 9/14/2020
Completed: 9/15/2020
Recommendation: Highly Recommended
Recommended By:  Nobody

Review:

It is a good story.  It is well told.  I enjoyed it!

The Hardest Job in the World, John Dickerson

 

The Hardest Job in the World:  The American presidency by John Dickerson seems appropriate in the current environment.

Started: 9/10/2020

Completed: 9/14/2020

Recommendation: Not Recomended

Recommended By:  I read about this book in The New Republic, I think

Review:

Dickerson does his best to offer a positive spin on Donald Trump while clearly indicating how Trump has demolished the standards by which presidents are measured.  To my way of thinking, Dickerson's argument is a categorical set of reasons Trump should not be president and has failed.  Dickerson, instead, looks at Trump as potentially reforming the nature of the presidency.  This book largely takes a Truman forward look at the presidency and there is some reason for doing this, but Dickerson does not make the case for why his focus is there.  My guess is that this is where his knowledge lies.

I was hoping that this book would talk more about how hard the president's tasks are (which it does), not how the process of becoming president makes one unsuitable for the tasks.  I came into the book thinking that Dickerson would take a non-partisan look at the nature of the presidency, but from his looks at Ronald Reagan (literally, all glowing and no indication of how the presidency was hard on him) it became quickly clear that this was going to be a look at how Republicans have both met the nature of the presidency (Reagan, Lincoln, and Eisenhower) and how Republicans have pretty much demolished the presidency (Nixon and Trump) with scant attention paid to anyone else.

It would have been really informative if Dickerson had addressed how difficult the potential for impeachment makes the presidency, but this opportunity was lost.  I don't know, but I have not been impressed with this book which repeats itself frequently and fails to ultimately enumerate why it is so hard to be the president (while given passing reference to structural issues and having to be responsive to the electorate).

The conclusion offered a variety of criteria on which to evaluate a president without any effort at weighting the different elements and without any indication of priority beyond, "the more the better."  

The Bully Pulpit, Doris Kearns Goodwin

 

The Bully Pulpit: Theodore Roosevelt, William Howard Taft, and the golden age of journalism by Doris Kearns Goodwin was recommended by a friend during a discussion group.

Started: 8/29/2020

Completed: 9/10/2020

Recommendation: Recommended

Recommended By: Ann, from the discussion group

Words for which I sought help:

honeyfuggle -- to obtain by cheating or deception

trenchantly -- vigorously or incisively

Review:

I learned so much about these two men and the journalists around them.  It was truly fascinating to see how their lives intertwined and how they both leaned upon and repelled one another over time.  It was good to learn how they negotiated their stormy friendship.  As always, Goodwin's prose is both accessible and clear.  Well read.