From Barnes & Noble
According to Graydon Carter, the ruinous invasion of Iraq is just the tip of the iceberg. The longtime Vanity Fair editor-in-chief accuses the Bush White House of curtailing our freedoms, mortgaging our economy, ravaging our environment, and badly damaging our relations with other nations. With hundreds of specific examples, he documents the administration's spending abuses, hypocrisy, and attacks on personal freedom.
Publishers Weekly
No quarter is given in Vanity Fair editor Carter's furious, comprehensive indictment of the Bush administration. Dispensing with satire and mind-of-Bush psychoanalysis, Carter and his researchers sum up a now-familiar anti-Bush case mainly through a relentless buildup of often bullet-pointed facts, including many thematic litanies of Bush policies, a list of American soldiers killed in Iraq and a debunking of the 2004 State of the Union address. A sprinkling of choice quotes highlights what come across as broken promises, cynical deceptions and presidential inanity ("It's clearly a budget. It's got lots of numbers in it") that Carter uses to sum up the administration. He condemns the shortage of biochemical warfare suits for American soldiers in Iraq, even though he believes Iraq had no biological or chemical weapons, and he blames Bush both for soaring trade deficits and for protectionist measures. Carter's voice comes through this blunt marshalling of facts and figures; people will be listening. (On sale Sept. 8) Forecast: This book is basically a branded, annotated list one tailored to a ready audience that is looking for facts to throw at undecided neighbors as debate heats up. Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.
Library Journal
Readers of Vanity Fair will not be surprised by the tone of editor in chief Carter's anti-Bush book since the magazine has produced several feature-length investigations critical of the President. Carter enumerates the areas of American life that he believes have been diminished or damaged by Bush policies, from the economy, civil liberties, the judiciary, and the environment to our reputation abroad with a misdirected war on terror. He contends that many of the policies and reforms will last far longer than the current administration and that much of the change has been enacted below the radar, if not in secret. Carter believes that the administration deceived Congress, the American people, and the UN in order to go to war in Iraq, and he devotes 12 pages to list the 833 coalition members killed in the year following the "end of hostilities." Although the documentation is incomplete, this book provides evidence of research and is not merely the author's opinion. Recommended for public libraries. [See Prepub Alert, LJ 5/15/04.]-Jill Ortner, SUNY at Buffalo Libs. Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.
