A compelling and sensible overview of America’s emerging democratic crisis.
A veteran columnist assesses the state of American democracy in this debut collection.
Donald Trump’s “words, deeds and basic instincts,” this book asserts, “are fundamentally at odds with America’s long-held essential ideals.” And while “American democracy withstood the Trump presidency,” which served as the nation’s titular “stress test,” the United States is not out of the woods given his sustained popularity on the right and the rise of sycophants who follow in his political footsteps. An attorney, Cooper is also an active columnist whose writings have appeared in more than 100 publications. This volume, a compilation of select columns from 2019 through “the first few months of 2022,” argues that Trump represents a dangerous trend in American politics that disregards the rule of law and fundamental constitutional principles; “openly and unapologetically” challenges the outcomes of fair and free elections; and has “descended into a whirlpool of lies, false narratives and abhorrent stupidities.” And while adamant that Trump represents “the foremost threat to American democracy,” the author does not absolve Democratic politicians for actively participating in the “bipartisan race to the bottom.” Most notably, in addition to joining the toxic cacophony of hyperbolic voices that has become a staple in American rhetoric, the Democrats displayed a preoccupation and “overreaction” in their pursuit of Trump’s first impeachment that lowered the standards of the process in a way that jeopardized its legitimacy. Covering topics that span criminal justice reform to the Jan. 6 insurrection, Cooper’s columns, which are organized thematically and accompanied by short, introductory essays, are well balanced and soundly argued as individual pieces. Stuffed together in a book, the columns make for a sometimes disjointed read. Given the nature of newspaper columns, the volume also lacks references and a bibliography. Some readers may also be skeptical of the work’s idealized version of American democratic history, backed by an ample use of inspirational quotes from Alexander Hamilton, Abraham Lincoln, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and other luminaries. Nevertheless, the book’s reasoned tone and bipartisan critiques are a welcome perspective in an increasingly polarized and heated political landscape.
A compelling and sensible overview of America’s emerging democratic crisis.Pub Date: July 1, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-913606-68-8
Page Count: 194
Publisher: Eyewear Publishing
Review Posted Online: May 6, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2022
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
An engrossing and ominous chronicle, told by a master of the form.
Documenting perilous times.
In his most recent behind-the-scenes account of political power and how it is wielded, Woodward synthesizes several narrative strands, from the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection and Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel to the 2024 presidential campaign. Woodward’s clear, gripping storytelling benefits from his legendary access to prominent figures and a structure of propulsive chapters. The run-up to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is tense (if occasionally repetitive), as a cast of geopolitical insiders try to divine Vladimir Putin’s intent: “Doubt among allies, the public and among Ukrainians meant valuable time and space for Putin to maneuver.” Against this backdrop, U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham implores Donald Trump to run again, notwithstanding the former president’s denial of his 2020 defeat. This provides unwelcome distraction for President Biden, portrayed as a thoughtful, compassionate lifetime politico who could not outrace time, as demonstrated in the June 2024 debate. Throughout, Trump’s prevarications and his supporters’ cynicism provide an unsettling counterpoint to warnings provided by everyone from former Joint Chief of Staff Mark Milley to Vice President Kamala Harris, who calls a second Trump term a likely “death knell for American democracy.” The author’s ambitious scope shows him at the top of his capabilities. He concludes with these unsettling words: “Based on my reporting, Trump’s language and conduct has at times presented risks to national security—both during his presidency and afterward.”
An engrossing and ominous chronicle, told by a master of the form.Pub Date: Oct. 15, 2024
ISBN: 9781668052273
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Oct. 15, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2024
IN THE NEWS
PERSPECTIVES
A revelatory meditation on shattering journeys.
Bearing witness to oppression.
Award-winning journalist and MacArthur Fellow Coates probes the narratives that shape our perception of the world through his reports on three journeys: to Dakar, Senegal, the last stop for Black Africans “before the genocide and rebirth of the Middle Passage”; to Chapin, South Carolina, where controversy erupted over a writing teacher’s use of Between the World and Me in class; and to Israel and Palestine, where he spent 10 days in a “Holy Land of barbed wire, settlers, and outrageous guns.” By addressing the essays to students in his writing workshop at Howard University in 2022, Coates makes a literary choice similar to the letter to his son that informed Between the World and Me; as in that book, the choice creates a sense of intimacy between writer and reader. Interweaving autobiography and reportage, Coates examines race, his identity as a Black American, and his role as a public intellectual. In Dakar, he is haunted by ghosts of his ancestors and “the shade of Niggerology,” a pseudoscientific narrative put forth to justify enslavement by portraying Blacks as inferior. In South Carolina, the 22-acre State House grounds, dotted with Confederate statues, continue to impart a narrative of white supremacy. His trip to the Middle East inspires the longest and most impassioned essay: “I don’t think I ever, in my life, felt the glare of racism burn stranger and more intense than in Israel,” he writes. In his complex analysis, he sees the trauma of the Holocaust playing a role in Israel’s tactics in the Middle East: “The wars against the Palestinians and their Arab allies were a kind of theater in which ‘weak Jews’ who went ‘like lambs to slaughter’ were supplanted by Israelis who would ‘fight back.’” Roiled by what he witnessed, Coates feels speechless, unable to adequately convey Palestinians’ agony; their reality “demands new messengers, tasked as we all are, with nothing less than saving the world.”
A revelatory meditation on shattering journeys.Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2024
ISBN: 9780593230381
Page Count: 176
Publisher: One World/Random House
Review Posted Online: Aug. 2, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2024
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