Book review of Woodward and Costa’s Peril…
Peril. Bob Woodward and Robert Costa, authors (2021). Who this book is not about: While the authors are mostly responsible for causing the media hype about the Milley-Pelosi interchange after January 6 (Trump aka Il Duce called Milley a traitor), it’s neither about the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs nor the Speaker of the House. It’s about the transition (or lack thereof) from the administration of the worst president in US history to the administration of the newly elected president, to whom the ex-president has never conceded.
Do you care? Maybe not. “Let’s not dwell on the past,” some people might say. Others still continue to believe the Big Lie. All that’s scary, and so is this book! A narcissistic psychopath with a fuehrer complex took us very close to the precipice that would plunge us into fascism, turning the US into one of those “shithole” countries he’d railed about during one rage. So this book is also about how the “marching morons” (C. M. Kornbluth’s aptly appropriate description of Narcissus le Grand’s rabid followers), who, like lemmings, followed the “f%$#ing moron,” their Pied Piper, right over that cliff and tried to drag more sane Americans along. (Good tidbit in the book about McConnell’s admiration for SecState Tillerson’s quote: Moscow Mitch said to his sycophants that Tillerson was allowed to deny calling Trump a moron because he called the president a “f&^%ing moron”! Of course, McConnell used Trump for four years to further his own fascist agenda. By the way, I was happy to see the word fascist used in the book to describe Trump…rarely, but even by some of Trump’s own “supporters”!)
The book, as chaotic as the Trump administration’s four years, can also be considered that administration’s post mortem, a forensic analysis of a dead criminal who almost destroyed American democracy. Of course, like a zombie, Trump might rise again and prey on democracy again. He was impeached twice (which will be the Big Loser’s most lasting legacy), but he was never convicted. He still has the “marching morons” who continue to follow him, although their numbers are reduced now as many of them die from Covid. (Is the virus eliminating the “stupid gene”? If so, there’s collateral damage, of course.)
This book is scary indeed! It’s Dr. Strangelove and Full Metal Jacket all wrapped up in a real American tragedy! And the fright still grips because me because we might have yet another Trump reality show. That gives me nightmares. It should give any sane person nightmares.
For reasonable and logical people who lived through this four-year debacle caused by a deranged psychopath, there’s not much new here…if they were paying attention. From the day Trump made the announcement he was running after that grand entrance in Trump Tower in NYC, I said that we should never let this deranged person anywhere near the “nuclear football.” Yet we did, and the country suffered greatly, and so did the world, teetering far too close to an apocalypse.
While everyone should read this book (of course, the Big Loser, his minions, and the marching morons will only diss it…if they know how to read—Trump doesn’t!), I do have a few nits to pick. One, the authors are too damn nice to Trump’s evil minions, all fascists like Meadows, Miller, Steve Bannon, Pompeo, Don Jr., Giuliani, etc., etc. Two, the authors did no favors for General Milley by hyping his participation in trying to control Il Duce’s multiring circus; that only made the poor man an easy and continuing target of Trump’s wrath.
As you read this book, you’ll see there’s more than one American hero here, albeit some were reluctant ones like Pence, who saved the country from disaster. May we still have more around if the Big Loser runs again in 2024!
I suppose I should have posted this review at Pub Progressive, my political blog, but it is a book review and an honest one, after all. And this is an important book to read. It contains good journalism, even if the writing is poor at times and a bit sensational. In their hurry to capture market share, Woodward and his publishers are becoming more and more willing to sacrifice quality. It’s a long but an easy read, especially if you paid attention to what’s been going on; and it’s damn scary! So maybe you shouldn’t read it late at night? And maybe it will only be a prelude to the apocalypse?
***
Comments are always welcome!
The Chaos Chronicles Collection. This bundle contains three full sci-fi novels. Survivors of the Chaos begins with a dystopian Earth controlled by international mega-corporations that have resorted to private militias to police what remains of the collapse of Earth’s society; it ends with the third of three starships bound for the 82 Eridani system…and the first interstellar stowaway. Sing a Zamba Galactica is an epic history that goes from first contact with good ETs to a war against bad ones that have conquered Earth, but some strange collective intelligences also make trouble in the near-Earth galactic neighborhoods. If the first two novels are considered my Foundation tales, in Come Dance a Cumbia…with Stars in Your Hand! my Mule is the autocratic Human who wants to control all near-Earth space using ESP powers. Available wherever quality ebooks are sold.
Around the world and to the stars! In libris libertas!
