The current president of the US is a travesty to all that our country supposedly stands for, a mockery of American ideals, THE em2.5 stars, rounded up
The current president of the US is a travesty to all that our country supposedly stands for, a mockery of American ideals, THE embodiment of a perfect caricature of the ugly American - self obsessed, egoistical, ignorant, arrogant, and on and on. And he is also the pinnacle of what American xenophobic racist "conservativism" has been building up to in this country for decades- it's perfectly clear at this point, from the ways in which his own party has enabled him and refused to check him, that the conservative party has been co-opted by hateful bigots lacking any ideas, driven SOLELY by a fear of the other and by their terror of the fall of white supremacy.
On a personal level - Trump is a petulant man-child, someone who is so insecure he thrives off inflicting pain on others and gets off on being praised (say, by the likes of Putin) - even when this praise is clearly faux buttering-up. This book is mostly about this - about the way Trump basically has no clue as to what he is doing, the way he rules from a place of ignorance and pettiness, off-the-cuff, without any ounce of curiosity about the workings of our government.
I wasn't a huge fan of the book mostly because it's written in the style of an extended article (instead of holding together more of a thesis), and frankly, it stressed me out to once again get down in the trenches and follow along with this insanity from the beginning, on the ground-level (I've been consuming the news at an intoxicatingly voracious pace these past couple years and I basically knew all the info in the book, which was mostly presented "as is", without much analysis that rose above the daily details). Other than that, yeah, definitely agree with the basic premise: Trump is a lunatic who attracts followers and "rules" by inspiring fear, and an individual who is deeply very afraid himself....more
This book was such a mess - a mish-mash soup that tasted as if the author just threw in every trick in his repertoire in order to create an exciting sThis book was such a mess - a mish-mash soup that tasted as if the author just threw in every trick in his repertoire in order to create an exciting suspense, with the jarring effect that none of the elements fit together to give the novel a cohesive feel or conclusion. The premise is that a flight attendant wakes up next to a one-night-stand who has been killed ((view spoiler)[but then the novel steers desperately off course as there are hints at the dead man being a spy (he's not), more hints of his illegal monetary dealings (he's a fund manager), and more entirely incongruent story lines (hide spoiler)]).
To top off the ridiculousness of this story is the fact that the main character is a weak mess of an alcoholic woman who lacks any direction or self control. IF this had been written by a woman, or IF the main character had actually grown in any way throughout her tribulations, I'd feel a bit differently perhaps; however, such a character, seemingly lacking any redeeming qualities, written by a man, struck all the misogynist chords on my radar. I mean. FFS: the woman is hunted by the FBI, woke up next to a dead man in Saudia Arabia, is now a tabloid sensation and yet she learns NOTHING and seems almost nonplussed by it all- after all, her life is such a mess, what's one more tabloid story.. (??) Ugh.
Finally, the finale: the ending was entirely unrealistic, unbelievable, and did not follow from anything in the rest of the story....more
