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Title: George Herbert Walker Bush (Penguin Lives) by Tom Wicker ISBN: 0-670-03303-0 Publisher: Lipper Pub. Date: 03 May, 2004 Format: Hardcover Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $19.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 3 (1 review)
Rating: 3
Summary: Competent and predictable
Comment: Tom Wicker contributes the latest election year biography of the president's father. This volume is an improvement over his similar work on Dwight Eisenhower for Times Books' American Presidents series. That volume suffered from an overabundance of journalism and not enough scholarship, in that Wicker took his newsman's ideas about Eisenhower (which really hadn't changed in the last 50 years) and imposed them on his work. One expected to hear the Adlai Stevenson jingle playing in the background.
His biography of GHW Bush is better in this regard, but suffers from some of the same flaws. For example, you'll never convince Tom Wicker that Reagan was anything other than an idiot that Bush more or less suffered nobly for eight years (along with the rest of the nation which inexplicably kept electing him). And Wicker will have none of this foolishness that it was the defense buildup of the eighties that led to the collapse of the Soviet Union. Curiously, he gives no alternate explanation for this, I guess because it couldn't possibly have been attributable to Reagan's leadership (or Bush's for that matter).
He gives ample praise to Bush for the coalition he built for Gulf War I, though it does come off as backhanded, since he might be insinuating that the father outdid the son in this regard when it came to Gulf War II. And a good portion of the book is spent reliving the debacle of the 1992 election, which has Wicker excoriating Bush for miscues that were later duplicated during the Clinton Administration, but I guess were okay then. For example, it's too bad that Bush stooped to low tactics in regard to Willie Horton and campaigning against Clinton's supposed character flaws, but Clinton's routine lies about himself and Bush were apparently fair game since they aren't mentioned.
The point of this review is not to say this is a bad book. It is as fair an assessment of the first Bush presidency as you are likely to get from the former Timesman. It might even be characterized as admirable given the outright lies that are being told about the Bushes in order to keep a dynasty from flourishing. It should be noted, though, that the reader can sense Wicker trying to be "fair" with Bush, and it feels awkward. While this is by no means a hatchet job, its tone at times is at times gratingly patronizing.
But, it's better than you could have expected from, say, Anthony Lewis.
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Title: Martin Luther: A Penguin Life (Penguin Lives) by Martin E. Marty, Martin Marty ISBN: 0670032727 Publisher: Lipper Pub. Date: 29 January, 2004 List Price(USD): $19.95 |
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Title: Saint Therese of Lisieux (Penguin Lives) by Kathryn Harrison ISBN: 0670031488 Publisher: Lipper Pub. Date: 01 August, 2003 List Price(USD): $19.95 |
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Title: Franklin Delano Roosevelt (American Presidents) by Roy Jenkins, Richard E. Neustadt, Arthur M., Jr. Schlesinger ISBN: 0805069593 Publisher: Times Books Pub. Date: 01 November, 2003 List Price(USD): $20.00 |
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Title: Rise of the Vulcans: The History of Bush's War Cabinet by Jim Mann, James Mann ISBN: 0670032999 Publisher: Viking Books Pub. Date: 08 March, 2004 List Price(USD): $25.95 |
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Title: Alexander Hamilton by Ron Chernow ISBN: 1594200092 Publisher: The Penguin Press Pub. Date: 26 April, 2004 List Price(USD): $35.00 |
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