Dick Morris

Catastrophe
$26.99
We are still trying to fix what Bush (whom you had no problem with) and all you do is still push to divide everyone and make things worse.

The New Prince: Machiavelli Updated for the Twenty-First Century
$19.99
Dick Morris
Tries mightily to bore us---
Often on TV,
Where he's an intellectual peewee.
And Dick Morris
Went with a whorris.
His book
Is politics with a meathook.
He's as much like Machiavelli,
As is Tony of the Soprani.

Fleeced: How Barack Obama, Media Mockery of Terrorist Threats, Liberals Who Want to Kill Talk Radio, the Self-Serving Congress, Companies That Help Iran, and Washington Lobbyists for Forei
$16.99
Although generally informative, this book is heavy reading, maybe because it is somewhat incoherent. The use of GREY areas to enhance items of interest is distracting and makes them hard to read because of the loss of contrast. My beef is not content, but rather presentation.

Power Plays: Win or Lose--How History's Great Political Leaders Play the Game
$13.95
Dick Morris, Washington insider turned political analyst, knows all about political strategy. He was once an advisor to Bill Clinton and is credited with coming up with Clinton's famed "triangulation" strategy. In this book, Morris identfies six political strategies that can lead to political success. Interestingly, he provides 20 splendid examples of how these strategies have been misplayed and have led to failure.

The six strategies are:

1. "Stand on Principle"
2. "Triangulate"
3. "Divide and Conquer"
4. "Reform your own Party"
5. "Use a new technology"
6. "Mobilizing the Nation in Times of Crisis"

Sometimes, Morris oversells his explanations. For example, he places Lincoln in the "Divide and Conquer" category, since the Democrats split themselves into three parties in the election of 1860 and allowed Lincoln to win the Presidential election. That makes sense, since the Democrats divided and the Republicans conquered. However, Morris makes it sound like Lincoln maneuvered the Democrats into their crisis as part of his master plan that began with comments and questions raised during the Lincoln/Douglas debates in 1858, rather then simply taking advantage of the split. Lincoln was a political genius, but Morris oversimplifies here.

I mentioned at the top that I am a history teacher. I am also a Spanish teacher and Morris quotes George W. Bush speaking Spanish in a campaign speech: "Muchos espanos viver en ese estado". That's not Spanish. That's not even Spanglish. I've heard Bush speak Spanish. It is nothing to brag about, but it is definitely serviceable. It threw the rest of Morris' research into doubt since he had obviously not even bothered to talk to any Spanish speaker to see if his attempt to write down Bush's Spanish words were even correct. Double checking research is always important. By the way, it should have been "Muchos hispanos viven en ese estado."

So, I give this one a B+. The grade was not really reduced because of the Spanish thing, although it left some nagging doubts and was a major pet peeve.