Frustrating and scattered | Spanking the Donkey: Dispatches from the Dumb Season

The most astute observations ever to emerge from a gorilla suit. | Spanking the Donkey: Dispatches from the Dumb Season | Matt Taibbi

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	• Spanking the Donkey: Dispatches from the Dumb Season Matt Taibbi Three Rivers Press, 2006 - 368 pages average customer review:based on 28 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

Funny, insightful, thoughtful and immature...

I'm a middle-aged Republican who hates the trivialization of the English language (and in particular the overuse of the "f" word) and so I suppose that I should have hated this book. But it's too funny, and in parts too insightful, to dismiss it that easily. Although some of the articles of which the book is a compilation seem forced and artificial, others more than make up for it. I do wish that he had avoided the Hunter Thompson-like drug trip bits, which say more about him than they do about the candidates he covers. This immaturity aside, I have to, with some reluctance, recommend this book. I'm just sorry I missed his Daily Show appearance, which sounds like it captured the best aspects of the book.

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Frustrating and scattered

I'm pretty liberal, so I don't object to Taibbi's politics or disappointment with the system, but I still found myself powerfully frustrated with this book. I saw him on "The Colbert Report" and found him delightful, and expected the same from the book. He's insightful about the public-appearance apparatus behind politicians-- examples of Dean's behavior compared with Kucinich's were really interesting-- but mostly I felt the book to be a well-sourced diatribe. Taibbi seems very angry (with good reason, granted), and I found it hard to slog through so many pages of his rants without any sign of hopefulness or direction. The book was more like a blog of his campaign trail experiences than a fully structured book with a conclusion. I'd rather watch him on Colbert again.

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The most astute observations ever to emerge from a gorilla suit.

There's little I can offer that hasn't been said in other reviews here. But I want to add my voice to those championing Taibbi.

Readers not paying attention might mistake his writing for sophomoric rant, but it's actually eloquent. Having read his book I read the "news" differently, running everything through new and improved filters.

If I ran the world, Spanking the Donkey would be required reading for every voter. Guerilla journalism at its best.

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Great Book

This is a great book. A must for anyone interested in the workings of America's elections.

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Spanking the Donkey

Taibbi is a journalist similar to Hunter Thompson, and the 'gonzo' style of reporting. He takes no prisoners in his approach to coverage of the ludicrous process of a presidential campaign, with all its distractions, relentless schedule, and lame stump speeches. If you like hard-hitting, no-nonsense political coverage and analysis with a good (though dark) sense of humor, you'll enjoy Matt Taibbi's writing as much as I do. Also recommended is his "Smells like Dead Elephants", because as harsh (and deserved) as his assessment of Democrats is, the republicans get it considerably worse (again, deserved).

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The 2004 Election Was a Circus, and Matt Taibbi enjoyed a Front-Row Seat.

As a correspondent for the New York Press, The Nation, and Rolling Stone, Matt Taibbi scoured the political landscape for hard-hitting news stories. But the closer he got to the politicians, the more pompous and vapid they appeared. How could he write anything meaningful about these puffed-up martinets, much less vote for them? Nevertheless, Taibbi forged on and continued his responsibilities as a serious campaign reporter?though not without frequent bouts of blind panic, drug use, and donning a gorilla suit.

Spanking the Donkey indicts the surreal irrelevance of today?s mainstream politics with barbed wit and caustic intelligence. Follow Taibbi as he covers the primary for the 2004 presidential election, joining him for a spot on John Kerry?s campaign plane, face-to-face encounters with John Edwards?s pancake makeup, enough Howard Dean press conferences to memorize the good doctor's stump speech by heart, and?just to spice things up?a two-month stint working undercover in a Republican campaign office in Orlando, Florida. Brimming with uncensored opinions and total truth, Taibbi captures the real American political mind; as a patron at Flo?s Bar in Manchester, New Hampshire, eloquently puts it: ?They all suck . . . who?s running??

?Gonzo journalist Matt Taibbi will do anything . . . to bring political reporting back to life. Spanking the Donkey is all the more necessary in the aftermath of an election that harnessed enough liberal outrage to light the Vegas strip, cost more than a billion dollars, absorbed hundreds of hours we will never get back, and achieved absolutely nothing.? ?Salon

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reviews: page 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6

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