Rating: 
Summary: Another Woodward gem!
Review: Another one of Woodward's must-read's for the political junkie...
Rating: 
Summary: Its a good book, but.....
Review: I like Bob Woodward as a reporter. He, more than anyone else, is given access to the inner workings of the White House regardless of party in power and he is almost always fair about the results. Plan of Attack is a good read. Its as good as any other Woodward book.The problem I have with his book (and for many of his books when they come out) is that every revelation in it has been already made public. The major points of it, in some cases, have been distributed to the public in excepts to be read in newspapers or on the internet. As a result, its like knowing what happens in a movie because everybody has already told you what happens.
Rating:
Summary: Comparison
Review: If one wishes to get a good indepth background on the Bush team I feel "Rise of the Vulcans" by James Mann is excellent.
Rating: 
Summary: A balanced journalistic account
Review: This book has been widely publicized and hyped by the media and it goes to the heart of the Bush administration decision for war in Iraq. This is investigative journalism, not history, and thus we are given a very intimate portrait of the president and his advisors and the halls of power from the U.N to Saudi to the white house where decisions were made and plans were hatched. The main problem with this book is not its political views, because it is surprisingly balanced for such a heated subject. The main problem here is that this book has no sense of history and no conclusion of context. Just what was the Iraq war? How will the Iraq war be judged? For some the decision to judge the Iraq war a vast conspiracy is already cemented in our mindsets. But for many the Iraq war has not crystallized. For the Iraq war was quite simply a seminary event. America has never before embarked on a war of building democracy beyond the western hemisphere. One could argue differently about Japan and Germany but the reality is the American occupation of those countries was due to their own attacks on America. In Iraq we have a country far removed from America posing no threat to the mainland, yet posing a threat to the region. And we have an administration with the willingness to gamble that American troops could not just conquer a hostile Arab country but could also create democracy in a place where no such tradition exists. In the least the administration felt a friendly dictator could be set up in one of the Middle east's most fractious countries. This was the epic of the Iraq war. Far beyond a mere conspiracy to get a few gallons of oil, and beyond the mere propaganda of WMD, Iraq was in affect the epic of America entering its place on the world stage as a hegemon, capable of anything. Woodward doesn't touch on this theme and yet for a man of his stature and a book as anticipated as this it would have been nice to have a conclusion that explained just what the Iraq war symbolized for American policy. Thus in the end this book is a balanced account of the events, without much analysis of the aftermath. A good read for anyone interested in the roll up to the Iraq war and the contemporary administration Seth J. Frantzman
Rating:
Summary: Neutral Ground
Review: I agree with the wit of a previous reviewer, so I waited until I actually read this book before commenting. I'm not a big Woodward or Washington Post fan, but when it comes to investigative journalism, Woodward's legacy of thoroughness, dating back to Watergate, appears beyond reproach. I'm a busy person, and try to read and sort facts out for myself, but ultimately, we must either trust or not trust what we read. In this case, I believe Woodward managed to find himself both for and against Bush's policies and decisions towards Iraq. In a quagmire of worthless journalism on this subject, I found Woodward's take both refreshing and enlightening.
Rating:
Summary: A Very Worthwhile Read!!!
Review: Its funny I have read many of the reviews hear and I see that many people aren't actually reading the book. Its obvious to me that they are baseing there reviews on Woodward's interview on 60 minutes; and that is very funny. On that interview, Woodward focused on a few "negative's," Such as president Bush Believes in God, to get on the anti-Bush bandwagon. I really think he did this so that those anti-Bush people (who are buying the Moore, Frankin, etc., propaganda books) would buy his book as well; Not caring if they would actually read it; and that was a brilliant marketing tool. What we get when we read Plan of Attack is an inside account of the inner workings, of an administration, making a HARD decision to go to war. We have all the pros and cons laid out for the President by his staff and intelligence. And what we see is that the evidence is presented to a president who is on top of everything, a president who is skeptical and a president who is in charge. Also the intelligence was presented as a slam dunk (read the book). So the president decided to make the hard choice and go to war; even if we have to do it alone (of course we do have some help Great Britain, Italy, Poland, etc.). Woodward's shows President Bush in a totally different light then all the anti Bush Books, and that is because he got on the inside. While this book is not absolute truth, we must remember there are always flaws, and choicses and biases, etc., it is still a very good account of the inner working of the Bush Administration and will be a good resource for Historians. This is a good read, and if you purchased this book, I only ask one thing, Read it!!!!!
Rating:
Summary: Liberator or warmonger?
Review: This wasn't the book I thought it would be, expecting another stick to beat Bushies over the head with. There is plenty of material for that, but the tone is generally favorable to Bush, with a sort of sly ambiguity beyond my tea leaves assessments.
But after changing in my mind the reason for reading the book at all, it turned out to be an interesting documentation of something always top priority, why a so and so, president no less, decided to go to war, speaking to history, here caught in the act. And there, while Woodward gives us a good piece of documentation, of great value in and of itself, the mystery of what's going on remains. It seems this war was planned years ago and is somehow the fruit of a secret government we never see. One's paraonia remains. Here the book is less successful. But the account is very acute as far as it goes and somewhat unnerving in its portrait of the cavalier Alfred E. Neuman playing Machiavelli, with its strains of behind the soapy idealism, from small foibles and secret agendas great consequences may spring. It remains to be seen what the outcome will be.
Rating:
Summary: try reading the book
Review: has anyone actualy read this book? seriously. both pro bush and anti bush people look real stupid talking about a book they didnt even read. amazon so useless they let anyone post a review on the day the book was released (some pretty fast readers i suppose)
Rating: 
Summary: Anyone Can Apparently Write A Book These Days!
Review: All the BELTWAY 'BS" is beginning to get to me. Please, give me a 'GD" break! Make up your mind fellas, you cannot have it both ways! Now which is it? Credibility? Fair & Balanced Reporting Of The "REAL" facts? Hard decision to go to war, oh, please, spare me! Liberal propaganda? You people are giving me a "GD" headache! What all you dofis' won't do for your fifteen minutes of fame! Get over yourselves and write something worth reading!
Rating:
Summary: Woodward is NOT a Bush Basher, but he has fact problems.
Review: Make no mistake. Woodward is NOT a flaming, turn-off-your-brain-and-just-blindly-hate Bush Basher like Michael Moore or Al Franken. He is basically a fair-minded man, which is increasingly rare in the venomous hate-based liberal press. His problem has to do with basic accuracy of his facts. The Bush administration has pretty much discredited significant parts of this book already. And this isn't the first time it's happened. Woodward has done the same thing to other Democrats and Republicans both. Virtually every time he's released a book in the last ten years, he's had SOMEBODY come forward and claim that he got some important fact wrong or that he just made up whole converstations of which he had no possible way of knowing exactly what was really said. He ROUTINELY puts words in quotation marks without actually directly hearing someone speak those words. That is UNFORGIVABLE in journalism. Paraphrasing is not quoting. Putting words to how someone feels is not quoting. Quoting is reserved for ONLY when you have an exact statement in the unaltered form it first appeared. Woodward should know this.
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