Rating: 
Summary: One-Sided Neo-Marx Rant
Review: One-sided neo-marx rant on how President Bush is a brilliant liar. If you're a fan of this genre you'll probably love it. Bush is in the pocket of evil corporations. That media is un-biased as a result of their left-leaning politics (by this I mean the way they actually vote), but rather is actually part of the "vast right-wing conspiracy", and is ingeniously manipulated by republicans.The reality is anyone who is manipulated by sound-bites & talking-heads deserves to be. This author is a political apparatchik, no more & no less, and like his counterparts on the right, like Sean Hannity & Laura Ingram to name a few, he only sees the deceit of his adversary. Where was this guy during the Clinton administration? Or why not a book on how politicians lie in general? You see, any author that writes such one-sided election-year propaganda will be embraced by their comrades as a brilliant hero. Expect this book to be well reviewed by The New York Times, NPR, and by the army of useful idiots of the left.
Rating: 
Summary: A Must-Read for Informed Voters!
Review: Paul Waldman takes the media to task in this book about George W. Bush's carefully-crafted public persona and the not-so-pretty truths behind it. If you want to know what is REALLY going on in the White House, read this book. It isn't about a bunch of "gaffes" and "misstatements" on the part of the President; his deceptions are far more serious than that. The media doesn't even call him on any of his lies, because they buy his down-home unsophisticated good-ol-boy act. Do you know what the "Healthy Forests Initiative" is really all about? How about the "Clear Skies" initiative? Sounds pretty environment-friendly, right? Those are just some of the pretty names Dubya tacks onto policies that DO THE OPPOSITE! Yes, folks, we are living in Bizarro-world led by a 1st class manipulator. The average voter would never even know how they are being deceived. Read this book; you won't see the President in the same light again.
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Summary: A must-read analysis of the Bush facade.
Review: Paul Waldman, a media and political analyst, is a liberal, and not ashamed to flaunt that fact. A list of suggested interview questions for the author directly from the books publisher includes this one: "You clearly are a liberal. So you are biased against Bush. Why should we listen to you?" Well, we-both liberals and conservatives alike-should listen to (or better yet, read) Waldman's well-organized logbook of Bush Administration deception, centered around his central thesis: how the minds behind George W. Bush have orchestrated a perceptual fraud on the mass public, characterized by deception, that is being reinforced by the media. Waldman gets right to the chase, using straightforward language to bring forth his main arguments. In a way, Fraud feels like a complement to Al Franken's Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them (even both titles make the same general point), but is more serious, remaining free of humorous intent. Waldman, like Franken, uses Internet searching a fair deal, and most of the sources and footnoted materials may be familiar to many. With the simplified style and vast usage of internet search tools, an armchair anti-Bush activist gets the feeling that they themselves could've written this book-if only they had the time or the publishing deal. Fraud is more of a populist primer on the Bush media machine than a full-fledged academic masterpiece. Which is the way to go when trying to reach a defrauded public. Unfortunately, Waldman stumbles at some points. A book that seems to characterize itself as a analytical expose should remain based on fact and free of message-hampering partisan zeal. Yet Waldman editorializes greatly at times, especially in the following passage: "If anyone is guilty of treason, it's John Ashcroft. Ashcroft is a traitor to liberty, a traitor to justice, and a traitor to the noble ideals on which America was founded. Despite what he may think, Ashcroft is not a true American patriot." While many would agree completely, such wording shouldn't be in what would be better suited as an objective analysis. Still, Bush backers will deny the facts presented in the book, and simply dismiss Waldman as a partisan liberal who is out to get Bush. But Waldman has collected vast amounts of facts and details from various sources, and his main thesis regarding the "fraud" behind Bush's image, the way he has led the nation, and the media's wrongdoings, are backed up nicely (a vast majority of the pages contains at least one footnote)-and not distorted in an Ann Coulter fashion. While diehard fans of politics and serious Democrats or Bush critics may already be aware of the information presented, it's interesting to see how Waldman ties it all together. Does it rise above all the other anti-Bush books? Not really. It's a should-read for the uninitiated; if you pay such close attention to politics that none of this is new to you, do something positive for the country-give Fraud to someone who's still unaware of the manipulation they've undergone.
Rating:
Summary: No Middle Ground
Review: Reviewing the 20 add Amazon reads' rating I'm struck by the lack of three stars. It's all ones and fives. Count me among the fives. If you're looking for an update on the science of getting elected this is the book to read. I suspect, however, that most of the readers will be those seeking yet another reason to loath GWBush. What's really depressing is how well Paul Waldman presents the Media as lap dogs rather than guard dogs of the "right too know."
Rating:
Summary: No Middle Ground
Review: Reviewing the 20 add Amazon reads' rating I'm struck by the lack of three stars. It's all ones and fives. Count me among the fives. If you're looking for an update on the science of getting elected this is the book to read. I suspect, however, that most of the readers will be those seeking yet another reason to loath GWBush. What's really depressing is how well Paul Waldman presents the Media as lap dogs rather than guard dogs of the "right too know."
Rating:
Summary: The Jig is Up!
Review: The author presents absolutely unrefutable arguments, with all the documentation and back-up evidence you need, to demonstrate how the American public has been misled, cheated, and manipulated by the current administration, who all seem absolutely without any ethics or concern for the American people. One can only hope that its not too late to correct some of the truly terrible legislation and policies that have been implemented. If not, we're all in deep trouble. This book should be required reading for every legislator, journalist, and public figure in America. For private citizens also! Thank goodness the USA is still a democracy and books like this can still be published.
Rating:
Summary: Very informative with the best cover picture
Review: The cover is great for throwing itself out at people, and to help establish a simple message in the minds of passers-by. "George Bush is a FRAUD!" If not for that great cover I might have passed this jewel up at the bookstore. The book is well written. I found myself for extended periods of time consumed in the book. The book also presents a quick view of several tricky republican mudslinging and topic avoidance tactics. I recommend this book as a gift for anyone thinking of voting for George Bush this election season. The more people that despise this man, the less chance we'll see him in office next year.
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Summary: Wipe that smirk off your face.
Review: The only way the conservative mindset can fake democracy is through fraud and Waldman's portrait exposes the game plan in action with the relevant details on Bushocracy. Bush seems to have discovered being stupid could play to his advantage as a cover for the deceptions necessary. In fact, behind this stealth operation lies a well-organized political machine with all the dirty tricks reduced to a new reactionary political science, a major piece of the con being the neutralization of the media. I was wondering what had happened to that smirk. Someone figured out it was bad PR. It's gone.
Rating:
Summary: The truth shall set you free
Review: The thing that sets this book apart from all the other anti-Bush books is the amount of support the author provides for his arguments. While it is chock-full of evidence and documentation, it is also very readable and accessible. All the evidence, of course, will probably not sway die-hard conservatives or supporters of Bush (who seem immune to reason) but hopefully this book will be widely read among moderates and liberals. And, hopefully, they will be motivated enough to DO SOMETHING ABOUT THE FRAUD. What should we do? 1. Tell a friend (or even better, buy them a copy of this book), 2. Write letters to your local paper to expose the ongoing fraud, 3. VOTE Democrat this year and send the FRAUD back to his phony-baloney ranch in Crawford, Texas.
Rating: 
Summary: Explains a lot
Review: This book "jarred loose" some questions that had been disturbing me for a while -- all the way from the disputed election to the actions after September 11 and beyond. Something wasn't right. While I never read a lot of the matters in detail while they were going on, this book confirmed a lot of unease I was feeling. I won't reiterate the issues raised by Paul Waldman - he writes them clearly and understandably. But basically, the book deals with Bush's manipulation of the media, his building up of a "down home" type of persona, his "turn around of the meaning" explanations concerning tax cuts (Waldman makes use of Orwell's "doublespeak) as well as his "war on terrorism." Most thinking people, whether conservative or liberal will find a lot of food for thought. Also fascinating was the insight that the Republican Party - a party begun under Abraham Lincoln Of The Emancipation Proclamation - has become more and more reactionary and "conservative" in the most negative sense - especially on social issues. In other words, the Republican party of today has turned into something I don't know any more. This has all troubled me a lot. For my entire adult voting life, I would probably be called an economic "conservative" - if, by that term, we refer to being pro private enterprise, opposing excessive government handouts, and taking the idea that it is business in general and people in particular who produce the wealth from which our taxes come. From a social viewpoint, I may be more of a centrist, as I am also very concerned about the problems of the poor and the targets of racial and gender discrimination. (Yes, I value "property rights," which the conservatives favor greatly - but then, I also want my civil rights.) My reason for not giving this book five stars is when it got into partisan politics and tried to show one party as being more interested in people than the other. For sure, conservatives need to treat their workers fairly as well as guard against racial and gender discrimination. Government regulations came about because many businesses treated their employees badly in the past; that's a matter of historical record. Working people, racial minorities and women have not always fared well from policies advocated by conservatives. Liberals, however, need to realize business and economic activity generate taxes. Businesspeople, for sure, are not angels and yes, we do need some government regulation. But Liberals must remember that government people are not angels, and we need accountability on both sides to restrain greed, which runs rampant in both business and government. I recommend the book highly.
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