The American Spectator

* On a book by Michael Kinsley, “If Michael Kinsley were a Dickens character his name would be Barnaby Sneerly.”

* On a book on the “men’s movement” humbug Robert Bly, she says his mummery calls for …”campfires, animal skins, reverence for the tribal elder (Bly), and enough spears for round-the-clock performance of Aida in the major opera houses of the world.”

* In a review of a book on John Quincy Adams, she refers to feminist icon Abigail Adams as “America’s founding scold,” and says, “Her specialty was long distance nagging.”

* On a memoir by Doris Kearns Goodwin we read, “Like many aging Democrats, Goodwin tends to wax nostalgic about the things that liberalism has ruined.”

* On a political book there’s this aside, “The growing feminization of America has turned journalism into a cat fight. The media’s favorite buzzword, ‘mean-spirited,’ has a definite hiss to it and cannot be uttered without an accompanying sniff. Girlish double emphasis flies as reporters demand to know what the President really said and what he really meant. The ubiquitous figure of our time, ‘a highly placed administration official who spoke on condition of anonymity,’ suggest a beldame in britches hanging over the back fences of government whispering, ‘Don’t you dare tell a soul.’”

* On a political novel, “Powertown is being hyped as another Bonfire of the Vanities, but in fact it’s a cast of thousands looking for a novel. If they ever find it, they can call it a gas leak of the incongruities.”

* On a book about the Spanish-American War, “Anyone who is disgusted with Pat Schroeder’s politically correct navy will get a thrill up the spine and a lump in the throat reading these descriptions of a time when America’s sailing men were wind-whipped, not pussy-whipped, and morale was in the stratosphere.”

* On a ghosted book about a former Congressperson’s career, “Susan Molinari is so bereft of self-knowledge and introspective power that one is tempted to read this book through spread fingers like a queasy juror looks at autopsy photos.”

If these examples don’t make you eager for the book, then you delight not in man (nor woman neither), and surely your sense of humor was shot off in the war.

Buy the book. (Click here to order.) You’ll have fun reading it. And when you’re done it will sit nicely on your book shelf next to the well-thumbed copy of STET Damnit!, King’s collection of “The Misanthrope’s Corner” columns written for National Review. You do have that one, don’t you?