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AmSpecBlog
The Latimer Stupidity
Well, Matt Latimer has a book out.
Don't all rush at once to your Barnes and Noble.
The real scoop on young Mr. Latimer, a Bush speechwriter who has now penned the requisite poison pen letters to his president and colleagues, is revealed in this great piece over in the Wall Street Journal by William McGurn -- Matt's boss in Bushland.
Ouch!
Since I don't know Mr. Latimer and haven't read the book, there's no contribution here on his substance. But if McGurn is right, and there's no reason to suspect otherwise, this book is just another one of those insipid White House aide books in which the disgruntled author uses the gift bestowed on him by trusting superiors to turn the boss and colleagues into human fire hydrants, with the author playing the role of Spot the dog.
There is zero intellectual effort, just an attempt to use the publishing industry to make a quick buck and get a fast fifteen seconds of face time on cable TV. The hero of the piece is apparently Donald Rumsfeld. No problem -- I like Rumsfeld. But the author apparently never tells the reader he's helping Rummy with his, Rumsfeld's, memoirs, a necessary fact if one is going to dump on others but not the former Defense Secretary.
Latimer's post-White House career has gotten off to a rocky start. As future employers realize this is the way he treats a former President-boss and the people he worked with -- who wants to work with a guy like that?
Once upon a time, before I actually got to the White House, I loved reading books like this as a kid, on the mistaken assumption they were real history. In fact, books like this are to history what McDonald's is to a gourmet meal in a four star restaurant. So once on the scene and understanding a bit better how the world worked, I adopted a rule if I felt the need to buy. Never buy these odious missives in a bookstore. Wait until that next summer vacation when you are ambling through a used-book sale and -- voila! -- what once was twenty-something bucks is now a nickel.
Mr. McGurn's advice, it is clear, is to go the nickel route.
I think he's on to something. If the late spy novelist Robert Ludlum were telling this tale, I suspect he'd call it "The Latimer Stupidity."
Comments
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2Anglico| 9.22.09 @ 10:24AM
He points out Bush was not a conservative (NCLB, Prescription Drugs, Open Borders,and all the rest), what is stupid about that? Maybe YOU should read the book and THEN give us a point by point refutation of Latimer's points.
Jeffrey Lord| 9.22.09 @ 11:11AM
2Anglico..
But I already know that...this is news? McGurn has read the book and was Lattimer's boss. He has some knowledge of both subjects, I would say...
Quin| 9.22.09 @ 11:41AM
Jeff,
I don't approve of Latimer's kiss-and-tell routine. But I DO approve of the points he has been making, which is that conservatives seriously lost their way; that the Bush administration was filled at the middle levels with incompetent, underqualified, underimportant people chosen for loyalty or connections alone; and that power did utterly bedazzle too many in the ranks, at the expense of principle. Also, his characterizations of President Bush -- his arrogant insularity, his disdain for the conservative movement, etc. -- ring entirely true to me. I say this as somebody who will go to my deathbed thanking Bush for his actions against terrorism, for his political courage on numerous fronts, and for his promotion of missile defenses. But Bush was seriously flawed, and Latimer exposes some of those flaws in convincing and entertaining detail. I condemn him for betraying confidences -- but, perhaps hypocritically, I am glad somebody is saying the things he is saying.
Liberal Reader| 9.22.09 @ 1:49PM
I have mixed feelings about this book.
However, the excerpts I've read confirm something I argued for most of his two terms: he was a great deal smarter than many gave him credit for. His sense of humor was shrewd and robust, and he was more aware or "in touch" than people believed.
This only makes sense, and I realize I'm not sponsoring some bold claim. To be president -- just to get there -- you have to be wickedly smart; you have to be manipulative; you also have to be extremely earnest.
Any time you feel yourself gearing up for a sweeping, simplistic claim about a president of the United States, you should hesitate -- if you're interested in anything other than mud slinging and hate mongering.
W may come under fire from you guys for his response to Palin -- but if you study these remarks, they are prescient. He saw exactly what her weaknesses were the day she was nominated.
Liberal Reader| 9.22.09 @ 1:54PM
So what's the rule on tell-alls?
Everyone is saying they disapprove of these kinds of books.
It would be bad if presidents guarded their words fearing these kinds of revelations.
But what about the interests of history? The fact that Bush was seriously vexed by his own economic policies or wasn't prepared to tell "some gay kid in the audience" that he shouldn't be allowed to marry is pretty interesting material for historians.
Shouldn't there be a rule?
Liberal Reader's humble opinion:
It seems like presidents should enjoy some number of years --25 years? -- of reasonable privilege after they leave office. The information shouldn't be lost forever, but it also should be held in trust for a while.
Shrug| 9.23.09 @ 2:30PM
I find books like this to be boring, no matter who writes them. One group praises the boss at every turn. Another group cuffs the boss upside the head every chapter.
As Quin so aptly noted earlier, and as Mr. Lord has so clearly evidenced, it's the blind loyalty of some to the party, movement, and/or the boss that is most disturbing. Blind loyalty always proves bothersome and distasteful and indicates self-interest over national/state/local/community interest.
Hope Mr. Lord makes money off this screed. That's clearly his reason for being in the game. Problem is, while Mr. Lord pads his bank account with the benefits of blind loyalty, society and citizens suffer the consequences.
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econoblog.info » Latimer Pushback links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
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