Blumenthal's Rage against the havoc of Bush and Backers

The Strange Death of Republican America
Chronicles of a Collapsing Party
By Sidney Blumenthal, Union Square Press.
Reviewed: 28 May 2008

Sidney Blumenthal, a committed Democrat and senior adviser to both Bill and Hillary Clinton, makes no pretence of impartiality in this chronicle of the U.S. Republican Party under the Bush Administration. Don’t expect much generosity toward Bush and his Republican Party supporters.

George W Bush is always in the cross-hairs, but Blumenthal does distinguish between those surrounding the Republican Administration who are simply misguided (such as Colin Powell, James Baker, Condoleeza Rice and George Bush senior) and those he considers to be irredeemably malevolent, dangerous to US democracy, and thus dangerous to the world.
The principle demons to emerge are Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld, with a large cast of supporting trolls headed by Karl Rove, Paul Wolfowitz, George Tenet, and others whose names have passed through the headlines and, in most cases, to eventual ignominy.

Blumenthal says the press generally failed in their duty to keep the Administration accountable. He is passionate about the ideals of an American Democracy that he believes is being corrupted by power-hungry cynics. The exemplars are Cheney and Rumsfeld, both veterans of the Nixon Administration..
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Richard Thwaites has been a journalist and has served politicians of many colours..