Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #90659 in Books
• Published on: 2008-08-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 288 pages

Customer Reviews

Rolling Stone reporter spies on America's disaffected idiots
Taibbi commendably takes his journalist spotlight off the corrupt actors on Washington's center stage, and instead investigates the most disaffected ordinary Americans. But to do so he goes undercover, posing as a believer in far right-wing Christian-Zionism, or far-left 9/11 conspiracy theories. He basically plays Borat, inventing oddball past experiences to play his part, and letting the unsuspecting locals make fools of themselves for the camera. Later Taibbi gives his real opinions of what idiots they are, and asks what America is coming to.

Only slowly does Taibbi's basic compassion for these people rise to the fore. These are people, he reasons, both conservatives and liberals, who feel so conned by the political rip-off system that they can't tell who to trust. And maybe, Taibbi suspects, part of the con has been to get them to blame and hate each other.