Gothamist: Michiko Puts A Hurt On Bubba's Book

Sterling

Sun, 27 Jun 2004 18:51:22 -0500

Jennifer! "The Ronald Reagan treatment - is that Alzheimer's for 10 years, which contributes in most media sources forgetting the terrible things he did, and then having his dead body shuttled from coast to coast?" First off, if you don't enumerate these "terrible things" then you shouldn't make reference to them. I don't recall any myself, and unlike you I actually remember his two terms in office, firsthand. Secondly, it's common practice to move the bodies of dead government officials around. Robert F. Kennedy's funeral train from NYC to DC (after his body was flown from LA to NYC), ran over some mourners, so at least Reagan's funeral procession didn't have a bodycount. Incidentally, unlike Reagan, who never apologized for his anti-communism, RFK and his biographers have for decades tried to conceal RFK's three-year tenure as assistant counsel to Senator Joe McCarthy during the height of the wacky Permanent Investigations Subcommittee "Red Scare" hearings, including the Army/McCarthy Hearings. Reagan never walked away from any of his principles - he wasn't perfect but in his case no one's trying to conceal actual events.

emily

Mon, 21 Jun 2004 13:43:45 -0500

"...having his dead body shuttled from coast to coast?" LOL Jen, that scathing tidbit on Uncle Ronnie was even better than the Kakutani filleting of Bill and his book. Nice! ;)

Hoyt Pollard

Mon, 21 Jun 2004 13:12:45 -0500

Yesterday on Meet the Press, Joe Klein said that all presidential memoirs are sloppy and self-indulgent. Then they talked about BJs for the remaining 30 minutes. Shocker.

Brian Van

Mon, 21 Jun 2004 12:41:01 -0500

Jen, they're not letting you have it easy in the comments on Monday morning, eh? Criticizing the critics may be of interest and honor if the purpose is to either question the validity of an unfair or biased review (think Hessergate), or if the purpose is to disagree with an opinion. In each case, there's not much of a valid point that you can make (without resorting to fallacies) if you haven't reviewed the original subject material in question. A substitute for your own review, however, would be to cite other credible review sources. You really never state that this is a hit piece (which is a point in your favor), but you do state in the comments that her reviews are questionable. I can't find much here to convince me of that claim, which makes me curious as to why you would venture to make it. Furthermore, it's a bit on the snarky side to gossip it up a little. ----------------------------- I know that this piece is in tone with Gothamist content, but that tone is part of the ever-present blog trend of why-write-content-when-I-can-link-to-it. I know generating daily content is a pain in the butt, but it's disappointing when I think of how you could contribute further. I feel that you have a strong opinion and a solid base of knowledge about a lot of things, so I'd look forward to your reviews on the subjects that you frequently discuss. The claim that you don't have a copy of the book because it's not released yet... well, I have an issue with that. Ms. Kakutani obviously read the book (at nearly 1,000 pages, she's had some time with it too). Where'd she get it from? Certainly not off Amazon. You could almost certainly make yourself available to PR people as a reviewer, receive advance copies, and print reviews. Hell, you don't even have to go through the trouble of pitching them freelance. So, if you're interested in books, you should write a review sometime. And if you think Ms. Kakutani's reviews have issues, you could counterpoint them as well. It's something to consider.

Tim N.

Mon, 21 Jun 2004 12:16:20 -0500

I sort of agree with Drew. I love Bill, I really do, but why am I not surprised if the book is a sloppy, confessional mess? So was his administration! I'd take a sloppy mess with a healthy economy and the world at peace over our current trim, prim scumbag any day, tho'...

DS

Mon, 21 Jun 2004 10:16:48 -0500

This review may or may not be a "hit piece" and "clearly biased," but can you tell me what makes you think it is? A hit piece would be something put out to intentionally discredit or undermine an author - can you tell me why perhaps the most well known reviewer for the Times, and one who has trashed (and praised) books on both the right and left, would go out of her way to do that in this case? More likely the book is as she describes it. The fact that it's pretty scathing doesn't mean anything - are all negative reviews necessarily hatchet jobs? Kakutani is known for her harsh evaluations and no doubt takes some pride in that fact (which may contribute to this particular review - it was a good chance to skewer a high profile book. But that doesn't make it a hit piece). I'm just a little aggravated by people claiming that reviewers always have it in for particular books or authors. Maybe the book just sucks (and I'm a liberal). Some reviews actually are hatchet jobs meant to hurt the author, that's why people shouldn't just toss out "biased" and "hit piece" at the drop of a hat anytime an author gets trashed. Drew

Jen

Mon, 21 Jun 2004 08:16:35 -0500

The book isn't out yet, so there's no way we could have reviewed it. But Gothamist consistently looks at reviews of things we haven't seen/experience (restaurants, movies, products, other books), so this isn't inconsistent. Also, Michiko Kakutani is notoriously strange in her reviewing habits. She's tough, but also questionable.

Pete

Mon, 21 Jun 2004 04:26:24 -0500

Reviewers are the lowest form of human life, even if they have cutesy names.

Christian

Mon, 21 Jun 2004 00:51:02 -0500

If it looks like a hit-piece, and smells like a hit-piece, the review is probably a hit-piece. It's disappointing to see gothamist simply jump on a clearly biased review instead of having the confidence to actually read and review the book itself.