What do you think?
Rate this book
The Backlash: Right-Wing Radicals, High-Def Hucksters, and Paranoid Politics in the Age of Obama
In The Backlash , Liberal columnist and Pulitzer Prize-winning political reporter Will Bunch goes behind the scenes of America’s new extreme right-wing minority to explore how their campaign of misinformation, their distortion of President Obama, and their collective fear of the future combine to pose a very real threat to our democratic system. From health care reform to immigration policies, The Backlash is a gripping investigation into the emerging voice of the dangerous American right wing.
368 pages, Hardcover
First published August 31, 2010
11 people are currently reading
288 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 30 of 37 reviews
October 15, 2011
While Bunch doesn't offer much new information on the emergence of the Tea Party, he does weaved together a fascinating narrative that puts the Tea Party in a context that allows those of us baffled by them to attain a bit more understanding.
The author points out these types of fringe groups have always existed but where marginalized and the biggest change is simply that now they have their own news channel. No one would deny that much of the backlash against the current president stems from fear of a more diversity country they feel does not represent them, and not so much a fear of big government but a government of the Other. But racism is the easy answer, far deeper answers according to the author are misdirected rage of the economy insecurity, group polarization, and human nature to scapegoats others. The author argues that often what people find in these groups is simply a feeling of belonging, of being counted.
I certainly started this book absolutely hating the Tea Party but Bunch really humanizes them and though you may feel sorry for them it is hard to hate people who have so clearly been manipulated by those trying to make a fast buck of their real fear and discontent. The author reserves his rage for those who take advantage of this displaced fear to sell Goldline, Lifelock, freeze dried rations and survival seed banks. It's these TV/radio personalities who have no responsibility of government, to whom politics is mere performance art, a means of evoking a visceral responses to sell more crap, which requires continually upping the ante, these are the people now setting the right wing political agenda and who the author argues we should focus our anger.
The author points out these types of fringe groups have always existed but where marginalized and the biggest change is simply that now they have their own news channel. No one would deny that much of the backlash against the current president stems from fear of a more diversity country they feel does not represent them, and not so much a fear of big government but a government of the Other. But racism is the easy answer, far deeper answers according to the author are misdirected rage of the economy insecurity, group polarization, and human nature to scapegoats others. The author argues that often what people find in these groups is simply a feeling of belonging, of being counted.
I certainly started this book absolutely hating the Tea Party but Bunch really humanizes them and though you may feel sorry for them it is hard to hate people who have so clearly been manipulated by those trying to make a fast buck of their real fear and discontent. The author reserves his rage for those who take advantage of this displaced fear to sell Goldline, Lifelock, freeze dried rations and survival seed banks. It's these TV/radio personalities who have no responsibility of government, to whom politics is mere performance art, a means of evoking a visceral responses to sell more crap, which requires continually upping the ante, these are the people now setting the right wing political agenda and who the author argues we should focus our anger.
January 24, 2014
There are many things that connect us all, no matter where we live, what color we are and which God we believe in. One of the deepest and most integral of those connections is fear. We all have it, whether it’s worrying about the spread of Communism, the shortage of scientific breakthroughs toward a cure for cancer, or maybe just late night jitters about the foul-smelling thing hiding underneath the bed. Most of it can be boiled down to a simple phrase, “fear of the other“. While some fears can be debated and argued as being justified, the underlying problem with fear is that once someone or something knows what your fear is, it can be used against you as a weapon. People throughout history have made their livelihoods based on that fact alone and it is on proud display here in the present day inside the formation of the Tea Party movement and the outlandish opposition to Barack Obama.
The Backlash by Will Bunch is a well thought out and deeply researched journey into the heart of the fear that sprung forth like snakes-in-a-can upon the inauguration of our new President. While many progressives and liberals clamor from the sideline, poking fun at the Tea Party and their growing membership, Bunch takes the honorable mission of tracing the movement to some of its more humble beginnings and the people actually at the ground level. What he discovers is real people with real fears who are being co-opted by big business and private interests in order to stop the change promised by the new administration.
One of the first things most people were introduced to when they saw the Tea Party crash onto the political scene was their fascination and fervor for protest signs and costumes. While this might have increased their news coverage, it also quickly devalued their message. From the subtle to the incredibly overt, racist slogans and imagery littered the reports of the fledgling movement giving an overall impression that everyone involved had the same color-coded mission, to purify the White House, and by extension, the country as a whole. On one side of the cable news spectrum (MSNBC, CNN, BBC, etc…) the Tea Party was characterized as rednecks that time had obviously left behind, while the other side (championed by Fox News) raised them onto the pedestal of patriots and grassroots revolution hailed as “real America”. The problem here is that neither description is true, but labels are sticky and even removed they can leave a nasty residue behind.
Another factor behind the proliferation of the “real America” illusion was those pundits and political commentators who saw the Tea Party as the lightning-in-a-bottle moment they were waiting for. Once they grabbed onto the coattails of fear inside the Tea Party, people such as radio/TV/internet phenom Glenn Beck wove those coattails around and around into each other until the fear escalated into paranoia, which in the ratings world is a wonderful thing. Beck had actually boiled it down to a simple equation, the bumper-sticker solution to all the fear in the country:
On his November 23, 2009 show, Beck went back again to the theme of a looming economic meltdown and recommended to his listeners what could just as well be a mantra of the right-wing movement in this new decade: “The 3 G system” of “God, Gold and Guns.”
Beck skyrocketed in popularity and influence, like many of the voices from the outer right-wing fringe, preying on the fears of people feeling like their country was forgetting about them. He wheeled out his chalkboard day after day, giving his viewers something familiar from their childhood, a symbol of learning which they all believed would never lie to them. Beck littered the surface of the chalkboard with various historical people and moments, drawing incredibly slippery and weak connections between them to prove any conspiracy theory he imagined that morning. Worse than that were those occasions where he blatantly misrepresented the views of historical figures to grant his own ideas more credence. Bunch illustrates that nicely in this section:
“Beck – and probably many of his listeners – would be turned off by many of the views of the real Thomas Paine. For one thing, while Beck has tried to argue that America’s true roots lie in Christianity, the real Thomas Paine was a Deist who loathed organized religion, writing in “The Age of Reason” that all churches “appear to me no other than human inventions, set up to terrify and enslave mankind, and monopolize power and profit.”
You can be sure that particular quote from Paine never graced the esteemed surface of Beck’s chalkboard.
This is the thrust of Bunch’s message, that much of the Tea Party is being towed along by puppeteers and plagiarizers, purposely mis-informing them to wean the money from their wallets and the devotion from their hearts. The fervent devotees of the Tea Party should not be written off as a joke, especially since some of them actually won seats in our government during the last election. They should be listened to, but filtered through a lens of mis-appropriated fear. If we do not try and understand where they are actually coming from, people like Beck and his cohorts will continue to wield them like a bludgeon against the wall of this country until its inevitable collapse.
My recommendation, The Backlash by Will Bunch is a staggeringly human look into the real fear behind the so-called grassroots revolution of the Tea Party and how it has been co-opted, controlled and ultimately, how it will be condemned.
The Backlash by Will Bunch is a well thought out and deeply researched journey into the heart of the fear that sprung forth like snakes-in-a-can upon the inauguration of our new President. While many progressives and liberals clamor from the sideline, poking fun at the Tea Party and their growing membership, Bunch takes the honorable mission of tracing the movement to some of its more humble beginnings and the people actually at the ground level. What he discovers is real people with real fears who are being co-opted by big business and private interests in order to stop the change promised by the new administration.
One of the first things most people were introduced to when they saw the Tea Party crash onto the political scene was their fascination and fervor for protest signs and costumes. While this might have increased their news coverage, it also quickly devalued their message. From the subtle to the incredibly overt, racist slogans and imagery littered the reports of the fledgling movement giving an overall impression that everyone involved had the same color-coded mission, to purify the White House, and by extension, the country as a whole. On one side of the cable news spectrum (MSNBC, CNN, BBC, etc…) the Tea Party was characterized as rednecks that time had obviously left behind, while the other side (championed by Fox News) raised them onto the pedestal of patriots and grassroots revolution hailed as “real America”. The problem here is that neither description is true, but labels are sticky and even removed they can leave a nasty residue behind.
Another factor behind the proliferation of the “real America” illusion was those pundits and political commentators who saw the Tea Party as the lightning-in-a-bottle moment they were waiting for. Once they grabbed onto the coattails of fear inside the Tea Party, people such as radio/TV/internet phenom Glenn Beck wove those coattails around and around into each other until the fear escalated into paranoia, which in the ratings world is a wonderful thing. Beck had actually boiled it down to a simple equation, the bumper-sticker solution to all the fear in the country:
On his November 23, 2009 show, Beck went back again to the theme of a looming economic meltdown and recommended to his listeners what could just as well be a mantra of the right-wing movement in this new decade: “The 3 G system” of “God, Gold and Guns.”
Beck skyrocketed in popularity and influence, like many of the voices from the outer right-wing fringe, preying on the fears of people feeling like their country was forgetting about them. He wheeled out his chalkboard day after day, giving his viewers something familiar from their childhood, a symbol of learning which they all believed would never lie to them. Beck littered the surface of the chalkboard with various historical people and moments, drawing incredibly slippery and weak connections between them to prove any conspiracy theory he imagined that morning. Worse than that were those occasions where he blatantly misrepresented the views of historical figures to grant his own ideas more credence. Bunch illustrates that nicely in this section:
“Beck – and probably many of his listeners – would be turned off by many of the views of the real Thomas Paine. For one thing, while Beck has tried to argue that America’s true roots lie in Christianity, the real Thomas Paine was a Deist who loathed organized religion, writing in “The Age of Reason” that all churches “appear to me no other than human inventions, set up to terrify and enslave mankind, and monopolize power and profit.”
You can be sure that particular quote from Paine never graced the esteemed surface of Beck’s chalkboard.
This is the thrust of Bunch’s message, that much of the Tea Party is being towed along by puppeteers and plagiarizers, purposely mis-informing them to wean the money from their wallets and the devotion from their hearts. The fervent devotees of the Tea Party should not be written off as a joke, especially since some of them actually won seats in our government during the last election. They should be listened to, but filtered through a lens of mis-appropriated fear. If we do not try and understand where they are actually coming from, people like Beck and his cohorts will continue to wield them like a bludgeon against the wall of this country until its inevitable collapse.
My recommendation, The Backlash by Will Bunch is a staggeringly human look into the real fear behind the so-called grassroots revolution of the Tea Party and how it has been co-opted, controlled and ultimately, how it will be condemned.
September 13, 2010
Good book although it took a while to get accustomed to Bunch's writing in the second person for approximately half of each chapter. He does an excellent job of exposing the self-serving and somewhat internally inconsistent agendas of Glenn Beck. I was also pleasently pleased to note that Bunch makes this book 'personal' by interviewing real people and providing their views as well as providing research derived from Toffler's Future Shock and Becker's The Denial of Death. I'd recommend you read this you are having a hard time getting around the intellectual disconnect between the Tea Party movement and reality.
October 19, 2010
An excellent book that examines and explains the genesis of the tea party movement as well as the new-found love fest between such Republican big shots and the tea party candidates.
Mr. Bunch spent a considerable amount of time in the presence of tea party adherents in an effort to give them a fair voice, which he does ably.
This book is highly recommended for readers on all sides of the political divide.
Mr. Bunch spent a considerable amount of time in the presence of tea party adherents in an effort to give them a fair voice, which he does ably.
This book is highly recommended for readers on all sides of the political divide.
February 24, 2011
I LOVED this book. Crazy rednecks, paranoid rightwing television personalities, and the politicians who listen to them, how can you go wrong? The only criticism I have is Bunch's ending. Having compassion for conspiracy theorists gone bad is not the route I would take. I propose an Orwellian brainwashing until they all become liberals and we can gather in a circle and sing "We are the World."
July 15, 2024
A VISITATION OF VARIOUS "OPPOSITION" MOVEMENTS AND FIGURES
Will Bunch is a journalist who is also a fellow at "Media Matters."
He wrote in this 2010 book, "when the bank bailout happened---proposed by President George W. Bush and backed by John McCain and Sarah Palin as well as Barack Obama---some conservatives did get mad enough about it to call talk radio, rant, and then hang up and go back to their lives." (Pg. 38)
He suggests that "The Genius of Glenn Beck---and make no mistake, there is genius amid the mayhem---lies in a remarkable ability to synthesize disconnected yet iconic American sound bites, both from real pop-culture heroes and from fictional ones... The character of Glenn Beck manages to be 100 percent derivative yet an American original." (Pg. 72)
Dealing with the Oath Keepers (i.e., former/current police officers, etc., who pledge to refuse to disarm Americans, etc.), he says, "After all, there's no law against declaring what you won't do, at least not until you're actually forced to disobey an order... in fact, the vast majority of Oath Keepers were no longer in uniform and weren't getting any orders to disobey in the first place." (Pg. 121-122)
While admitting that "anyone who begrudges the right of a guy making a dollar must be some kind of socialist, or worse," he asserts that the right-wing movement in America is "becoming an unabashedly for-profit venture, a RIGHT-WING MOVEMENT." (Pg. 210)
This book is an interesting "pass by" a number of right-wing critics of the current administration; while more a brief "travelogue" than a detailed critical analysis, it has its value.
Will Bunch is a journalist who is also a fellow at "Media Matters."
He wrote in this 2010 book, "when the bank bailout happened---proposed by President George W. Bush and backed by John McCain and Sarah Palin as well as Barack Obama---some conservatives did get mad enough about it to call talk radio, rant, and then hang up and go back to their lives." (Pg. 38)
He suggests that "The Genius of Glenn Beck---and make no mistake, there is genius amid the mayhem---lies in a remarkable ability to synthesize disconnected yet iconic American sound bites, both from real pop-culture heroes and from fictional ones... The character of Glenn Beck manages to be 100 percent derivative yet an American original." (Pg. 72)
Dealing with the Oath Keepers (i.e., former/current police officers, etc., who pledge to refuse to disarm Americans, etc.), he says, "After all, there's no law against declaring what you won't do, at least not until you're actually forced to disobey an order... in fact, the vast majority of Oath Keepers were no longer in uniform and weren't getting any orders to disobey in the first place." (Pg. 121-122)
While admitting that "anyone who begrudges the right of a guy making a dollar must be some kind of socialist, or worse," he asserts that the right-wing movement in America is "becoming an unabashedly for-profit venture, a RIGHT-WING MOVEMENT." (Pg. 210)
This book is an interesting "pass by" a number of right-wing critics of the current administration; while more a brief "travelogue" than a detailed critical analysis, it has its value.
March 16, 2022
At the time of its publication, a useful exploration of the populist-right milieu (birthers, the Tea Party, gold bugs, et al), and the media figures and politicians that existed in a symbiotic (maybe actually parasitic) relationship with this "base."
In retrospect, it's somewhat lacking in analysis or a theoretical understanding of what Bunch is reporting on, but it's still useful as solid reportage on the social-political-economic currents that would climax in Trump's election and presidency a few years later.
In retrospect, it's somewhat lacking in analysis or a theoretical understanding of what Bunch is reporting on, but it's still useful as solid reportage on the social-political-economic currents that would climax in Trump's election and presidency a few years later.
February 23, 2024
Lively, conversational. Well reported. Will Bunch introduces us to the people who amplified political points that over a decade solidified to elect a president and power an insurrection. Written to describe current events in 2008 or so, this is now important history and explains where we stand in 2024.
July 11, 2020
Good storytelling, and very interesting to read this as a history lesson 10 years after the fact and during the Trump administration
September 3, 2024
Great Book!!
February 24, 2025
While it flip flops focuses constantly, Will Bunch’s wit is enough to carry through the usually great by sometime monotonous panoramas he employs on events and the people attending.
January 14, 2012
For the most part, this book was awful. The author does not appear to understand basic pronouns and uses dashes so much, often incorrectly, that I really had to restrain myself from marking this book up with my red pen. Here's an example of this "creative" style:
In addition to the comma splice in the first sentence, Bunch tries to put the reader "into the action," I guess, by using the second person when he's really talking about himself. This is the kind of idea that sounds interesting in theory, but is terrible in practice. For one thing, he dissolves his credibility as a researcher by not taking credit for his own actions, questions, or research. He absolves himself from any experience in finding information, making himself void of any responsibility to the research or opinions.
Bunch also has a tendency to describe the Tea Partiers he interviews as "nuts" or "crazy"; the above passage illustrates this with his mentioning "birther-porn DVDs" in reference to the people who believe President Obama was not born here. Don't get me wrong: I think the Tea Party is crazy and am appalled at what people will believe. That said, I have real qualms with an author who treats his subject as stupid or crazy. Once again, this kind of rhetoric only weakens Bunch's credibility.
Another thing that bothered me was Bunch's reluctance to state what the real impetus behind the Tea Party is: racism. I really don't care what anyone else says; the Tea Party movement, along with the peripheral movements such as the Oath Keepers or Birthers, is a racist reaction to having a black president. Think about it; most of the people who believe this nonsense are older white people, meaning two things: they probably finished high school before desegregation and thus never went to school with African Americans; and they are probably on Medicare, making their arguments about President Obama's "socialism" and "Nazi-like" health care system completely hypocritical. Yet, Bunch never mentions this. He devotes maybe one paragraph - out of the entire book! - to race, but does not mention the facts I just stated. He does provide some racist quotes from Tea Partiers, but he never bothers to analyze what they are saying or why. In short, his attempt to examine the Tea Party for what it is is cowardly and weak.
In short, there is not much to glean from this book. It's poorly written, lazily researched, and lousily analyzed. Avoid this one, even if you would like to read a book exposing the Tea Party. This one does not suffice.
"You decide that you've heard enough and take a walk back under the pole tent, to see what Joe Gayan is up to. When you reach his stall, a few customers are milling around, fondling Gayan's birther-porn DVDs and then putting them back in the rack. But the proprietor and mild-mannered conspiracy theorist is nowhere to be found. You glance back at his empty meal stool and notice there is something taped to the counter right behind his seat that was not there the day before.
"It is the picture of Obama and Hitler, of course."
In addition to the comma splice in the first sentence, Bunch tries to put the reader "into the action," I guess, by using the second person when he's really talking about himself. This is the kind of idea that sounds interesting in theory, but is terrible in practice. For one thing, he dissolves his credibility as a researcher by not taking credit for his own actions, questions, or research. He absolves himself from any experience in finding information, making himself void of any responsibility to the research or opinions.
Bunch also has a tendency to describe the Tea Partiers he interviews as "nuts" or "crazy"; the above passage illustrates this with his mentioning "birther-porn DVDs" in reference to the people who believe President Obama was not born here. Don't get me wrong: I think the Tea Party is crazy and am appalled at what people will believe. That said, I have real qualms with an author who treats his subject as stupid or crazy. Once again, this kind of rhetoric only weakens Bunch's credibility.
Another thing that bothered me was Bunch's reluctance to state what the real impetus behind the Tea Party is: racism. I really don't care what anyone else says; the Tea Party movement, along with the peripheral movements such as the Oath Keepers or Birthers, is a racist reaction to having a black president. Think about it; most of the people who believe this nonsense are older white people, meaning two things: they probably finished high school before desegregation and thus never went to school with African Americans; and they are probably on Medicare, making their arguments about President Obama's "socialism" and "Nazi-like" health care system completely hypocritical. Yet, Bunch never mentions this. He devotes maybe one paragraph - out of the entire book! - to race, but does not mention the facts I just stated. He does provide some racist quotes from Tea Partiers, but he never bothers to analyze what they are saying or why. In short, his attempt to examine the Tea Party for what it is is cowardly and weak.
In short, there is not much to glean from this book. It's poorly written, lazily researched, and lousily analyzed. Avoid this one, even if you would like to read a book exposing the Tea Party. This one does not suffice.
September 22, 2010
Will Bunch has written a decent piece of investigative journalism that covers large swaths of terrain already familiar to most political junkies. Even so, to read his book is instructive. Much of his effort is expended in trying to answer the question of why so many Americans have become acolytes of Glenn Beck and his hokey brand of libertarian politics. It turns out to be a more difficult task than one might expect. To begin with, many of those who self-identify with the "Tea Party" say that they are motivated by existential threats that are impossible to substantiate. Wading through the clutches of conspiracy theorists and profiteers of the apocalypse that populate the right-wing fringe, Bunch ultimately reaches some predictably pedestrian conclusions: people are motivated by fear and uncertainty, and their prophets are driven by profit.
Even though Bunch is an avowed progressive, he does a fairly decent job of presenting his case in a relatively objective and straightforward manner. Oddly, as someone who is more sympathetic to liberal ideology generally, by the time I finished the book I found myself less alarmed by the rise of Tea Party activism than I had been previously. Perhaps I'm naturally sympathetic to those who find themselves on the political fringe; which, incidentally, is an impulse manipulated to great advantage by those tasked with bringing fresh recruits into anti-government, anti-elitist, and anti-establishment movements. Mine is, to be sure, a sympathy for the underdog. Even as Bunch desperately tries to convey a sense of import in all this Tea Partying, the unmistakable and lasting impression is that this is a party of outliers and disgruntled misfits who mainly serve the purposes of those who are in the business of selling fear.
The almost inevitable obsolescence of the backlash against the Obama administration assumes a kind of omnipresence throughout the book, as Bunch relentlessly references the demographics involved: senior citizens, the unemployed, old school social conservatives, white people, more senior citizens, etc. The available polling data indicates that, over the long term, traditional liberal values and classic freethinking are shaping the country's political future (i.e., increasingly open-minded attitudes towards homosexuality, non-theism, anti-xenophobic immigration policy, health-care reform, environmental law, the rights of women and children, etc.); meanwhile, the expanding Latino population and the social values of younger generations of Americans are threatening to swamp the old political worldview of which "The Backlash" appears to be but a vestigial polyp. Viewed in this light, its hard not to feel some sympathy for the those who insist on haplessly protesting modernity.
Even though Bunch is an avowed progressive, he does a fairly decent job of presenting his case in a relatively objective and straightforward manner. Oddly, as someone who is more sympathetic to liberal ideology generally, by the time I finished the book I found myself less alarmed by the rise of Tea Party activism than I had been previously. Perhaps I'm naturally sympathetic to those who find themselves on the political fringe; which, incidentally, is an impulse manipulated to great advantage by those tasked with bringing fresh recruits into anti-government, anti-elitist, and anti-establishment movements. Mine is, to be sure, a sympathy for the underdog. Even as Bunch desperately tries to convey a sense of import in all this Tea Partying, the unmistakable and lasting impression is that this is a party of outliers and disgruntled misfits who mainly serve the purposes of those who are in the business of selling fear.
The almost inevitable obsolescence of the backlash against the Obama administration assumes a kind of omnipresence throughout the book, as Bunch relentlessly references the demographics involved: senior citizens, the unemployed, old school social conservatives, white people, more senior citizens, etc. The available polling data indicates that, over the long term, traditional liberal values and classic freethinking are shaping the country's political future (i.e., increasingly open-minded attitudes towards homosexuality, non-theism, anti-xenophobic immigration policy, health-care reform, environmental law, the rights of women and children, etc.); meanwhile, the expanding Latino population and the social values of younger generations of Americans are threatening to swamp the old political worldview of which "The Backlash" appears to be but a vestigial polyp. Viewed in this light, its hard not to feel some sympathy for the those who insist on haplessly protesting modernity.
November 25, 2011
Written by a blogger and columnist for the Philadelphia Daily News, Bunch goes into the frothy anger and paranoia of the Tea Party and the backlash to Obama. He goes into some detail about Glenn Beck's masterful hucksterism, but also spends time interviewing true believers from Delaware and Pennsylvania out to Florida and Arizona. The fringe conspiracy theorists are not new, but now more connected through the Internet, mass gatherings, and talk radio, and given a new level of credibility through the bully pulpit of Glenn Beck and Fox News to the point where civil discourse in Washington is nigh impossible because of the hard right anger demanding that Republicans not give one inch or risk losing a primary. Most of it wasn't new to me, but the tone was interesting, as Bunch writes a lot of it in the second person, putting you in the conversation of talking to people that you may not just disagree with, but find a bit frightening. The 21st Century entertainment fear factor is right out of Neal Postman's Amusing Ourselves To Death and one wonders if and when we can return to some level of basic political civility (if it was there to begin with) in an age of entertainment masquerading as news.
October 11, 2010
Like many self-identified liberals, I have struggled to understand the motives and beliefs that drive the Tea Party and other reactionary, right-wing organizations. Why so much fear and rage? Why the almost-religious devotion to FOX News and right-wing political entertainers, especially Glenn Beck? After my retiree book group members turned yet another discussion into a sounding board for the views and statements of O'Reilly and his ilk, I turned to this book.
And while Bunch won't give you all the answers, he does shed the harsh light of day on the fear-mongering hucksters who often seem to be doing no more than taking advantage of their fan's wallets. Beck, especially, doesn't come out looking good. How many of his hard-line pro-life followers realize that in Beck's "Morning Zoo" radio-show days, he once personally called the wife of the rival station's manager and mocked her for having a miscarriage?
And, I finally got to learn the bizarre backstory to the book "The 5,000 Year Leap," requests for which we were absolutely deluged with a while back.
(A side note: The author's second-person writing style is rather unusual and jarring.)
And while Bunch won't give you all the answers, he does shed the harsh light of day on the fear-mongering hucksters who often seem to be doing no more than taking advantage of their fan's wallets. Beck, especially, doesn't come out looking good. How many of his hard-line pro-life followers realize that in Beck's "Morning Zoo" radio-show days, he once personally called the wife of the rival station's manager and mocked her for having a miscarriage?
And, I finally got to learn the bizarre backstory to the book "The 5,000 Year Leap," requests for which we were absolutely deluged with a while back.
(A side note: The author's second-person writing style is rather unusual and jarring.)
October 25, 2010
An interesting investigation of some of the players in the right wing noise machine, along with some conversations with folks on the ground who have gotten involved in the tea party movement. But I found two things that were bothersome. First, it jumped around too much - activists are introduced for a few pages, and then never heard from again, while others are threaded throughout the book. Second, Bunch has this really annoying habit of writing in the 2nd person, but only half the time (otherwise it's 3rd person). I found this completely distracting and irritating. "I'm" not driving anywhere. Bunch is. And he should just say that, rather than ascribing what was obviously his reaction to certain things to the reader. Even where I agreed in principle with his thoughts, I don't like having that "put" on me. so...eh.
My interest in this book can also be measured by the fact that it was only 336 pages long, and it took me 11 days to read it. I was worried that I wasn't going to finish before it expired (I borrowed the e-book from the Brooklyn Public Library), and found myself skimming over things, even though I didn't intend to. Not quite an engaging/engrossing read.
My interest in this book can also be measured by the fact that it was only 336 pages long, and it took me 11 days to read it. I was worried that I wasn't going to finish before it expired (I borrowed the e-book from the Brooklyn Public Library), and found myself skimming over things, even though I didn't intend to. Not quite an engaging/engrossing read.
August 14, 2011
I am so glad to be a Canadian. (Also to see the great Richard Hofstader getting his due: Bunch is a fan of his 1964 essay The Paranoid Style in American Politics.) Sorry for your troubles, Americans.
I got this because I'm still on the wait-list for Among the Truthers at my library. It's not bad but not great either. Bunch falls in with some Tea Party, 9-12 Patriot, Glenn Beck followers and uses their stories to look at Birthers, militias and other disaffected right wing conspiracy- believers. There are stops along the way at a gun shop and the Knob Creek Machine Gun Shoot.
Bunch's theory seems to be that this group
Is old for rebels and that their alienation stems from joblessness or premature retirement. I agree with Myron Getman's point that the shift to a sort of second person narrative in describing his meetings and travels is disconcerting. I say "sort of" because although he writes "here you are, standing at the counter" or "you called Gillie later", but in fact what he means is not "you" but "I." It's an odd stylistic quirk.
I got this because I'm still on the wait-list for Among the Truthers at my library. It's not bad but not great either. Bunch falls in with some Tea Party, 9-12 Patriot, Glenn Beck followers and uses their stories to look at Birthers, militias and other disaffected right wing conspiracy- believers. There are stops along the way at a gun shop and the Knob Creek Machine Gun Shoot.
Bunch's theory seems to be that this group
Is old for rebels and that their alienation stems from joblessness or premature retirement. I agree with Myron Getman's point that the shift to a sort of second person narrative in describing his meetings and travels is disconcerting. I say "sort of" because although he writes "here you are, standing at the counter" or "you called Gillie later", but in fact what he means is not "you" but "I." It's an odd stylistic quirk.
February 18, 2011
Author does a good job explaining the sustained hysteria on the far right during President Obama's first term. He stresses that they are (wrongly) convinced that their strident, extreme positions are held by "most voters" (I have seen those on the left with a similar mindset). One of the more interesting points raised is that Beck and others are in it for commercial profit (greed), including analyses of how viewers are deliberately ripped off (peddled gold at 30% over value as "Doomsday is right around the corner!"). Factual, though not "Fair and Balanced" - then again, it doesn't claim to be!
Recommended for those interested in how all the hysteria came to be. For a less subjective look at (broader overview of) the Tea Party movement, try Boiling Mad: Inside Tea Party America.
Recommended for those interested in how all the hysteria came to be. For a less subjective look at (broader overview of) the Tea Party movement, try Boiling Mad: Inside Tea Party America.
June 24, 2011
I am not sure that this book was altogether informative or worthwhile reading. It is an account of what the far right thinks and the media types that feed that thinking. Again, like other non-fiction books that I have read lately, I felt that this was an essay expanded to make a book. While I like Will Buch (a fellow Philadelphia type) and agree with his politics, I felt that he was somewhat condescending and smacked of elitism. His incessant carping on the "trailer dewellers" as examples of whacky thinkers was off-putting. I know that there are quite a few upper middle class people who engage in paranoia and conspiracy type thinking.
After a while the interviews became repetetive and I found myself bored with the same old, same old whackey right wing conspiracy rhetoric from the mouths of his interviewees.
After a while the interviews became repetetive and I found myself bored with the same old, same old whackey right wing conspiracy rhetoric from the mouths of his interviewees.
November 30, 2010
This book points out how various groups of paranoid and fearful Americans have converged into the Tea Party movement. I found it somewhat interesting but also depressing. In my opinion, it all comes down to greed. There are folks who can make money off of the vulnerable and have no qualms about telling lies in order to feed the bottom line. Sadly there is no resolution in the end. Bunch does a so-so job of staying neutral, but he admits to being progressive and that is evident in his tone.
January 10, 2011
One of the few nonfiction ebooks at the library that sounded interesting and was also available for checkout. I'm a little torn: some of it was LOLTEAPARTY, but then the last chapter argued that mocking them was a bad idea. And personally, quite a bit was familiar from the last year or two. I will admit that I find it utterly horrifying that Glenn Beck has a book called The Overton Window. (I find him horrifying in general, though.) The second-person POV ("you") was sometimes cloying, but done reasonably well.
October 5, 2012
Considering how much I've lived under a political rock for the last 4 years, this was a really informative and insightful look into the growth of the radical right & tea party which has always sort of puzzled me. I feel as if I understand a lot more about the political right, though I am wary about how much liberal bias was evident in this book. The use of second person was somewhat jarring and I don't think it was a good choice--should have stuck to first person, I think. Regardless, still an interesting compilation of insights.
December 18, 2012
Bunch does a good job looking into the Tea Party movement-from old-time right-wingers who go back to the John Birch Society to today's anti-immigrant racists who fear 'the Other" in their midst. Along the way, he runs into people who fear that their guns will be confiscated or that FEMA is setting up concentration camps... a strange, bizarre world that many Americans exist in. Basically, he finds that these are people who are older white people, many self-employed or underemployed or retired, who don't understand the global society they are in and are being left increasingly behind..
January 19, 2016
Interesting review and analysis of the rightwing backlash against Obama that started out immediately upon his election (if not before it), that became paranoid and almost like a religion for those with nothing better to do and, unfortunately, some of the unhinged who reacted violently. The one annoying thing about this book is that, for his own reasons (which he explains in an afterword), the author often refers to himself as "you" so that the reader is 'being' the author. I don't like that tense and found it distracting.
October 3, 2010
It's basically an analysis of the lives and motivations of several regular people who are on the right end of the spectrum and who have been involved in the Tea Party movement, plus a fair bit about the involvement and public metamorphosis of Glenn Beck. It certainly tries to get into the heads of the people involved, and has some sympathy with their straits, without being too sentimental about it.
February 27, 2013
I found the use of "you" when Bunch is describing his own activities as a journalist to be quite annoying. Bunch does offer some justification for his use of a second person voice. Unfortunately, this comes at the end of the book in the acknowledgments. Had this been explained at the beginning of the book, perhaps it would have been a little bit less jarring. Overall, I think it detracts from the book.
February 28, 2014
A book full of fascinating information, interviews, and smart investigative journalism nearly done in by the author's obnoxious style and voice. When conservatives talk about arrogant, elitist, patronizing east coast intellectuals, Will Bunch is who they're referring to. His closing-chapter plea against "elitist condescension" is nearly paralyzing in the cognitive dissonance it evokes. 4 stars for the content, 1 star for the style.
October 20, 2014
Really enjoyed reading about how the media feeds into the paranoia of a certain segment of society. I am someone who is on the opposite end of the political spectrum of those covered in The Backlash, but did appreciate the nuanced way Will Bunch dealt with them. They are not faceless Fox drones but real people who have real problems.
August 9, 2011
Not as well written as The Family or as indispensable as Nixonland but for anyone looking for insight into the American Right, this is a must-read.
September 30, 2010
Best book on politics this year
Displaying 1 - 30 of 37 reviews