Book Review: The Town

Hardcover: 400 pages
Publisher: Blue Rider Press (July 16, 2013)

This Town: Two Parties and a Funeral—Plus, Plenty of Valet Parking!—in America's Gilded Capital was written by Mark Leibovich.  Leibovich's book is a stunningly frank, witty, and perceptive account of the DC establishment and shows how it's become more self-serving than any other time in history.

The author calls out a score of names for their hypocrisy.  These people include politicians, journalists, and lobbyists.  Unfortunately for those people, there is no index.  The only way for thm to find out if they are in the book is if they read it themselves.

The book stretches from June 2008 at Tim Russert's funeral and goes until January 2013.  It's a critical profile of "This Town" during a time of turbulence and decadence.

Remember how President Obama campaigned to change Washington?  Didn't happen.  It's still politics as usual.  Lobbyists had their most prosperous year in 2009, Obama's first year in office.

Leibovich writes how punditry has replaced the idea of reporting.

Characters include Mike Allen, Tammy Haddad, Terry McAullife, Harry Reid, Trent Lott, Tom Daschle, Rahm Emanuel, Valerie Jarrett, Richard Gephardt, Chris Christie, Kurt Bardella, Richard Holbrooke, Hilary Rosen, Andrea Mitchell, Alan Greenspan, Tim Russert, and the Clintons.  That's not all the names but only a handful.

This account is dazzling, insightful, but also very entertaining.