Spanking the Donkey: On the Campaign Trail with the Democrats Book

Let's be honest: some chunks of this book are just tiresome. Many of the short essays, mini-satires originally from The Beast, that are collected between the longer sections, are throw-aways, though funny enough. I'll admit to finally skipping some in the second half. But the longer sections are not just smart, and not just funny - the longer sections are important. The first essay, about the wild under-counting of an anti-war protest (especially in light of the more recent over-counting of the Restoring Honor Rally) is valuable and disturbing, as is his campaign reporting on Howard Dean and the Democratic primaries (which involves hallucinogens and a Viking costume).

But the long-form essay Bush Like Me, where he goes undercover as a Republican on the Bush campaign in Florida, is one of the most important essays on American politics I've ever read. Liberal America doesn't understand what conservatives think , nor why we can't seem to beat them in politics. Our stereotypes of the inbred redneck or the wealthy and evil CEO aren't as damaging as their stereotypes of the welfare queen or the sex-crazed hippie, but they're no more sophisticated. Taibbi's portrait of how the conservative mind operates is often vicious, but weirdly empathetic, and it exposes a lot of the ways the Democratic party is woefully ineffectual, no matter how good its intentions.

For that essay alone, it'd be worth reading. But it's also very funny, and provides a good dissection of how the media works in relation to politics (hint: not very well). Makes ya want to write articles.