So I got this far, then turned Olbermann on and I'm wondering whether there's such a thing as televised-disaster PTSD. Well, tonight's guest is presidential historian Michael Beschloss, he's selling a book called Presidential Courage: Brave Leaders and How they Changed America, 1789-1989, and now I'm going to grab some iced tea and sit out on my patio to relax and enjoy the twilight. Maybe I'll come back and put some links in.
I'll just add a bit. Beschloss was on with Jon in May, one one of the days during my break when ek graciously filled in. His nndb entry is amusingly full of 'is too a scholar!', ignoring his recent journey as NBC's historian (on call?) to Roswell, New Mexico to report on the 60th anniversary of 'the incident.' And I probably would have ignored the nndb thing, except for this paragraph in the NYTimes review of Presidential Courage:
The book is written not only in short, choppy chapters (why devote four chapters to recounting each episode? why not consolidate that information into longer chapters of 30-40 pages?) but also in short, choppy sentences and short, choppy paragraphs. Most paragraphs are just one or two sentences long; few run for more than four or five lines. As a result, the argument appears as the written equivalent of sound bites and is at times hard to follow. One-line digressions are commonplace, as readers are fed a series of interesting but not always relevant tidbits along with Beschloss’s narrative of the central events of his chosen episodes. Does it matter, for example, that Kennedy changed his clothes "down to the flesh" at least four times each day? Or that John Adams once stayed in Trenton, N.J., at a house "owned by two maiden sisters named Barnes," who were pleased to have the president as a lodger?
And I found the requisite interviews, articles, etc., including a review by him with the publication date August 5, 2007. I was momentarily confused...
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