Best Book Review Ever
You know how the propaganda machine pumps out books during election years peddling bullshit as fact to rile up the base. In past years, it was manure shoveled by the likes of Ann Coulter and Bill O’Reilly where they wove fantastical fairy tales claiming that up is down, left is right, and the sun rises in the west. One magnificent piece of work is by Dinesh D’Souza, The Big Lie: Exposing the Nazi Roots of the American Left, where he does mental gymnastics to assert the case that American progressives were connected to Hitler and Nazi Germany. It’s idiotic, especially to anyone who has even fleeting familiarity with high school world history, but a huge hit among the drooling class who slurp it up while filling D’Souza’s pockets with millions of dollars.
One new piece of work, written by David Brody, a reporter with the Christian Broadcasting Network, and Scott Lamb, a Baptist minister and biographer of Mike Huckabee and the baseball player, Albert Pujols is a new low in right wing manure. It’s called The Faith of Donald J. Trump, A Spiritual Biography. Wrongly classified as a biography rather than fiction, it spends 375 pages trying to convince the reader that Donald Trump, owner of casinos and topless bars, swindler, and world class philanderer, is actually a devout Christian. You read that correctly – this work of fiction actually asserts Trump is a man of God.
There is one good thing, however, that has come from this book, and that is the review of it in the LA Times by Lawrence Downes, titled “Holy Crap – The ‘Godly Side of Donald Trump’ which contains some very meaningful insights about the book. A few of his better quotes:
“And you think, as you wade into the text, these poor hacks. This is going to be bad. And it is. As Noah built a mighty ark, so have Brody and Lamb built their vessel, broad and beamy and loaded with what smells like 40 days’ and nights’ manure in the bilge.”
“In other words, this president has a godliness that is unspoken and invisible and cannot easily be detected in — what do you call that thing? — his life. This is Christian homeopathy. It makes possible all kinds of miraculous pronouncements and mind-bending conclusions.”
and this little tidbit,
“Decency, honesty, charity, humility: Who cares if the president does not manifest these things in what he says or does? Never mind the Lord’s commandments, like the ones forbidding idolatry, bearing false witness and moving on thy neighbor’s wife like a bitch.”
Unlike the actual book, this review is a great read, highly recommended. I’m dubbing it Best Book Review Ever.
That review is a thing of BEAUTY! Two thumbs up!
1@Deb, maybe Lawrence Downes will get a movie deal!
2RE: “moving on thy neighbor’s wife like a bitch” from the review and referenced above by Jefe..
Consider that quote stolen. patrons hereabouts WILL see that quote again, more or less attributed properly, and surrounded by a rant.
3Donald Trump is a godly man so long as the god is Mammon. Likewise most of his administration, the Gang of Four Numbskulls on the Supreme Court, and the GOP in Congress.
4I think I’ve got a new favorite panning review. It gives Dorothy Parker’s review of Aimee Semple McPherson’s autobiography, “In the Service of the King” a good run for its money, and overall wins, though some of Parker’s gibes hit harder.
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1928/02/25/our-lady-of-the-loud-speaker
5That review was a damned good read.
This partial quote is pretty good, describing a state in which I find myself getting magnetically pulled into whenever I read or see on TV the assortment of RWNJ’s who dominate our ‘media’ (KA Conway and her ilk especially):
“…where my vision blurred and I felt an unseen force trying to make my brain go stupid.”.
And if his last sentence should come to pass, good ol’ Lucifer hisself is going to have to build a damn huuge addition onto Hell itself, a special ‘Hellacious Reading Room’ to hold all those millions of Talibangelikkkals and fake Xtians:
6“And for the worst of the holy hypocrites, those who abused and distorted the Gospel for the most nakedly profane reasons — worldly power and sycophancy to Donald J. Trump — perhaps the Lord in his mercy will find a way to slip them this book, so they will have something to read in Hell.
Lawrence Downes is a writer and editor in New York.”
I am of the age that when I do air travel I still look for the airport bookstores — what few of them still exist. All the youngsters (say 45 or less) have their portable electronic devices and that is all they will ever want.
But when you do find a “book store” which is really more in the nature of a pumped up magazine stand you can pretty much be guaranteed to be presented with paper bilge of this type. Almost aways they are on the concourse-facing table in proud display.
Somebody must be buying this crap. Retail space at the airport isn’t exactly free.
7“Christian homeopathy” is definitely going into my list of useful phrases. Likewise, “homeopathic christian”: someone who’s perhaps seen Christianity, but won’t get near enough to let any rub off.
8This is just a brilliant review. I love “Christian homeopathy” too.
From Wikipedia: “The preparations are manufactured using a process of homeopathic dilution, in which a chosen substance is repeatedly diluted in alcohol or distilled water, each time with the containing vessel being bashed against an elastic material, commonly a leather-bound book. Dilution typically continues well past the point where no molecules of the original substance remain.”
As for the authors of the book, perhaps they diluted Trump’s decidedly un-Christian lifestyle many times by bashing it against a leather-bound Bible until there were no discernible molecules left. And then they swallowed it.
9What bugs me is that this kind of book gets classified by Half Price Books as Political Science. I have complained but it has not changed.
10Soon to be jostling for position next to anything by Sarah Palin in the back corner of say, a store for remainders of remainders. Closer to the dumpster.
11Linda Phipps, when literary trash like these tomes get remaindered out for a buck or less, their pages make real good kindling for the fireplace.
12“this president has a godliness that is unspoken and invisible and cannot easily be detected”
The Emperor’s new religion. Invisible, but some people are willing to describe how great it is, over 375 pages.
13Nominate Lawrence Downes for a Pulizer!
14A thing of beauty.
15Wonderful review of a crap book.
I confess to having gagged while reading a poisonous little piece by David Brody describing his opus. Thank you, El Jefe, for directing me to the perfect antidote. Best brutally honest book review ever!
16He must be the wingnuts second coming of Christ cuz nobody does Armageddon better then Trump. Bigly.
17Christian homeopathy? That’s good. That’s real good. I gotta remember that because a time will come when I’ll have a chance to use it.
18Christian homeopathy sounds a lot like Christian charity.
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