Confronting the Presidents: No Spin Assessments from Washington to Biden

by Bill O'Reilly, Martin Dugard

Overview

Notes From Your Bookseller

Bestselling authors Bill O’Reilly and Martin Dugard delve into the hallowed halls of the White House, uncovering never before seen information on each leader of our country, one president at a time.

Instant #1 New York Times and USA Today nonfiction bestseller!

Every American president, from Washington to Biden: Their lives, policies, foibles, and legacies, assessed with clear-eyed authority and wit.

Authors of the acclaimed Killing books, the #1 bestselling narrative history series in the world, Bill O’Reilly and Martin Dugard begin a new direction with Confronting the Presidents.

From Washington to Jefferson, Lincoln to Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Kennedy to Nixon, Reagan to Obama and Biden, the 45 United States presidents have left lasting impacts on our nation. Some of their legacies continue today, some are justly forgotten, and some have changed as America has changed. Whether famous, infamous, or obscure, all the presidents shaped our nation in unexpected ways.

The authors' extensive research has uncovered never before seen historical facts based on private correspondence and newly discovered documentation, such as George Washington's troubled relationship with his mother.

In Confronting the Presidents, O’Reilly and Dugard present 45 wonderfully entertaining and insightful portraits of each president, with no-spin commentary on their achievements—or lack thereof. Who best served America, and who undermined the founding ideals? Who were the first ladies, and what were their surprising roles in making history? Which presidents were the best, which the worst, and which didn’t have much impact? How do decisions made in one era, under the pressure of particular circumstances, still resonate today? And what do presidents like to eat, drink, and do when they aren’t working—or even sometimes when they are?

These and many more questions are answered in each fascinating chapter of Confronting the Presidents. Written with O’Reilly and Dugard’s signature style, authority, and eye for telling detail, Confronting the Presidents will delight all readers of history, politics, and current affairs, especially during the 2024 election season.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781250346414
Publisher:	St. Martin's Publishing Group
Publication date:	09/10/2024
Pages:	432
Sales rank:	124
Product dimensions:	6.50(w) x 9.30(h) x 1.20(d)

About the Author

BILL O'REILLY is a trailblazing TV journalist who has experienced unprecedented success on cable news and in writing eighteen national number-one bestselling nonfiction books. There are more than eighteen million books in the Killing series in print. He lives on Long Island.

MARTIN DUGARD is the New York Times bestselling author of several books of history, among them the Killing series, Into Africa, and Taking Paris. He and his wife live in Southern California.

Editorial Reviews

2024-08-02
A shallow dive into the POTUS pool.

George Washington enjoyed snacking on “nuts, cheese, and bread.” Omnivorous Bill Clinton “openly admits a fondness for enchiladas and jalapeño cheeseburgers.” Thomas Jefferson “prefers a great assortment of vegetables with a small portion of meat.” Of Trump’s devotion to hamberders we learn nothing, but George Bush dug a lunchtime BLT, Barack Obama a breakfast of “eggs, potatoes, and wheat toast,” Abraham Lincoln a hard-boiled egg, Richard Nixon “cottage cheese doused in ketchup.” For a book not explicitly called “Favorite Foods of the Presidents,” there’s a lot of attention to our leaders’ culinary leanings. Apart from that, fallen Fox News star O’Reilly and sidekick Dugard skim over the presidents’ histories for a few pages apiece, always taking care to state the well known: “Harry S. Truman has no middle name.” “Abraham Lincoln does not live to see the party. Six days earlier [sic], he is shot in the head while watching a play with his wife in a place called Ford’s Theater.” “The safety nets [Franklin] Roosevelt put into place protect vulnerable Americans to this day.” Following these cursory biographies, the authors rank the presidents: Washington and Lincoln were great, and FDR too, even if “he enabled Stalin and the Cold War” (a remark with which historians may differ). Nixon is remembered as corrupt: “That may not be fair, but history often isn’t.” (The possibility that Nixon actually was corrupt is, unsurprisingly, not discussed.) Millard Fillmore was in over his head and “failed to grasp the growing danger America was facing from a slavery-driven insurrection.” And so on.

For those in need of a handy checklist of who was who in the White House, here it is.

Kirkus Reviews