What It Takes: The Way to the White House

by Richard Ben Cramer Narrated by Keith Sellon-Wright

Overview

An American Iliad in the guise of contemporary political reportage, What It Takes penetrates the mystery at the heart of all presidential campaigns: How do presumably ordinary people acquire that mixture of ambition, stamina, and pure shamelessness that makes a true candidate? As he recounts the frenzied course of the 1988 presidential race-and scours the psyches of contenders from George Bush and Robert Dole to Michael Dukakis and Gary Hart-Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Richard Ben Cramer comes up with the answers, in a book that is vast, exhaustively researched, exhilarating, and sometimes appalling in its revelations.

Editorial Reviews

NOVEMBER 2020 - AudioFile

Originally published in 1992, Cramer’s lengthy, well-researched examination of the 1988 U.S. presidential election may speak of years gone by—but the inclusion of President-Elect Joe Biden makes it quite current. Sadly, Keith Sellon-Wright’s workmanlike performance does little to take the facts and commentary beyond the pedestrian. Much of the audiobook addresses the early lives and political careers of the Democratic and Republican primary contenders of that year, and of the ultimate race for the highest office in the land. Sellon-Wright’s narration, despite being friendly, mellow, and well measured, does not even approach the drama one might expect of its peeks into what we used to call “smoky back rooms.” W.A.G. © AudioFile 2020, Portland, Maine

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

Cramer's compulsively readable chronicle of the 1988 presidential campaign, a BOMC featured selection and a one-week PW bestseller in cloth, focuses on six contenders--Bush and Dole among the Republicans, and Democrats Hart, Biden, Gephardt and Dukakis--bringing them to life with detailed descriptions and well-crafted interior monologues. (June)

Library Journal

Defying political logic, Cramer has written a non sequitur that succeeds. In the midst of the 1992 campaign, why write such an exhaustive scorecard of the presidential candidates of 1988? By delving into the lives of these men--George Bush, Robert Dole, Gary Hart, Richard Gephardt, Joseph Biden, and Michael Dukakis--Cramer allows the reader to experience palpably what it feels like to run for president in 1992. The extended biographical sketches are among the finest of the current genre, surpassing his choppier but still satisfying transitional sections on the campaign itself. Dole's recovery from having his arm nearly blown off in World War II is a triumph as powerfully retold as Ron Kovic's story in Born on the Fourth of July (McGraw, 1976). This extended metaphor of surviving and prospering on the mean streets of American politics is recommended for public libraries and emphatically so for large collections. BOMC featured selection; previewed in Prepub Alert, LJ 1/92, and ``On the Campaign Book Trail,'' LJ 3/15/92, p. 110-112.-- Karl Helicher, Upper Merion Twp. Lib., King of Prussia, Pa.

Kirkus Reviews

Irreverent, highly knowledgeable look at the 1988 presidential primaries by Pulitzer-winning journalist Cramer. The author's candidates are tough and clever, driven to a life so complicated by power that ordinary behavior is impossible—as when George Bush, ever eager to please (his intelligence "a silken windsock...so responsive to the currents"), tries to throw a baseball while wearing a bulletproof vest even as his son, bumped from the presidential box by an aide, throws a tantrum. Cramer's images are indelible: Shy, thoughtful Gary Hart, who soon will be destroyed by the press, noticing things that others do not ("The Soviet Union is rotting from within," he's quoted as saying; "...the Cold War rules do not have to apply"). Joe Biden, stutterer, the toughest kid in school somehow now a US senator, climbing into an abandoned DuPont mansion, claiming it for his own, and pouring money into it until friends think he is mad. Down-home Michael Dukakis chasing his cousin around the house with a fish- head, thinking that running the nation can be like running Massachusetts, and never grasping that the limos and other perks of power are essential evidence of major-league behavior. Or the usually well-balanced Richard Gephardt exploding at an overbearing reporter: "Fuck him to death!" But the great achievement of this powerful piece of Americana is its majestic sweep and range, brought into focus by Cramer's ability to fuse telling details into a fierce crescendo of a barbaric marketing process that, he contends, hucksters like Lee Atwater and Roger Ailes use to hoodwink the press (for which the author has little respect: "David Frost, the celebrated English brown-nose").Cramer penetrates media smoke screens as only a media-man can, marching into the psyches of his candidates as boldly as Albert Goldman investigating pop heroes. Exhaustively researched and written in a hot, jarring, unsentimental prose: the perfect antidote to election-year mythologizing.

From the Publisher

"Quite possibly the finest book on presidential politics ever written, combining meticulous reporting and compelling, at times soaringly lyrical, prose." — Cleveland Plain Dealer

"The ultimate insider's book on presidential politics...an unparalleled source book on the 1988 candidates."

— San Francisco Chronicle

NOVEMBER 2020 - AudioFile

Originally published in 1992, Cramer’s lengthy, well-researched examination of the 1988 U.S. presidential election may speak of years gone by—but the inclusion of President-Elect Joe Biden makes it quite current. Sadly, Keith Sellon-Wright’s workmanlike performance does little to take the facts and commentary beyond the pedestrian. Much of the audiobook addresses the early lives and political careers of the Democratic and Republican primary contenders of that year, and of the ultimate race for the highest office in the land. Sellon-Wright’s narration, despite being friendly, mellow, and well measured, does not even approach the drama one might expect of its peeks into what we used to call “smoky back rooms.” W.A.G. © AudioFile 2020, Portland, Maine

Product Details

BN ID:	2940172278648
Publisher:	Tantor Audio
Publication date:	03/31/2020
Edition description:	Unabridged

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