Customer Reviews

Grass Roots: One Year in the Life of the New Hampshire Presidential Primary

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Andi Johnson of Cheshire County, New Hampshire will tell you that NH takes their presidential politics seriously. You will find well educated voters and activists as they work hard to let people know their candidate can beat the other guy best. Dayton follows several local activists during the First in the Nation primary in Cheshire County, NH. You will learn what makes them tick and why they feel they are going to win: who's it gonna be: Senator Paul Simon (D-IL) or former Massachusetts Governor Mike Dukakis against George Bush or Pat Robertson...? Enjoy a good read and learn history in the making.

With all the drama and soap opera theatrics of the Clinton years, its hard to remember just how unusual and downright bizarre the 1988 Presidential election was. Though it didn't feature any serious attempts at impeachment or Wag the Dog style bombings, 1988 was still the year that saw, briefly, the possibility that both parties would nominate preachers for President, the Willie Horton ads (which have been called "racist" so many times that people tend to forget the fact that the only was they became an issue was because Gov. Dukakis saw no problem with allowing a known dangerous felon to have an unsupervised weekend outside of prison), Dan Quayle, and most strangely, the theory that the pairing of robotic Michael Dukakis and blandly corrupt Lloyd Bentsen would somehow lead to memories of Jack Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson. Yeah, it was a strange year from the beginning, as this book clearly proves.

As opposed to other campaign histories, Grass Roots covers only one pivotal event in the campaign -- the New Hamsphire primary (which, even if it wasn't admitted at the time, pretty much sealed the nominations of both Bush and Dukakis). As well, instead of concentrating on all the behind-the-scenes strategizing, Grass Roots focuses on the citizen/activists who spent a year crisscrossing New Hampshire in an effort to bring their candidates to victory. Its a nice change from most campaign histories. Instead of supplying analysis of why certain campaigns failed, author Dayton Duncan instead shows us the gritty details that goes into the campaigns at the ground level and one comes away with both an appreciation of the massive effort it takes to run a succesful political campaign and a better feel for what makes for victory and what dooms a cause for defeat.

Duncan concentrates his narrative on a few individuals such as Doug Kidd, a former directionless man whose devotion to the Rev. Pat Robertson's campaign becomes rather touching and inspirational even if Robertson, himself, hardly strikes one as Presidential. We meet Al Rubega, a down-to-earth conservative whose frustration with the stillborn campaign of Jack Kemp reaches truly tragic heights. On the Democratic side, Dan Burnham faces the agony of watching Bruce Babbitt crash and burn as a result of the candidate's lack of charisma while veteran activist Andi Johnson helplessly watches as both Gary Hart and Joe Biden self-destruct in scandal before finally hooking up with the far more honest but just as doomed Paul Simon. Along with these stories, we get insightful views of various Presidential long-shots doing their best to make a name for themselves -- Duncan's account of a day in the life of Republican Pete Du Pont and his attempts to campaign as a common man (let's just say that juggling is involved) are especially funny and strangely sad. All in all, it makes for inspiring reading as both a political history and an account of human drama.

Duncan, it should be said, is admirably upfront about his own political leanings. He is a Democrat and, after the primary, even worked as a press secretary to the Dukakis campaign. So, what is amazing, is that this partisan has managed to write a truly nonbiased account of one of the most partisan presidential elections in recent history. As opposed to so-called objective journalists (Jack Germond and Jules Whitcover, I'm looking in your direction), Duncan treats all the candidates and their campaigns fairly and, even when writing about the Republicans that he surely disagrees with, Duncan never resorts to easy stereotypes. Everyone is allowed to present their case and everyone is treated with respect. What a concept!

Every post-election year, it seems that we are flooded with books that claim to give an inside account of the previous election and usually they dissapoint by either engaging in the pompous rhetoric of Teddy White's later books or the surly partisan grumpiness that seems to have afflicted Germond and Whitcover (who always seemed to be saying, "How could the rest of you vote differently from us!?") Duncan's book, however, reminds us why so many people have devoted their lives to politics. It reminds us that politics -- even today -- can still be an exhilirating way for a citizen to make his voice heard. And for that -- as well as giving as a wonderful record of really weird election -- he is to be commended and his book treasured.