Hill Rat: Blowing the Lid Off Congress [Hardcover]

John L. Jackley (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 25, 1992

...a scathing indictment of today's legislature as venal, corrupt, even criminal. --The Wall Street Journal

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

A depressing and infuriating book about the U.S. Congress, this expose by a man who was an aide to three members of the House between 1978 and 1990 shows legislators as vain and self-important, interested only in money and re-election. A Democrat, Jackley began his Hill-rat career in the office of Rep. Thomas Luken of Ohio, whom he depicts as a near-psychotic. He lasted six months, retreated, returned to the Hill in 1981 for a two-year stint with Rep. Jim Mattox of Texas, then joined the staff of Texas Rep. Ronald Coleman, serving as press secretary for seven years. Jackley portrays Coleman as a legislator bored with his job who left the running of his office to his assistants. In his view, very few members of Congress voted on principle; they tried instead to steer a bland middle course as they garnered pay raises and perks and tried to keep the public from finding out about their chicanery. An eye-opener. $75,000 ad/promo.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Kirkus Reviews

Brittle expos‚ of Congress by a former aide to three Democratic congressmen. It's unbelievably nasty on the Hill, says Jackley, who saw the light and left to write this book. According to the author, ``Hill Rats'' (congressional aides) and their employers conspire to lie, steal, cheat, and play games with national policy and finances. Moreover, he says, congressmen are vain and ill-informed, talk dirty, and lavish government money on their offices. But the vicious partisanship that Jackley purports to have left behind seems to run rampant even here. His finger-pointing undermines any sense of considered judgment and suggests that getting even is part of his agenda. Primarily concerned with Democratic perfidy, Jackley ends up offering ammunition to conservatives attacking Congress; and, by default, the Executive and Judicial branches come off well. The author offers no sense of cultural/historical context--the ascendancy of the Executive Branch, the conservative packing of the Supreme Court, the new role of the media. He does occasionally explore a situation in depth (Jim Wright and Texas politics in Washington; election-year shenanigans), but, more often, he simply reels off names, incidents, and accusations in a scattershot flurry of tiny paragraphs tumbling along one after another, helter- skelter. Nor is there any real sense of the man or what inner development led him to abandon his life as a Hill Rat. Jackley remarks of Congressman Ronald Coleman (a former employer) that, after a meeting with President Reagan and several Cabinet members, ``he expressed no sense of history, showed no heightened feelings of gravitas toward great issues.'' The same could be said of the author. -- Copyright ©1992, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 377 pages
• Publisher: Regnery Publishing, Inc.; 1st edition (April 25, 1992)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 089526529X
• ISBN-13: 978-0895265296
• Product Dimensions: 9.4 x 6.3 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #814,593 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars You will never look at your representatives in the same way, September 8, 1996

By A Customer

This review is from: Hill Rat: Blowing the Lid Off Congress (Hardcover)

Jackley recounts his career as a press secretary for various Democratic congressmen during the 1980's. Congressmen are whores for honoraria and junkets from the industries they regulate, CSPAN time, and enough campaign contributions to ensure that they remain among the 96% re-elected. Their staffers, the "Hill rats", are whores for receptions where the lobbyists buy shrimp. Every few pages, you learn about another perk the separates Congress from the rest of us. Maybe it is the IRS opening an office in the Cannon House Office Building to help members and staff prepare their taxes. Or perhaps the Congressionally-funded FAA traffic controller revoking the landing clearance of a commercial jet so that Congressman Ron Coleman (D-TX) wouldn't have to circle. I grew up in Washington, D.C., so I thought that I didn't have anything more to learn about politicians. Jackley's strangely apolitical work casts a very different light on the people we thought we knew.

(note, I wrote more about this on my site, http://photo.net/philg )

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars If You're Interested in Government, Read This, April 18, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Hill Rat: Blowing the Lid Off Congress (Hardcover)

Jackley writes an unsmiling portrait of the modern congressional office. His anecdotes from the Hill feel real and will make you feel ill. Once you read this book, you'll really appreciate why so many people feel disaffected from government.

After having read the book, I saw Jackley on CSPAN. He gave an address where you could write him and said that he would try to answer. I did write him and he did answer -- in longhand!

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Obscuring the message, July 19, 2004

By 

vernon andrews (IL, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Hill Rat: Blowing the Lid Off Congress (Hardcover)

I cannot remember when I last read a book this badly written. After 100 pages of grimly determined reading, I finally gave up. It's a great shame since the author clearly knows a great deal about the machinations on the Hill and exposing some of our leagislators is a hugely important task. His overblown and purple prose style renders the book unreadable, however. Its hard to comment sensibly on the content since it so much obscured by his style. Shame.