Customer Reviews

How to Rig an Election: Confessions of a Republican Operative

5 star:		(18)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

This book confirms everything you suspected was true about how politicians get elected in the country. It has the tone of a P.J. O'Rourke novel, hilarious and all too real at the same time because it happened. I laughed all the way through it, and then watched Hardball with Chris Matthews in a whole new light once I was done. One reviewer asked "who has ever heard of this guy?" and that is exactly the point! These nameless, faceless operatives and consultants are legion in both political parties and they are the ones who actually decide what candidates say, do, wear, etc. Raymond was a very high level player at the Republican National Committee, chief of staff to a republican congressman and ran numerous campaigns at the national level, he saw it all from the inside and it's not pretty. A great read, I highly recommend.

If you loved the book or movie THANK YOU FOR SMOKING, you'll love this book. I'm a political junky, but i've shared the book with someone who isn't, and he agreed with me this is laugh-out loud funny. For those who read TalkingPoints memo or DailyKos et al, you'll remember this story about New Hampshire phone jamming in the 2004. This book gives you real behind-the-scenes stuff on the political trenches from backwater NJ campaigns to the RNC and the major leagues: presidential politics. Makes you wonder: what's happening in 2008?

This is a colorful, frank, and profane memoir of seamy politics by a pro whose Republican pals threw him under the bus when one of their dirty tricks (and not the dirtiest one in his book) started making some headlines.

If you want to see what the top of the Republican world looks like to an RNC hotshot (and Raymond was picked by the RNC to teach their up-and-comers just how to do business) this book is for you. "If you don't know who the sucker in the room is, it's you." See Karl Rove in a glass cage orchestrating his minions "like Darth Vader in his life-support pod." Hear GWB make the same joke again and again with staffers (and no one else) laughing each time. Observe the surprisingly seamy tactics of DCI Group's Tony Feather and Tom Synhorst.

Allen Raymond spent fifteen years on the Karl Rove side of Republican politics. This book details many stunts more colorful than phone-jamming. Deceptive robocalls to Democrats from "scary black men" or "actors putting on thick Spanish accents" worked wonders at keeping them home on Election Day. Swapping soft money for hard--funneling GOP dollars to "spoiler" Democratic candidates--engineering repeat contributions from donors who had already given their legal limit--Raymond names names and shows how each trick works. During one Superbowl, Allen masterminded a midgame annoying phone call to--maybe you just have to read the book to understand that one.

Probably the biggest reason that GOP insiders want you not to read this book is that it showcases the in-crowd's complete contempt for their supporters -- "the Jesus-loves-guns crowd" -- "the knuckle-draggers, the gunnies, and the committed ideologue nuts." "The mouth-breathers who who decide GOP primaries might allow people to steal their money and send their children to impossible wars but they'll cut no such slack for baby-killers."

Chances are "mouth-breathers" won't read Raymond's book. I hope you will. The Senate Judiciary Committee can't seem to get off the dime to release the much-needed Deceptive Practices and Voter Intimidation Prevention Act so it can get voted on. Maybe this book will help more people see the light about why it is needed.

I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in the upcoming presidential election. It's very funny, candid, and insightful -- a zippy, fascinating read. (For a book about politics, it's a real page-turner!) American voters are manipulated by political campaign strategists during every, single election. We always fall for their dirty tricks. Read the book and learn how it's done. Afterwards you'll question every piece of "news" from every politician's campaign about a rival candidate.

Refreshingly, the author takes full responsibility for the things he did to slime opponents when he was in the dirty tricks business. He did his jail time and doesn't whine about it.

At first you think, "what a self important @&%$#%^. What is with all the name dropping?" Then you see that is the point.

1. He was (and maybe still is) full of himself and that is what led him into trouble. But his arrogance was the norm and his behavior was condoned.

2. The name dropping of who he worked for and the titles he had indicate he was a high level operative. Working for Haley Barbour is a big deal. Being in business with him is an even bigger deal. He is both proud of what he accomplished and ashamed of what he did.

3. But for a few twists of fate he would have continued along his merry way subverting democracy. He is very honest that he was trying to work his way back into the top echelon of the GOP that had been taken over by Bushies.

He avoids the temptation to kitchen sink every wrong doing he had heard of and only talks about dirty tricks he had direct knowledge of.

It is a must read at the cost and you can finish it very quickly. If you are reading it on a coast to coast flight better bring a 2nd book.

If you love inside politics you'll love this book! Look beyond party politics...this is not a pro-Democratic or pro-Republican book...this book condemns the whole system and exposes it for what it is. Extremely funny and oftentimes tragic, Raymond's story is brutally honest. He is the rare insider to come clean and explain in the plain light of day what really goes on behind the scenes no matter what political party or campaign you support. A must-read for political junkies!

I doubt politics will ever again get a behind-the-scenes book like this. Raymond must be really, really angry at the GOP power structure to expose everything he learned from them about campaigning the way he does here. I mean, he is very funny about it all, but still: this is the whole deal about what tricks campaign managers use to get their candidates elected. Push-polling, fake automated calls, manipulating the press, direct mail negative campaigns, etc etc. -- it's truly astonishing, everything you wanted to know but were afraid to ask, because it turns out it's totally as bad as you feared it was. It's very much the "you don't want to see the sausage get made" kind of book.

Except that, in the end, I'd rather see than NOT see. This isn't sausage -- this is our political system, and I'd like to believe it's still the best in the world. But whatever it is, I feel much more empowered knowing how the game is played than being in the dark. In that sense, and probably unintentionally, Raymond has done the public an incredible service with this book.

I do wish it were a little bit longer, with a little more detail about some of the dirty tricks that Raymond wasn't directly a party to. That would really have rounded out the picture. I was less interested in the trick Raymond went to prison for (New Hampshire) than just the general behind-the-scenes information. But I doubt very much we'll ever be let further inside than in this book -- an amazing, brutally honest, smart and funny, stomach-churning ride.

Highly recommended.

This is not a well written book. Raymond should probably have gotten someone else to write it for him. There is too much anger at the Republican Party in the pages, and too much telegraphing, instead of astute foreshadowing. The book is chalk full of hackneyed metaphors and colloquialisms, and has far too much cussing to make this quality literature. If you're going to cuss in writing, you have to be careful. Some writers like Carlos Fuentes can pull it off. But Allen Raymond is no Carlos Fuentes. The book feels like Raymond took his blog and put it into print to make some money.

But this is still a great story. One gets the distinct impression that it will be much better communicated in a film genre than it is in writing. How to Rig an Election is a phenomenal portrait into the slippery slope of evil. Allen Raymond invites us step by step into the hidden underbelly of campaigning. From his first person narrative we gain an appreciation of just how easy it was to convince oneself that what one is doing is permissible, and what is right becomes progressively less important. At first it is small things, part of the political process. But gradually the indiscretions get larger, all the more justified because others are doing it, leaders are teaching it, and frankly, Allen has grown to be an expert in the system, so it therefore must be right. It is horrible to hear how the Republican Party (and to a lesser extent the Democrats) have manipulated the people for their own glory and power. But this is far more a personal story of learning to hate truth, and embrace lies.

Thus the story, if not the writing, becomes truly Shakespearean. Most tragic of all? Though in the introduction Allen indicates he is truly repentant, by the time you reach the end of the novel, you start to realize he is yet, still, gaming the system. And he does not even appear to realize it. The protagonist (the author) has so lost touch with truth and reality that he misinterprets repentance for theatre, and believes everything is now resolved.

C.S. Lewis used to say George MacDonald wasn't the best writer, but he could tell myth like no other. I recommend this book not for the writing, but for the story: a spiritual tragedy of our times.

Although written from the republican perspective, I was surprised at how much I enjoyed this book. He has a firm understanding of how politics really operates and he shares it - no holds barred - with his readers. His great sense of humor also made this an easy read.

Allen Raymond gives us an insider's view of how one has to operate to work up the career ladder of the modern GOP, and it ain't pretty.

If not for the amorality involved, a number of the episodes would be even funnier, with how language is narrowly and lawyerly parsed to claim legality for ethically dubious actions, for example.

Suck-up-itis toward GOP higher-ups combined with various forms of shivving and back-stabbing toward equals is also funny. At the same time, it increases the pressure to produce results, such as what Raymond did.

Also interesting, just as an aside, was his observation about the cliqueishness and status-conscious nature of the Village of insider Washington, such as Congressional chiefs of staff dine only with other chiefs of staff, and not legislative assistants, etc.

The biggest thing I found missing was a bit more on the post-prison Raymond. Is he still a Republican? Independent? Democrat? Is he now apolitical? As someone in a position to know, does he have recommendations on how to further reform the current campaign and campaign finance situation?

Also, although he expressed some degree of regret at his resentencing hearing, how does he feel now, with more hindsight? And, what exactly is he doing with his life and career?

The second biggest thing that's missing, which may align with another reader's impression that this was a bit of a rush job? No index.

Overall, a pretty informative work on the "sausage making" of campaign politics, but could have used some more depth.