Dave Barry Hits Below the Beltway : A Vicious and Unprovoked Attack on Our Most Cherished Political Institutions

http://nhw.livejournal.com/313691.html

Dave Barry is one of the funniest writers in the English language, but he is best at the length of his newspaper columns - his one novel, Big Trouble, is surprisingly flat. I did like his book on American history, Dave Barry Slept Here. This book, nominally about Washington DC and the US political system, contains some beautiful laugh out loud moments and some bits that are less memorable. One passage that stood out for me was his description of losing Democratic candidates, especially 1988's Michael Dukakis:

Dukakis was an intelligent man, but he was also a man who had essentially the same range of facial expressions as an iguana. He did not fire up audiences. When he was speaking, the audience show more expected that at any moment his tongue would come flicking out and snag a passing insect.

For those of us who remember those days, it all seems too true.

The best chapter, though, is the one on South Florida and why the rest of the US should expel it from the Union. Here his humour boils over into sæva indignatio, and is all the better for it. Not quite worth the price I paid for it but fun all the same. show less

Right up there with Wodehouse as a guaranteed mood lifter. Do not read with food; you might asphyxiate in a fit of hysteria. And bear in mind that "piracy on the low seas is ok" in the Barry Constitution. . .oh, that did it. I can't. . .

This is a snarky book about a whole cloud of things. It starts with the United States government, but it meanders from there into U.S. History, Florida, and concludes with a recounting of the drama surrounding the 2000 election. At no point is this book serious. It's basically just a serious of comedic observation organized around a central theme.

Dave Barry takes on the political process, from Early Human Governments to Florida in the 2000 election, never once losing sight of the role of the Giant Prehistoric Zucchini.

Although I am normally a big fan of Dave Barry, his style doesn't quite do it for me in this book. I enjoyed the chapter on south Florida, but the rest of it lacks specifics, seems too easy, and falls flat.

Barry is silly as ever in this send-up of American politics, but his running gags fall a bit flat and his long section on South Florida politics is off the mark.

Dave Barry does it again! A great look at the humor of politics.