MICK MCSHANE is roused by a band whose socialism laces every line of every song with commitment and raw passion
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Out of the frying pan
PAUL DONOVAN assesses an insider account of recent and future US foreign policy
IN THE KNOW: Bob Woodward with governor Wes Moore at the Prince George's County Chamber of Commerce gala, October 2023. Moore is Maryland’s first Black governor in its 246-year history, and the third African American elected governor in the history of the US
New releases from Mountain, Soul Asylum and Michael McDermott
ALEX HALL is disgusted by the misuse of ‘emotional narratives’ to justify uninformed geo-political prejudice
SUE TURNER welcomes a thoughtful, engaging book that lays bare the economic realities of global waste management
JOHN GREEN welcomes an insider account of the achievements and failures of the transition to democracy in Portugal
SIMON PARSONS applauds an imaginative and absorbing updating of Strindberg’s classic
PETER MASON is enthralled by an assembly of objects, ancient and modern, that have lain in the mud of London’s river
War
Bob Woodward, Simon & Schuster, £25
THIS is a fascinating, though rather frightening book from former Washington Post journalist Bob Woodward. The fright value has markedly increased since the publication of the book and the election of Donald Trump to serve a second term as US president.
An Establishment journalist, Woodward had a ring-side seat in the Biden White House as it sought to navigate a path through Russia’s war in Ukraine, and then the hostilities in the Middle East following the October 7 attacks in Israel. Interestingly, most sections on what is going on in the White House are then followed by Trump’s take on the situation.
Biden is shown to be a fairly astute operator, born of a long career at the top of US politics. He is determined not to be pushed around by his own military chiefs, seeing how predecessors in the Oval Office have been to ill-effect. Most notable in this respect was president Barack Obama’s decision in 2011 to send another 30,000 troops into Afghanistan, at the behest of the military.
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