PLAN OF ... SALES (WOODWARD BOOK)

New York Post ^ | 4/21/04 | JOHN PODHORETZ

[kattracks]

April 21, 2004 -- BOB Woodward has misled the nation! In the run-up to the publication of his new book, "Plan of Attack," he sexed up his own intelligence findings! Quick, convene a panel at the Columbia Journalism School!

How did Woodward deceive the audience of "60 Minutes" and the entire press corps? He made people believe "Plan of Attack" rivaled Richard Clarke's bestseller in Bush-bashing - by pulling out a few isolated sentences from the book's endless 465 pages to make it appear as though "Plan" were a startling indictment of the war in Iraq.

[MEG33]

A book that is on the White House site as suggested reading is hardly red meat for the dems.

[kcvl]

So what if he distorted the contents of his own book? He knows perfectly well that nobody actually reads him.

ROFLOL!

[dawn53]

I think the fact that the White House site links to the book is sheer genius.

Absolutely takes all the wind out of the sails of the anti-Bush crowd. Deflates the theory that the Woodward book has "secret" info on the President and his administration that they didn't want the public to know.

What Bush-basher will fork out $30 to buy a book that the White House is recommending, much less take the time to plow through it?

[MEG33]

Strategery in motion..a lovely thing to watch.

[mewzilla]

Betcha libraries, the same folks who bought multiple copies of Hilliary's and Clarke's book but who can't find the time to order anything from Regnery, are the same folks buying most of the copies of Woodward's.

[aardvark1]

I am a book lover. I have an incurable, terminal case of BAS (Book Acquisition Syndrome). A few years ago I joined a book club that specialized in these kinds (political) of tomes. I quit buying them because things change so quickly on the political landscape that they become dust collectors in about a week. Worthless except to those who hole themselves up inside the Beltway tenaciously holding to the belief that that is reality.

[MoralSense]

"Sludge-like prose" really nails it, too. In "All the President's Men," there's actually a jibe from Bernstein about how badly Woodward writes: "as though English is his second language."

[OESY]

It is revealing to compare the rigorous intellectual integrity of Ann Coulter's footnotes in her books to those in Bob Woodward's sludge-bound tomes. Woodward may have inadvertently exposed the myths fostered by the liberal antiwar left about the preparation for war within the Bush administration, but overall Woodward is hardly a credible source. He would do better cavorting again with Deep Throat.