Dark side - BookWyrm

392 pages

English language

Published May 2, 2008 by Doubleday.

ISBN:: 978-0-385-52639-5
OCLC Number:: 229309144

(4 reviews)

In the days immediately following September 11th, the most powerful people in the country were panic-stricken. Radical decisions about how to combat terrorists and strengthen national security were made in a state of chaos and fear, but the key players, Vice President Cheney and his powerful, secretive adviser David Addington, used the crisis to further a long-held agenda to enhance presidential powers to a degree never known in U.S. history, and obliterate Constitutional protections that define the very essence of the American experiment. This is a dramatic account of how the United States made terrible decisions in the pursuit of terrorists around the world--decisions that not only violated the Constitution, but also hampered the pursuit of Al Qaeda. Whatever the short-term gains, there were incalculable losses in terms of moral standing, our country's place in the world, and its sense of itself.--From publisher description.

1 edition

Jonathan Arnold reviewed Dark side by Jane Mayer

Review of 'Dark side' on 'Goodreads'

3 stars

A painful book to read, much like all the other ones documenting the abuses of power as the Bush Administration and the Dark Cheney rid roughshod over the Constitution. Once again, like many of these, I had to stopped reading to avoid going crazy.

That being said, for a National Book award nominee, I thought the writing was a little scattershot, with all kinds of offshoots as the paragraphs went along. A little hard to follow. It seemed like if there was an interesting idea, off she went to talk about it. If I could, I probably would have rated it 3.5 stars. A good, even necessary book, but one that was too painful to read in more ways than one.