Customer Reviews:
Showing reviews 1-5 of 152
 Honest, opinion with facts to back him up January 30, 2010
Joseph (Davenport, Florida U.S.A.)
I like to be to the point. I loved the book, could not put it down once I started to read it. Buy it you won't be disapointed.
 A Great Premise Gone Dreadfully Awry December 19, 2009
William Alexander (Spartanburg, SC)
3 out of 6 found this review helpful
Now that the election is long since over and passions cooler, I found a discount copy of this book and decided to read it. It's not especially long, and it's a quick read.
I open with the disclosure that I have seen Mr. Goldberg on television a few times, and was not favorably impressed by his overall demeanor and what I can only describe as a lack of essential gravitas. Yet, the idiot box can lie, so I thought that perhaps Goldberg's writing would be better. I am sorry to say it was not.
I do not mind people writing works from a partisan point of view. They have their audience, they have their own memes and tropes. And one cannot fault the enterprising author for wanting to make money by catering to a niche market. I mean, that's what has kept the romance industry in the black for decades. But Goldberg's book was a fright for the following reasons.
1) I found many quotes to be distorted out of context and bent to serve an argument that, as the pages wore on, became increasingly shrill and mean-spirited, not to mention so over-generalized I could not make out what he was complaining about half the time.
2) Goldberg tries to sell the old Nixonian "liberal elite - liberal media" "dark other" theory which, in my opinion, has been largely discredited. I never knew who this mysterious "they" was, except for people for whom Goldberg has an obviously personal dislike. I also found his cheerleading for FOX News as some kind of paragon of objectivity laughable for the simple reason that he is a paid contributor for that network, I believe. These kinds of conflicts of interest should, I think, be constantly acknowledged, and, I would assume, make any objectivity very difficult to achieve.
3) The book has been panned, and rightly, by many who found it glib and shady, some of its claims dubious and unsubstantiated by objective and logical facts. I have to agree with those harsh appraisals. In other words, Goldberg, when he is not yelling, is really insufferably snarky in tone, and he comes off sounding a bit like a bitter old "crank." That makes any book hard to read. This is not analysis. This is - again - Bernie Goldberg complaining about people who have run afoul of him in some way. There is indeed a kind of a general "Perez Hilton" kind of feel to the prose that does not serve the narrative well.
But here is why I was really disappointed. Goldberg, in spite of his axes to grind and generally unpleasant television persona, has been an industry "insider," if only a minor player, for years. And I think he has a great point about media image being used to sell candidates, and he did indeed make a few really interesting observations about how some in the media behaved towards candidates during the last election. I would love for him, then, to abandon his partisan hat and write a book about how media, especially cable television, has evolved as a tool in American politics since its introduction. True, there are many, many books out there which do exactly that, but I would think his background would give him useful insights not readily accessible to more academicmally-oriented writers. It would also compel him to be as objective as possible. And I think he is capable of this, although perhaps unwilling.
Apart from content, I note that the production values of the copy I had left a lot to be desired. Cheap binding and cheap paper. Not worth the full dust jacket price, certainly. If you wish to buy this book, I urge a used copy.
It's a bad footnote to an interesting chapter in American history, sensationalist, hyper-partisan, badly researched, and sloppy red meat for a niche audience. And with credibility so fundamentally at issue as I mentioned, it's a book I just cannot take seriously on any level. And, as I mentioned too, that's a shame because I think he has an interesting core hypothesis that gets left out in the rain.
No recommendation. Instead, I would recommend a documentary about the MTV years called "The Merchants of Cool." A fantastic look at entertainment media that does a much better job of outlining what Goldberg frets over, and without the politics!
No recommendation.
Eagerly Awaiting Katie Couric's Candid Revelations December 13, 2009
David Petrie (St. Louis, MO. USA)
1 out of 2 found this review helpful
When Katie Couric eventually sits down to pen her autobiography, I suspect that she will reveal that she was beset by that indigenous female medical condition, Pre-Menstral Syndrome, whenever she had the opportunity to interview such Republican luminaries as Bob Dole or Sarah Palin. She will also reveal that if only she had put away her ben-wa when interviewing Barack Obama, she might have asked questions half as tough-minded as those she posed to Sarah Palin.
But in the mean time, we have Mr. Goldberg's book to provide us with insights into the journalistic process. I suspect that it will render her autobiography superfluous.
A very interesting book and a rather alarming read December 4, 2009
Kurt A. Johnson (North-Central Illinois, USA)
2 out of 3 found this review helpful
Bernie Goldberg has been a noted journalist since the mid-1970s, winning many awards including ten Emmies for journalism. In this book, Mr. Goldberg looks at how the mainstream American media has embraced Barack Obama to the point of surrendering their already dwindling stocks of credibility amongst their viewers. Everything is covered in detail, as the media's bias and lack of objectivity is laid bare in excruciating detail.
Overall, I must say that I found this to be a very interesting book, and a rather alarming read. The Founding Fathers of the United States believed that an independent press is necessary to the proper functioning of the government, but this book shows that the press has themselves retreated from independence and have become mouthpieces for certain select people. If you want to see the depths to which the U.S. media has sunk then you must get this book, in which a genuine insider shows you exactly what is going on.
Note: Audio Review - Bernie DIDN'T Narrate His Own Book - Too BAD! November 17, 2009
Tonytoga (Houston, Texas United States)
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
Some authors butcher their work by insisting on narrating the audio version of their work when they have no talent for such.....not so Bernie Goldberg. He's a pro....a ten time Emmy Award winning broadcast correspondent for CBS and a nationally recognized commentator. His book 'Bias' was groundbreaking. In short, he knows what he's doing. Why didin't he do it here? I made the mistake of picking up the audio book without looking to make certain Bernie narrated it (it not occuring to me he wouldn't). His clever writing style practically mandates his narrating the books he writes. He didn't in this case and it ruined the book. No slap at Alan Sklar who provided his usual journeyman's effort as narrator, but it just wasn't the same without Bernie's voice. It's not unlike asking your local librarian to perform aloud Ann Coulter's latest book....it ain't the same.
As for content, the truth is that any reasonably attentive news junkie could have written this book. Bernie really didin't tell me anything here I didin't already know. It was a bit unnerving to hear it chronicled, one example after another, though. The liberal press made a mockery of journalism last year with their wretchingly lopsided coverage of the presidential election. I'm not a Sean Hannity fan, but he was right when he said journalism finally died in 2008. It's unfortunate but with the rise of talk radio and conservative cable TV, the once thinly vaniered objectivism of the mainstream press simply vanished. It is as though the mainstream said, "if they don't need to conceal their conservatism, no need to mask our liberalism." And, boy did they go all out for Obama. The country is much the worse for it.
I very much enjoyed Bernie's first three books: Bias, Arrogance, and 100 Peopole Who Are Screwing Up America, but this one fell well short of those works. Again, it may have had more to do with his not narrating his own work (anything Bill Bryson writes that he doesn't narrate falls flat, too) than anything else. Nevertheless, there was nothing new here. Better luck next time, Bernie.
Showing reviews 1-5 of 152
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